Healthy Living, Simplified

Spa therapist massaging a woman's neck and décolletage during a lymphatic drainage treatment, with a gentle water rinse over her skin.

Does Lymphatic Drainage Actually Work? What It Can and Can’t Do

Lymphatic drainage promises to flush toxins and depuff, but does it actually work? We break down what manual lymphatic drainage can do for lymphedema, and why the at-home toxin and weight-loss claims don't hold up to the evidence.

That Hot Sauce Obsession May Not Be Harmless After All

Hot Take: If you’ve never understood the appeal of drowning your eggs in ghost pepper sauce, a new review published in Frontiers in Nutrition finally provides you with a real argument against it beyond “that just seems like masochism.” Researchers have found that people who eat the most chili peppers face a higher risk of esophageal cancer than those who eat little to none. The Study: The review combined data from 14 studies covering more than 11,000 people, including over 5,000 diagnosed with digestive tract cancers. People with the highest chili pepper intake had about a 64% higher risk of gastrointestinal cancers overall compared to the lowest consumers. Esophageal cancer showed the strongest link, with heavy consumers facing nearly triple the risk of light consumers. Stomach and colorectal cancers showed similar trends, but they didn’t reach statistical significance. The Takeaway: Experts say there isn’t enough evidence to tell healthy people to stop eating spicy food entirely. However, chronic reflux is already a known risk factor for esophageal cancer, so if spicy food keeps triggering your heartburn, that’s a solid reason to cut back. Keep in Mind: Researchers have pinpointed a connection between chili peppers and esophageal cancer, but they can’t […]

A woman eats a plate of bacon, a processed meat linked to colon cancer.

Does Processed Meat Cause Colon Cancer? Here’s What the Science Actually Says

Woman organizing open wooden shelves in a bright kitchen with jars, plants, and books, decluttering and tidying up her kitchen space.

How to Declutter Your Kitchen: 9 Things to Toss Today

Your kitchen collects clutter faster than any room in the house. Here are the 9 things to toss today — from expired spices to cracked containers — and simple tests to figure out what's actually worth keeping.

a woman wonders what does cortisol belly look like

What Does ‘Cortisol Belly’ Actually Look Like, and What Can You Do About It?

"Cortisol belly" is all over social media, but can stress really reshape your midsection? Here's what the research says about cortisol and belly fat, how to tell normal stress from a medical issue, and what actually helps reduce stress-related weight gain.

Hormonal Health

Fitness

Nutrition

Sleep

a woman performing an exercise with dumbbells as part of a workout routine

How Many Different Exercises Should You Do Per Workout?

Most people only need 4 to 8 exercises per workout. Learn how weekly volume, not exercise count, drives real strength and muscle gains.

Exercise Appears to Rewind the Clock on Muscle Aging

Hit Rewind: Muscle loss and muscle weakening are major concerns in older adults, but we have the power to slow — or even reverse — muscle aging. New research suggests exercise can reverse some of the cellular changes associated with muscle aging. The Study: Researchers wanted to understand why muscles lose strength and function with age, and how exercise might counteract that process. They identified a protein called DEAF1 that becomes more active in aging muscle. When that happens, it disrupts a cellular system called mTORC1, which helps muscles manage the production and recycling of proteins. That disruption can contribute to the buildup of damaged proteins and other signs of muscle aging. Exercise also appeared to activate another pathway, called FOXO, which suppressed DEAF1 and helped restore healthier muscle function. When researchers blocked this pathway, many of exercise’s beneficial effects disappeared. The Takeaway: More than just making muscles stronger, exercise may reverse some of the underlying cellular changes that occur as muscles age. Keep in Mind: This research doesn’t prove that exercise literally makes human muscles biologically young again. The study focused on the cellular mechanisms behind muscle aging, and more research is needed to determine how these findings translate […]

Here’s the Five-Minute Fix for Too Much Sitting

I Like To Move It Move It: If your job (or your doom-scrolling) keeps you in a chair for hours on end, this one’s relevant to you. Yes, it’s become patently clear that sitting too much isn’t great, but new research from Columbia University Irving Medical Center gets super specific about how much, exactly, is too much. The study concluded that sitting for more than 30 minutes straight is linked to a higher risk of dying from cancer, based on data from over 91,000 people tracked for about 12 years. How To Do It: Five minutes of walking every 30 minutes of sitting made the biggest difference in offsetting the downsides of being sedentary. That could look like a walk around the block or a few laps up and down the hallway. Shorter breaks helped some too, just not as much. The Benefits: In the Columbia study, the habit lowered blood pressure and blood sugar, cutting post-meal spikes by 58 percent compared to sitting all day. The results of a larger UK Biobank study supported this, finding that replacing sitting time with light activity, such as walking or housework, was associated with a lower risk of cancer death.

The 5-Minute Core Workout You’ll Actually Stick To

A 5-minute core workout sounds too short to matter, but done consistently, it builds real core strength and endurance — no equipment needed. Here's the science behind short workouts, plus a simple five-move bodyweight routine you can start today.

Do Our Taste Buds Really Change Every 7 Years?

You Should Know: It’s a common misconception that our taste buds change every seven years, leading to changes in food preferences. They actually change much more frequently — as often as every 10 to 14 days. The “seven years” misconception stems from a 2005 paper wherein a scientist famously estimated that the average age of cells in the human body was seven to 10 years. Going Deeper: Have you ever burned your tongue and noticed that the pain (thankfully) dissipated after a week or so? That’s because the cells that make up your tongue — including your taste buds — regenerate fairly quickly. This partially explains why many of us dislike certain foods as kids and teens, only to come around to them as adults. But other factors, like age, health, exposure to foods, and presentation of foods, also affect our palates. Even your sense of smell plays a role. Takeaway: Your palate evolves over time as biology, experience, culture, and exposure all shape what you like — and what you’re willing to try. Bottom Line: Your taste buds may be replaced every couple of weeks, but that doesn’t mean your food preferences will change overnight.

The Science Behind Brain Freeze

You Should Know: It’s ice cream headache season. When something cold hits the roof of your mouth, the blood vessels there can shrink super fast and trigger nearby nerves, causing that icepick-to-the-forehead feeling (also known as brain freeze). It sends a pain signal through the trigeminal nerve originating in the brainstem, which explains why the ache shows up in your forehead even though the cold food or drink only touched your mouth. Going Deeper: People who get migraines seem especially prone to intense brain freeze, since they tend to have a more reactive trigeminal nerve. And kids may get it more often than adults, but probably because they haven’t learned yet to eat and drink more slowly to avoid it. Takeaway: Some of us are more likely to experience brain freeze than others and may need to pay particularly close attention to eating ice cream slowly to avoid the pain. Bottom Line: If an ice cream headache still sets in, press your tongue against the roof of your mouth to warm it up. The pain should then pass pretty quickly.

You Should Never Skip Washing Your Greens, So Here’s How to Do It

Lettuce Remind Ourselves: Last week’s Cyclospora outbreak, eventually linked to bad lettuce at Taco Bell, sent more than 1,600 people across the country into GI distress before officials found the source. But that unsettling stretch of not knowing left an obvious question for anyone eating salad in the meantime. Luckily, there are specific ways to wash your fresh produce to lower your risk of illness no matter what’s happening upstream. How to Do It: Wait until you’re about to eat your produce to wash your greens, since doing so too early can lead to spoilage. Separate the lettuce leaves and other greens, then briefly soak them in a bowl to loosen the dirt. Using a salad spinner afterward can help dry things more quickly. Rub firmer produce like cucumbers or apples under running water. Root vegetables, however, do better with a firm scrub or a peel. And whatever you do, skip the soap or bleach since they can affect taste. The Benefits: No washing method will kill everything, but plain running water really helps reduce dirt and bacteria. And a quick rinse is worth the trouble, given how often fruits and vegetables get linked to outbreaks each summer.

How to Declutter Your Kitchen: 9 Things to Toss Today

Cannabis plant leaves in close-up, related to cannabis and sleep quality

What Cannabis Really Does to Your Sleep

THC gummies can help you drift off faster, but sleep experts warn that regular cannabis use suppresses REM sleep, builds tolerance, and may leave you more tired than when you started. Here's what the research says about cannabis as a sleep aid — and what actually works better long-term.

Just 78 Minutes Less Sleep a Night Could Lead to Weight Gain

Tip the Scales: Good sleep is essential for keeping nearly every system in our body working properly, including our hormones, brain, and heart. Need more incentive to catch more zzz’s? A new study has found that losing even a modest amount of sleep could contribute to weight gain. The Study: Researchers studied 95 people who were already at risk for heart or metabolic disease and normally slept between seven and eight hours a night. Each participant experienced two different sleep conditions over a six-week period. During the “adequate sleep” window, they slept their normal seven hours or more. During “sleep restriction,” they went to bed 1.5 hours later than normal, losing 90 minutes of sleep time. Participants wore wrist trackers to monitor sleep and activity levels. Their hormones, BMI, body composition, and waist circumference were measured multiple times. The Takeaway: Participants who slept an average of 78 minutes less per night gained nearly one pound of weight compared to when they got adequate sleep. They also gained an average of a half-centimeter around their waist and had 17 more minutes a day of sedentary time. Keep in Mind: Because the study was small and lasted only six weeks, it can’t […]

Why Do I Wake Up Groggy? The REM and Deep Sleep Connection

You logged a full eight hours and still feel foggy. If you've wondered why you wake up groggy, the answer is usually about sleep quality, not quantity — here's what's going on and how to fix it.

Why Do We Sleep Worse in the Summer?

You Should Know: Summer may feel like a time to rest and recharge, but when days stay lighter for hours longer and sweltering nights make it hard to get comfortable, our sleep often suffers. Going Deeper: We may sleep less in the summer because of vacations or extra socializing, and bedtimes and wake times get later when days are longer and warmer. The extra summer sunlight affects our circadian rhythm, which regulates the sleep/wake cycle. Darkness and a drop in body temperature helps trigger melatonin production and induce sleep — both of which can be hard to come by in summertime. Takeaway: You might need to do a little more in the summer to sleep better. Keep blinds or curtains open to get as much sunlight as possible during the day, and dim the lights an hour or two before bed to signal to your body that it’s time to sleep. Keep your bedroom cool and take a warm bath or shower before bed to help trigger the needed drop in core body temperature. A consistent sleep schedule, even on weekends and on vacation, can also help you sleep more soundly during the summer months. Bottom Line: Simple steps you […]

Mindfulness

Beauty

Personal Growth

Why Smoking Is Making a Comeback Among Gen Z

The Trend: What goes around comes around when it comes to trends and fashion, and it appears we’ve reached the “come around” moment for one that was seemingly gone forever: smoking. Cigarettes are making a comeback, particularly among young Gen Z adults. The resurgence can be attributed to multiple elements: more images of celebs smoking on social media and on the screen, the wave of ’80s and ’90s nostalgia and desire for anything analog, a need for stress relief, and a dose of nihilism and rebellion. What People Are Saying: Public attitude toward smoking also appears to have softened. In November, more than 2,000 New Yorkers smoked cigs together in Central Park for a planned communal “five-minute group smoke.” On social media, people lament the loss of the smoke break, which allowed you to go outside, unwind for a few minutes, and bond with other smokers. What to Know: Anti-smoking campaigns have waned in recent years, so Gen Z hasn’t been as inundated with this messaging like older generations were. It might be recently back in style and have a “good old days” nostalgic vibe, but smoking is still dangerous and still causes cancer and death.

Mindfulness

That Strange Feeling of Déjà Vu — Explained

You Should Know: Most of us have felt it: that weird, spooky “I swear I’ve been in this exact moment before” experience of déjà vu. It can feel freaky, but it usually only lasts for a few seconds. We might chalk it up to one of life’s mysteries or a glitch in the matrix, but there is an explanation for why and how it happens. Going Deeper: The term “déjà vu” translates to “already seen” in French. Scientists think déjà vu happens from a moment of miscommunication between the brain’s hippocampus, which processes new information, and the temporal lobe, which forms and stores memories. This can cause the brain to falsely register a new situation as a memory, especially if it happens in a familiar place. Takeaway: People with certain neurological conditions, including anxiety and schizophrenia, can experience déjà vu more often. It’s more likely to happen when we’re stressed or tired, and it’s more common in people who are highly educated, travel a lot, and often remember their dreams (though it’s not clear why). Bottom Line: Déjà vu feels unsettling, but it’s incredibly common (97% of people have experienced it) and rarely means something is wrong with our brain.

Mindfulness

Why Gen Z Is Taking the Plunge

Mindfulness

a woman applying facial sunscreen with her face tilted up to the sun

Meet Bemotrizinol, the Sunscreen Filter Americans Have Waited Decades For

The FDA just cleared bemotrizinol, a broad-spectrum UV filter used across Europe and Asia since 1999, marking its first new sunscreen ingredient approval in over two decades. Here's what makes it different and when you might see it on shelves.

Why Does Hair Turn Gray as We Age?

You Should Know: Ever wondered why hair eventually turns gray? Well, it comes down to melanin — or the eventual lack of it. Every strand of hair gets its color from this natural pigment made in your hair follicles. Your hair moves through growth cycles that last years, and follicles pump out fresh melanin at the start of each one. After somewhere between seven and 15 of these cycles, melanin production stops for good, and then new white or gray hair grows in without pigment. Going Deeper: Genetics determines much of the timeline for all this. If your parents grayed early, then you probably will too. Stress also plays a role because when your body goes into fight-or-flight mode, it releases norepinephrine, which pushes melanin-producing cells out of the follicle. Certain medications and vitamin deficiencies can also speed the process along. Takeaway: There’s no medical treatment that reliably restores color once it’s gone, though managing stress might slow the process. Hair dye remains the main option if any gray strands are bothering you. Bottom Line: When and if you go gray comes down to biology and time, so it’s mostly outside your control.

Been Outside? Here’s How to Check Yourself for Ticks