How’s Your Sleep Life?

I have a confession to make: I would rather get a good night’s sleep over a good night of sex. And evidently I am not alone. According to a 2012 survey by the Better Sleep Council nearly 80 percent of women would rather get a good night’s sleep that have sex. Here are a few stats from the survey which definitely woke me up: 6 in 10 Americans crave sleep more than sex Some admit to falling asleep during sex Men crave sex (over sleep) more than women (58% vs. 21% women) Women crave sleep (over sex) more than men (79%

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Getting Things Off My Chest: Pushing The Pause Button

This week was a milestone moment which had me going a mile a minute. Two back-to-back book launch events, several interviews, client appointments and writing deadlines nipping at my heels left me fearless, fabulous….and breathless. Dashing around the city from appointment to appointment in the searing late summer heat, playing catch-up to missed meetings and trying to remember names and faces of everyone I was seeing and thanking left me a bit foggy.  And then I was reminded to Push the Pause Button.   I was reminded on September 11 when my friend Kevin, former wine director for Windows on the

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Getting Things Off My Chest: Think Thank Listen Share

I learned the meaning of four words this past week as I traveled back to Atlanta and Tennessee to reconnect with old friends, family and colleagues, and make new friends with women from all over the country attending a Women’s Cancer Survivor Convention in Nashville. The words are Think, Thank, Listen, Share.   “Think” as in think before you speak or post. How you say something can be interpreted many ways, and words are harder to retract these days. Two examples: Women cancer survivors shared stories about misinformed comments people make such as “Oh, you have the good kind of cancer.” (told to a women with thyroid cancer).

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Step Up To Your Platform

For years I thought the term “platform” referred to shoes or staging at an event, or what you stood on at a train station.  But in today’s marketing jargon, “platform” has a new meaning in a bold new world of self-promotion. As in, “What’s your platform?” or “You need to build a platform.” Or, “I’m switching platforms.” A “platform” for the uninitiated is the basis for which you build your brand or image. Social media increases your platform. Scandals make it shaky. Sometimes one platform becomes unsteady, and you need to build another. If you don’t cultivate your platform it gets walked over and

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Sweeping Away The Doormat

Why do more men seem to get caught with their pants down then women? And why do their women put up with it?  This is the question of the moment in Weinerville (aka New York City) where Mayoral hopeful and hot dog handful Anthony Weiner is once again deflecting stories about his sexting habit that didn’t seem to stop after he resigned from public office. His wife Huma gamely stood by his side at a press conference vowing her support and assuring us “He’s a good man” (with a dirty little habit!).  Women around the nation cringed and said “Huma, don’t

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The Gal’s Got Game!

This week was pure serendipity! I met two authors of top selling breast cancer books that inspired me:  Marisa Acocella Marchetto, author of Cancer Vixen, and Geralyn Lucas, author of Why I Wore Lipstick To My Mastectomy. And I met Susan Seidelman, who directed a delightful movie opening this week called “Hot Flashes” which I highly recommend. The movie’s about a group of middle-aged women in the tiny town of Burning Bush, Texas, who form a basketball team to play against the high school champion Burning Bush Armadillos in a charity competition to raise funds to save the local mobile mammogram clinic from

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A Bitter Pill and a Better Option

The Center for Disease Control has reported a sharp rise in women’s deaths from overdose of painkillers.  The rate has quintupled since 1999 with white women affected more than black and older more than young. With more women shouldering the responsibility of providing for their home and their family; and juggling work, parenting, community and other obligations,  women are turning to prescription pain pills to alleviate stress. Quoting from today’s article by Sabrina Tavernise in The New York Times “…women blame the changing nature of American society. The rise of the single-parent household has thrust immense responsibility on women, who

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Pussy Riot: My Womanly Weekend

“Women are the greatest untapped natural resource in the world.”– Mama Gena It takes a lot of convincing and the chance to experience something out of the ordinary to keep me in the city on a Summer weekend. With my husband overseas swilling Cretan wine on an all male press junket, I used the time alone to reconnect with some of my girlfriends and with my womanly self. It was pure midsummer pleasure: sunset cocktails at  at the Metropolitan Museum’s rooftop terrace on Friday and rosé at the beach in Bridgehampton on Saturday. So how did I end up in a

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A Father’s Day Card from a Daughter

Yesterday I stopped in my local drugstore to buy a birthday card for a dear friend.  I paused in front of the rows of Father’s Day cards, and my heart skipped a beat. “No need for this section,” I thought to myself.  Yet, greeting cards and letters are some of the special mementos I have left of my father, Mel Young. When my husband, David, and I flew to Chattanooga to pack up my father’s office after he died in November 2009, we found a file drawer filled with all the Father’s Day and birthday cards I had sent him over the years along with hand written letters

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Lean In? How About Looking Up?

Lean  In  “to incline or press into something. You have to lean into the wind when you walk or you will be blown over.” (The Free Dictionary)  I just finished reading Facebook CEO Sheryl Sandberg’s book, “Lean In,” referred to by some blogs as “a feminist manifesto” to motivate women in business to be assertive, set goals, establish boundaries and speak up and out if they want to crunch the glass ceiling and establish equality between the working sexes.  As a woman and a business owner I found her message compelling based both on my successes and my mistakes. Here’s my interpretation: It takes more than a traditional MBA “Master

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Live On! What It Means To Be a Survivor

Sunday, June 2, is National Cancer Survivors Day. I’ve given lot of thought about the word “survivor” and to what it means to survive cancer in the years since I was diagnosed in 2009. Once you are diagnosed with cancer you ask yourself “When exactly do I become a cancer survivor?” I looked the question up online at several sites and found varying answers: Some say you are survivor from the moment you are diagnosed. Some say you become a survivor five years after diagnosis Some say you are a survivor after five years of being cancer free. Some say

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Angie, Oh Angie- Ain’t It Good To Be Alive?*

It takes a lot of courage to get things off your chest- both physically and emotionally. That’s why Angelina Jolie’s announcement this past week that she underwent a prophylactic mastectomy after testing positive for the BRCA1 gene mutation resonated among so many people. Here is one of the most beautiful women in the world for whom privacy is a rarity. She opened up publicly about a very difficult and personal decision she made for herself and for her family.  I admire Angelina for putting her health first in an industry where impeccable looks and achieving the perfect body are a requirement for getting ahead. I love the fact

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