Six Ways to Warn Your Child of Adults Asking for Directions
Do you know how to train your child to recognize the “I need directions” lure from pedophiles? (more…)
Will a Bullied Child Attempt Suicide if You Talk About It?
Are you afraid to bring up suicide to your depressed and bullied child out of fear they’ll get the idea to try ending their life?
Some parents, alarmed after reading about yet another victim of bullies who commits suicide, may still be afraid of broaching this topic with their own bullied child.
“It might put the idea in their head,” the parent might think.
But will bringing up the topic of suicide actually encourage a bullied child to carry out this action?
“No! This is an important issue because it has come up so frequently — particularly with cyber bulling,” says Dr. Marilyn Benoit, MD, Chief Clinical Officer and SVP for Clinical & Professional Affairs of Devereux, the largest not-for-profit behavioral healthcare organization in the country. Dr. Benoit has a family practice as a child and adolescent psychiatrist.
“Literature has shown a direct correlation between people who have suffered bullying in silence, and physical health and mental health impairments,” continues Dr. Benoit.
Parents absolutely must discuss suicide with a bullied child.
“Discussing suicide does not make someone want to commit suicide,” says Dr. Benoit.
“It actually does quite the opposite. It offers the child an opportunity to disclose how awful they are feeling — and gives parents the opportunity to let them know that thoughts of suicide are not bad – rather, they are an indicator of what someone is feeling, and that there are ways for the child and family to receive help.”
Be very careful how you tackle this topic, however. There’s the case of the tween boy who complained to his mother how miserable his life was.
She got mad replied, “Oh don’t give me that! You have it so much luckier than most kids, you don’t even KNOW how lucky you have it!
“I bet if you wrote down all the good things in your life and all the bad things in your life, you’d see that all the good things would outnumber all the bad things!”
That last recommendation may actually sound beneficial, but it had been spoken in a demeaning, angry voice.
HOW you sound, not just the words coming out, is very important.
“I do want to bring up the issue that bullying sometimes leads children to feel so awful and so perplexed that they feel that they want to kill themselves,” says Dr. Benoit.
She urges parents to be very open about this troubling topic.
“We need to let them know that it’s okay to talk about these feelings and talk about bullying.
“This will allow families and children to seek the help they need from mental health professionals.”
If your child is being bullied or harassed at school, then next time there’s new news about a bully victim who committed suicide (and unfortunately, there probably will be in the next few months), discuss the case with your son or daughter.
Get them thinking and brainstorming on what the victim could have done instead of ending their life.
Dr. Benoit is past president of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and has provided Congressional testimony on issues including child abuse, teen pregnancy and youth suicide.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
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Top image: Shutterstock/Sascha Burkard
The Best Suicide Prevention Tips for Bullied Kids
Are you scared sick that your bullied child just might attempt suicide?
Every so often there’s a major news break of a teenager or adolescent who committed suicide because they were being bullied. Did their parents see this coming? (more…)
When the School Principal Is the Bully: Advice for Parents
Discipline is one thing, but the principal slammed a non-aggressive student into the lockers, hands around his throat.
The school principal could be the worst bully your child faces!
Yes, sometimes the school bully is the principal. At the high school I attended, the principal fit the definition of bully.
I once witnessed him grab a non-aggressive boy by the throat and shove him up against the lockers.
You can imagine what kind of social skills this full-grown person had with the students.
After I had graduated from college, I learned he’d been fired for being physically aggressive to another student.
Unfortunately, it took that long for something to be done. He knew which kids he could get away with picking on.
People like this instinctively know which students feel powerless, or, to put it another way, which kids have parents who feel powerless or would be too afraid to complain to their parents about the principal.
“Workplace bullies are more common than one might think, especially when they are in positions of power,” says Dr. Marilyn Benoit, MD, Chief Clinical Officer and SVP of Clinical & Professional Affairs of Devereux, the largest not-for-profit behavioral healthcare organization in the country.
Dr. Benoit has a family practice as a child and adolescent psychiatrist.
She points out that even when a parent learns the truth about the school principal, they may be intimidated by this individual’s position of power, and hence, not take strong measures to resolve the situation.
Compounding the problem is if someone’s child is being harassed by classmates or a teacher. If the principal is also a bully, who will go to bat for the young victim?
“Bullying in school is particularly damaging, because in the school hierarchy, students are expected to be respectful and obedient of their teachers and principals,” explains Dr. Benoit.
“So that when principals are the bullies, it affects the entire tenor of the school — morale is low, and the fear of initiating a response to the principal can create a negative environment.”
What can parents do when they find out that the school principal is a bully?
“My best advice is to mobilize other parents for support,” says Dr. Benoit.
“If you create a groundswell of support from parents and the school, you can address the issue in a broader manner and do what you need to do to petition to the school board.
“It’s extremely hard to do it alone and may seem too frightening, especially if you believe your child is at risk.”
Dr. Benoit is past president of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and has provided Congressional testimony on issues including child abuse, teen pregnancy and youth suicide.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
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Top image: Freepik.com/katemangostar
Can Martial Arts Training Help Prevent Child Abductions?
A pedophile will hesitate to go near a child who brims with martial arts training confidence.
With so many children being abducted every year by strangers, it’s certainly reasonable for parents to wonder how effective martial arts training can be at stifling abductions or even preventing attempts at kidnapping.
Master Dan Vigil of Dan Vigil’s Academy of Taekwondo in Northville, MI, knows something about childhood bullying.
Vigil was the victim of bullies himself — not one bully here and there, but many classmates on an ongoing basis — and only when he discovered martial arts was he able to reverse the bullying (without physical aggression) and develop healthy self-esteem.
First of all, this article isn’t about how to teach an 8-year-old how to kick a 170-pound man flat on his back.
Of course, a predator can be scared off by the size of the fight in a child, as was the case with David Moore, 39, who tried to abduct a 4-year-old in the presence of the child’s 7-year-old cousin.
The 7-year-old, A’Nari Taylor, wasted no time pulling, kicking and hand chopping at the man, who eventually gave up and ran off (and was later apprehended).
The girl had never before taken martial arts lessons, but had been expressing a desire to prior to the abduction attempt.
“Child abductors, in most cases, are looking for easy victims,” says Vigil. “All children, regardless of age and gender, can be taught how to recognize a dangerous adult. We teach kids there are certain things no adult would ever ask a child to do.”
And some examples of that are:
-Helping find a lost puppy or kitten
-Helping load something in or out of a car
-Give directions
-Enter a van to pose for photos for a “modeling scout”
Vigil explains, “If children learn to avoid these lures, it can go a long way toward anti-abduction.”
Martial arts teaches so much more than kicking and hand-strike techniques. Kids (and adults) are taught to be more aware of their surroundings.
Freepik.com, master1305
The development of the physical skills carries over to gait pattern when walking on a sidewalk. Predators aren’t looking for kids who walk with confidence or who possess what appears to be a high degree of awareness.
“Finally, we teach them how to fight back and make a lot of noise doing it,” says Vigil.
Though it’s not likely that a young child can knock an adult to the ground, they can be taught to deliver techniques that temporarily halt the predator, giving the intended victim a chance to bolt.
Older kids, indeed, can develop sufficient prowess to drop their attacker.
Children need not be in the martial arts for years and years to develop enough skills to deflect an abduction attempt.
Martial arts, like Vigil says, teaches students to make noise and carry themselves with confidence, making predators assume that they are anything but easy targets.
“Everything is aimed at the child not being an easy target and thereby avoiding an attempt altogether,” says Vigil.
A high quality martial arts program will engage children in role-playing with make-believe abductors, buffing up the student’s skill at verbally deflecting a kidnapping attempt.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
Master Daniel B. Vigil
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Source: miamiherald.com/2013/02/25/3253700/miami-girl-who-saves-cousin-from.html Can Martial Arts Training Help Prevent Child Abductions?
Do All School Bullies Learn Mean Behavior from Parents?
Should you assume that a bully has parents who bully him or her?
Just what kind of parents do youth bullies typically have in the first place?
Do parents of bullies bully their kid?
“This is actually a common misnomer,” says Rona Novick, PhD, who developed the BRAVE bully prevention program.
A clinical psychologist, Novick has worked with schools nationally on the issue of bullying, and is director of the Fanya Gottesfeld Heller Doctoral Program at Yeshiva University, NY.
“Children who are abused by their parents rarely bully others – abused children are usually timid and fearful,” continues Dr. Novick.
“While many abusing adults were, in fact, abused as children,” adds Dr. Novick, “during their vulnerable childhood years, abused children usually appear timid and fearful.”
However, Dr. Novick notes that there actually is some research that finds that parents of bullies may use more authoritarian styles of discipline.
“What is more likely, is that children who bully have witnessed their parents use bullying tactics on others.
“They may see Mom or Dad abuse their power to get their way with waiters, dry cleaners, teachers, neighbors, or other family members.”
Is your child a bully? Can’t figure out why?
Ask yourself how you respond to solicitors at your doorstep or telemarketers on the phone, and if your kids have witnessed your behavior.
Dr. Novick also points out that the child, who’s a bully at school, may witness their father bully around their mother, or vice versa.
Yes, sometimes the family bully is the woman of the house. And bullying doesn’t have to be physical. Words can strike as hard as a fist.
When parents bully each other, this sends the message that this behavior is acceptable and even a recommended way to solve problems and obtain goals.
“A more subtle way parents ‘teach’ children that bullying is acceptable is their response to it when they see it,” continues Dr. Novick.
“When parents see an older sibling bully the younger one, and do nothing, they communicate that bullying is not a problem.
“When parents see/hear/learn that their child has used their power to hurt another and they do not communicate their disapproval, children assume they approve.”
Have you ever seen parents throw a temper tantrum in an store when they couldn’t return merchandise, and in the shopping cart is a preschooler following the situation with big eyes?
That may be your future high school bully.
Dr. Novick is recognized for her expertise in behavior management and child behavior therapy. She has published scholarly articles on school applications of behavior management, children and trauma, and bully prevention in schools.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
Can Tons of Cardio EVER Cause Lots of Weight Loss?
Is there a way you can lose lots of weight with lots of cardio exercise?
Have you read that cardio won’t cut it for weight loss? How MUCH cardio must you do to lose all the weight you want?
Well, in good theory, if you walked five hours a day nonstop at 3 mph, you’d lose weight.
Or if you jogged nonstop two hours a day at 6 mph, you’d lose weight.
You’d lose all the weight you want with only cardio if you wanted to lose only 10 pounds, too. But what if you’re fat?
Maybe you’ve already been doing what seems like tons of cardio and have lost only a few pounds–not the amount that you should have lost after all this time and all that effort.
And what’s with marathon runners being so thin, with all that running they do?
Though most people who desperately want to lose large amounts of weight would like to trade their body in for that of a marathon runner’s, ask yourself if you truly, genuinely want the build of a competitive marathon runner: gaunt, frail looking?
Yes, lots of cardio, in the form of hard marathon training, over time will cause weight loss, but we also must assume that most competitive marathon runners were never fat!
Many began running in high school when they were already thin.
But there are marathon runners who used to be overweight. Losing weight with lots of running is a painful way to do it–you have to really love running to commit to this plan.
Are you willing to run dozens of miles a week at a hard pace?
When I was a personal trainer I never told my clients that the secret to losing lots of weight is to do tons of cardio. Never.
Instead, I preached high intensity interval training (HIIT).
High intensity interval training yields a spectacular hormonal response that culminates in a fat-burning response like you’ve never had before.
Why can’t you lose weight despite tons and tons of cardio exercise?
Because long duration, or steady state aerobics, absolutely fails to incite this hormonal response. Hormones control metabolism and fat-burning; we can manipulate those hormones through exercise!
You need not spend hours and hours killing your feet doing cardio, running, jogging, stepping and pedaling to burn stubborn body fat.
High intensity interval training will strip body fat with sessions as short as 20 minutes.
Forget about tons of cardio for weight loss unless you love to run for endless amounts of time.
Lorra Garrick is a former personal trainer certified through the American Council on Exercise. At Bally Total Fitness she trained women and men of all ages for fat loss, muscle building, fitness and improved health.
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Top image: Freepik.com master1305
How to Do HIIT if You’re Fat: Do Not Let Size Stop You
Here’s a guide for fat people who want to do HIIT: high intensity interval training.
Yes, fat people can do HIIT safely and lose tons of weight this way.
When I was a personal trainer I’d have my very plus-size clients doing HIIT.
There is no medical reason why a clinically healthy overweight person cannot or should not do high intensity interval training (HIIT).
Though HIIT is often applied to very fast running (sprinting), this doesn’t mean that running is the only way to perform this super fat-burning type of workout.
When it comes to high intensity interval training, it’s all about effort, not performance or speed.
Thus, a good HIIT workout for someone who’s very overweight could be simply walking as fast as possible up a slight street hill, then turning around and slowly walking back to the starting point to recover, then walking as fast as they can back up that hill.
This will be enough to really exhaust them, even though running or high speeds are not involved.
More Options
Overweight individuals who hate the idea of having to walk as fast as possible can do high intensity interval training on a stationary bike or elliptical trainer.
Shutterstock/Nomad_Soul
This means pedaling as fast as possible for 30 seconds, then pedaling nice and easy for 1-2 minutes before blasting out another 30 seconds.
The 30 seconds can be based purely on pedaling speed with a light pedal tension, or, you can increase pedal tension and work as much as possible against the tension – this would not be your fastest pedaling in the absolute sense, but it would be your fastest against that particular tension setting.
The bottom line is that the settings for that 30 second segment are such that 30 seconds leaves you nearly breathless.
Additional HIIT Modes
- Cardio rowing machine
- Stepping platform (very low height)
- Marching in place while holding small dumbbells
- Stair climbing
Safety of HIIT for Fat Men and Women
If you’re overweight and concerned about the safety of high intensity interval training on your heart, you should get a thorough evaluation by a cardiologist which includes a cardiac stress test.
If an overweight person is worried about their joints, then they can do high intensity interval training on a stationary bike, elliptical machine or revolving staircase, which provide low impact to the knees and lower back.
By definition, HIIT is very intense, so intense that you can’t exceed 30 or so seconds for each work interval.
What can be done in water such that, after 30 seconds, it’s impossible to continue? Hardcore lap swimming.
If an overweight person can swim with grueling intensity, then they should do this for HIIT.
However, simply walking in the pool holding Styrofoam “dumbbells” is not intense enough to qualify as HIIT.
Remember, this article is about high intensity interval training, not just any movement.
An overweight person can safely perform high intensity interval training by walking inclines, as this, too, produces minimal impact.
However, if you hold onto a treadmill while walking, this will cancel out the incline as well as the general effect of walking, and you’ll end up getting no results and likely bad “molding” of your spine. Swing your arms instead.
WRONG. Continuous holding onto a treadmill will not trigger fat loss, nor will it produce a difference in fitness and stamina in daily living where you don’t hang onto anything while walking.
HIIT is very doable for very plus-size men and women of all ages.
Lorra Garrick is a former personal trainer certified through the American Council on Exercise. At Bally Total Fitness she trained women and men of all ages for fat loss, muscle building, fitness and improved health.
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Top image: Shutterstock/ MarcusVDT
How to Do HIIT on the Stair Climber
If you normally use the stair climber for your cardio training, why not do high intensity interval training on this equipment?
I must admit, I’ve never seen anybody do high intensity interval training (HIIT) on the stair climber–other than some of my personal-training clients when I was a trainer some years ago.
Of course, I myself have done HIIT on the stair climber (revolving staircase).
To get in an effective HIIT routine on the stair climber, you must first get used to the idea of using the stair climber without hanging onto it.
I don’t know why people feel they must clutch the rails. If you were to work out on the staircase of a high rise, or an outdoor staircase like those at the Mother Cabrini Shrine in Golden, Colorado, you wouldn’t hang onto anything.
The purpose of high intensity interval training for many people is to burn as much fat as possible.
Holding onto the stair climber will suppress the burning of at least 20 percent of the calories that you’d burn without holding on.
The work segments of high intensity interval training must be brutal for maximal fat-burning following the exercise (the after-burn effect).
Holding onto the stair climber rails will prevent this optimization of fat-burning. So start slowly without using the rails and get used to this.
For high intensity interval training on the stair climber, each work segment lasts 30 seconds, which you can easily track on the machine’s clock.
Simply bring up the stepping speed to a pace that’s difficult to maintain, and go for 30 seconds. At the end of 30 seconds, bring the speed back down to a slow climb.
If you need to hold onto the rail to bring the speed down (because by then you should be heavily fatigued), then do so, but only to adjust the speed.
How fast should HIIT on stair climber be?
Experiment by increasing the speed a bit more with each work segment. So if the stair climber goes up to level 20, try level 10 for 30 seconds.
If that wasn’t maximal output, then for the next segment, see how level 13 feels like, and so on, until you find the level that you can barely sustain for about 30 seconds, after which you are absolutely utterly breathless.
This will be level 16 for some people, 18 for others, and for the fittest, level 20.
Remember, you are not – I repeat – not to hang onto the rails! At some point in the increasing of the speed, you will find that it’s not possible to walk the steps, but rather, it’s necessary to trot or “run” them. You’ll worry that you’ll stumble and fall if you don’t hold on.
This is why it’s important to practice hands-free with slower speeds first, and get used to this, before attempting it at fast speeds.
Trotting hands-free is not Olympic-level athleticism, so don’t underestimate yourself.
I’m telling you, hands-free at level 20 on the stair climber is furious high intensity interval training and will smoke the fat right out of your body!
Lorra Garrick is a former personal trainer certified through the American Council on Exercise. At Bally Total Fitness she trained women and men of all ages for fat loss, muscle building, fitness and improved health.
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Top image: Shutterstock/Jovan Barajevac
Can Parents Make Their Child Immune to Bullying?
How do you define “bully-proofing” your child?
There are things you can do that will help prevent your child from becoming that tortured person who eventually attempts suicide.
There’s a lot out there on “bully-proofing” your children. But is it possible?
“There is no such thing as a bully-proof child,” says Rona Novick, PhD, who developed the BRAVE bully prevention program.
A clinical psychologist, Novick has worked with schools nationally on the issue of bullying, and is director of the Fanya Gottesfeld Heller Doctoral Program at Yeshiva University, NY.
“Bullying is so common, virtually all children will experience it at some point in their school career (current research suggests rates over 90%).”
Be aware that there are different levels of bullying; bullying is on a continuum.
Some kids are bullied only within their circle of friends, while others are the individuals whom “everyone picks on.”
And interestingly, some victims even become friends with their bullies eventually.
“In addition, since bullies tend to target victims who react emotionally, and since emotional reactivity is largely a factor of temperament and biological, parents can’t change a reactive child into a cool cucumber,” explains Dr. Novick.
The term “bully-proof,” then, can simply mean doing what you can, as a caring parent, to minimize the risk of bullying.
And this begins by supporting a child’s social development, says Dr. Novick. Being more alone, she says, puts a young person at higher risk of being bullied.
Parents must help their children make and keep friends. However, this can’t be forced any more than you, as an adult, can be forced to feel genuine kinship with a coworker whom you don’t care for.
Lead and encourage, but don’t force play dates or other unwanted interactions.
Another group of individuals who are highly vulnerable to being harassed at school are those with cross-gender behavior or same-gender attraction.
Tomboys, effeminate boys, and gay-lesbian, transgender and questioning-youth are very vulnerable to bullying and also benefit from parental support, explains Dr. Novick.
Thus, if parents have noted that a child doesn’t seem to be snuggly fitting into society’s expectations of their gender, parents need to show unconditional love and avoid criticizing their son or daughter.
This non-judgmental approach can go a long way in “bully proofing” a child.
