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Take a deep breath, expanding your belly. Pause. Exhale slowly to the count of five. Repeat four times. Congratulations. You’ve just calmed your nervous system. Controlled breathing, like what you just practiced, has been shown to reduce stress, increase alertness and boost your immune system. For centuries yogis have used breath control, or pranayama, to promote concentration and improve vitality. Buddha advocated breath-meditation as a way to reach enlightenment. Science is just beginning...

Erik Vance didn't go to a doctor until he was 18; he grew up in California in a family that practiced Christian Science. "For the first half of my life, I never questioned the power of God to heal me," Vance writes in his new book, Suggestible You : Placebos, False Memories, Hypnosis, and the Power of Your Astonishing Brain. As a young man, Vance left the faith behind, but as he became a science journalist he didn't stop thinking about how people's beliefs and expectations affect their...

In Greensboro, N.C., Eyeisha Holt spends her days as a full-time child care worker at Head Start. But after a decade's work in early education she still earns only $11.50 an hour — barely enough, she says, to cover the basics as a single mom of two. So every weekday evening she heads to her second job, as a babysitter. "Are you ready to go to bed?" she asks, as she oversees bath time for her 3-year-old daughter and another of her charges. For 25 hours a week, Holt cares for toddler twins, in...

Legislation called cutting edge by national experts on juvenile justice reform has been unanimously passed by the Council of the District of Columbia. “We looked at best practices from across the country and really pulled together what we think is going to transform our juvenile justice system,” said Democratic councilmember Kenyan McDuffie , who sponsored the bill along with seven other councilmembers. “More importantly, it’s going to modernize the juvenile justice system to hold young...

On Election Day morning, Markita Kornegay waited to vote in a line that stretched around the block from a side entrance of Miner Elementary School in Washington, D.C. Kornegay knew the drill: She’d voted for President Barack Obama at this polling place before, which was around the same time her son was born. But she wasn’t sure exactly what to expect this morning. She and her family now reside in a shelter for the homeless. With three young children in tow, Kornegay told a poll worker that...

In one of President Obama’s last major health care initiatives, the administration is stepping up enforcement of laws that require equal insurance coverage for mental and physical illnesses, a move officials say will help combat an opioid overdose epidemic. A White House task force on Oct. 27 said insurers needed to understand that coverage for the treatment of drug addiction must be comparable to that for other conditions like depression, schizophrenia, cancer and heart disease. As an...

My family is no stranger to suicide and suicide attempts, and we are not alone. To recount just two instances: A 20-year-old nephew, after receiving a very caring letter from his sister-in-law explaining why she could not be his lover, went to his room, shot himself in the head and died. A beloved uncle, who had been plagued for years by bouts of severe depression that alternated with mild mania, was seen at a major hospital psychiatric clinic on a Friday and told to come back on Monday.

Being a parent is hard, even if you have a partner and a steady income (or two). Now, imagine doing that job solo. It's a trend that's risen steadily in the past few decades. In 1968, 85 percent of children were raised in two-parent families, according to U.S. Census data. By 2015, the share of U.S. kids in families with one parent had more than doubled, to 27 percent. In many two-parent (and two-income) families, the cost of day care is a heavy burden, creating anxiety for parents as they...

In a new study published in The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, Professor Sam Porter and co-authors, present the results of a music therapy intervention on social skills, self-esteem, depressive symptoms, as well as family and social functioning. The researchers, based in the United Kingdom, found that the results of the intervention showed the benefits of integrating music therapy into clinical practice. Ciara Reilly, the director of one of the study’s organizational partners,...

The 10,000 children and young people a year who go into care should have their mental health assessed so they can be helped to recover from childhood trauma and abuse, ministers are being urged. Claire Tyler, a Liberal Democrat peer, will on Tuesday lead a parliamentary effort to persuade the government to agree the change through an amendment to the children and social work bill. Children’s campaigners believe that a mandatory assessment of the mental health of every infant or youngster...

“Racism is (whites') massive experience of cognitive dissonance.” -Dr. Joy deGruy Social Identity Threat. check. White Supremacy. check. Social Devaluation of People of Color. check. Everyone I know and love faces an amplified threat with Trump. We are people of color, immigrants, variably abled, queer, poor/working class/barely faking it. This is distress, trauma, harm. This is historical, structural, political. We need to Race ACEs. Now now now.

One out of five California adults with children living in their homes were beaten, kicked or physically abused when they were children, and one in ten were sexually abused, according to data released recently by a children’s health foundation “I think it’s probably a low estimate,” said Cassandra Joubert, director of the Central California Children’s Institute at California State University, Fresno. “I think these kinds of events within families are hush-hush, swept under the rug, not really...