Why Do Men Fall Asleep After Sex? Page 13

  “Premenstrual dysphoric disorder: in most menstrual cycles during the past year, symptoms (e.g., markedly depressed mood, marked anxiety, marked affective lability, decreased interest in activities) regularly occurred during the last week of the luteal phase (and remitted within a few days of the onset of menses). These symptoms must be severe enough to markedly interfere with work, school, or usual activities and be entirely absent for at least 1 week postmenses.”

  Now, this is much more serious than your wife yelling at you for not taking out the garbage.

  Premenstrual dysmorphic disorder (PMDD) affects around 3 to 8 percent of women during their reproductive years. Exactly what causes it is not fully understood, but the sequence of events begins with ovulation, which triggers a series of changes in neurotransmitters. The most important of these is serotonin, and a reduction in serotonin has been found in the second half of the menstrual cycle. There have been many medical studies on this topic and there are many different treatment options. The most effective approaches are the use of drugs that either block serotonin reuptake (antidepressants) or suppress ovulation (birth control pills). Other options include: exercise which helps increase endorphins, Vitamin B6, dietary changes including reduced caffeine and increased complex carbohydrates, and Vitex agnus-castus extract Ze 440 (Chaste berry fruit).

  IS DEPRESSION MORE COMMON IN WOMEN?

  Most investigators report that depression is twice as common in women when compared to men. This holds true in the United States and in many societies around the world. For major depression, this ratio approaches almost 3:1. It is estimated that nearly 340 million people worldwide and 18 million people in the United States suffer from depression.

  There are several explanations for the disproportionate rate of depression in women. Hormonal changes around the time of pregnancy, menopause, and the premenstrual period can cause mood disturbances. Sexual or physical abuse is also more common in women and may contribute to higher rates of depression. It is also believed that women are more likely than men to talk about their symptoms and admit feelings of depression.

  The last explanation comes from our wives. They argue that a woman is bound to be depressed when she has to put up with men who never listen; talk incessantly about sex, poop, and sports; and obsessively babble on about some book they wrote.

  CHAPTER 8

  A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE SPA

  I was in a particularly great mood walking into the office one day as I bounced through the door, whistling. Crossing through the doorway, I noticed a bizarre odor in the waiting room and I saw Wendy with a bandanna covering her mouth and nose frantically spraying air freshener. Her eyes were watering uncontrollably and she pointed toward the office shaking her head. I took a deep breath, coughed, and opened the door. I then came upon the most harrowing sight. Leyner was seated in the corner of the office, semiconscious, one eye crusted shut, his hair matted and clumped, an unidentifiable layer of some cheesy material coating his upper torso. There was a sickening stench emanating from his direction that made it physically perilous to get any closer to him. I’d become used to Leyner’s eccentricities and bizarre behavior but this was a new dimension. He’d always been somewhat vain about his physical allure…something extreme surely must have happened. Holding a dampened handkerchief to my mouth and nose, I approached Leyner and shook him gently. “What happened? Tell me.”

  Leyner’s crusted eye opened with an audible crackle.

  “I met a bunch of exiled yakuza hit men playing miniature golf….”

  “What? How do you know they were exiled yakuza hit men?”

  “They were really, really, REALLY good miniature golf players, first of all…and none of them had pinkies.”

  “And…?”

  “So we meet this bunch of girls…grad students from Rensselaer Polytech…and they seem out for some fun and games. And one of the yakuza guys says in a guttural tone, ‘It is an honored tradition for you to pick one of us. The handsomest one.’ We all paraded in front of them…. And I’m thinking, there’s no contest here…first of all, I have both my pinkies. Second…I don’t know…I just think I’m a pretty hot kinda hunky guy…don’t you?”

  As lost and decrepit as Leyner was at the moment, there was no way I could do anything but nod.

  “So they rate us…like pieces of meat…and…and…” Leyner’s head fell despondently. “And I came in…last.”

  I didn’t know quite what to say. For Leyner to have been rated worst-in-show among a motley crew of maimed miniature golfers must have been devastating.

  I tried to reassure my partner. “Leyner, why do you care what a bunch of knock-kneed engineering students think? Maybe they just prefer Asian men.”

  Leyner wasn’t soothed at all. “That was my first reaction, but then when I suggested that the yakuza took great offense and tossed me in the Dumpster behind the concession stand. I was so mortified that I took an Ambien and slept in a pool of fryer grease and discarded nacho cheese.”

  Leyner seemed to have lost some of his normal bravado.

  Dejectedly, he added, “I guess it’s hard to realize that I’ve finally lost my mojo.”

  In a moment of surprising candor Leyner looked up at me and said, “You’re a doctor, help me!”

  My mind raced through a list of pharmaceuticals but I imagined Leyner abusing them all. Then I realized a simple solution. “Leyner you don’t need a doctor.”

  “I don’t,” he said with a glimmer of hope.

  “No, you just need a makeover!”

  Wendy, who obviously had been listening with her ear pressed to the door, was at our sides in a second. “I know just the place to start.”

  Two minutes later, we were in front of the local firehouse where Wendy had charmed several firefighters into hosing Leyner down with their most powerful water cannon.

  “It’s exfoliating!!” yelled Wendy as Leyner was blasted against a wall by the force of the water.

  From there we patronized a dizzying series of Manhattan’s most prestigious grooming establishments.

  Plucked, massaged, manicured, tanned, conditioned, waxed, coiffed, and moisturized, Leyner emerged a radiant and resplendent thing of beauty.

  “You’re magnificent!!” Wendy exclaimed.

  Leyner smiled and with a look of determination in his eyes turned and began walking off.

  “Where are you going?” I asked.

  “Troy, baby, Troy.”

  I was baffled by Leyner’s mythological reference. Was he making some esoteric allusion to The Iliad?

  Leyner sensed my confusion, smirked, and added, “Troy, New York—the home of Rensselaer Polytech!”

  I instantly realized that the old, irrepressible, irredeemably narcissistic Leyner was back.

  WHY DO I SNEEZE WHEN I PLUCK MY EYEBROWS?

  Duh…that’s so obvious. Just kidding. What could possibly be the connection between a tweezed eyebrow hair and a sneeze?

  The sneezing reflex is a complex, almost Rube Goldbergian sequence of physiological events. It typically starts with an irritation to your nasal passages that excites your trigeminal nerve. (No, it doesn’t take much to get a trigeminal nerve excited.) Then these impulses are transmitted through the trigeminal ganglion to a set of neurons in the brain stem called the sneezing center. The sneezing center then sends impulses back along the facial nerve to your nasal passages, mucus glands, blood vessels, and eyelids, which is the reason you close your eyes when you sneeze. (Impulses from the sneezing center also travel to nerves that control muscles in your abdomen, chest, diaphragm, and neck.)

  Plucking a hair from your eyebrow stimulates a nearby branch of the nerve that services your nasal passages. And even though these impulses don’t originate in your nose, the eyebrow plucking sensitizes the entire nerve, enabling sufficient impulses to reach the sneezing center…and you sternutate (that’s sneeze, in dorky doctorspeak).

  So whether you’re shaping those ultra-feminine crescents or manscaping th
at unibrow, here’s a hearty “Gusundheit!” for the next time you pluck.

  CAN DEODORANT REALLY CAUSE BREAST CANCER?

  For several years rumors have circulated, primarily on the Internet, claiming that the use of antiperspirant deodorants can cause breast cancer. But no clear scientific basis has been found to substantiate these rumors.

  According to the National Cancer Institute, “researchers at the NCI are not aware of any conclusive evidence linking the use of underarm antiperspirants or deodorants and the subsequent development of breast cancer. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which regulates food, cosmetics, medicines, and medical devices, also does not have any evidence or research data that ingredients in underarm antiperspirants or deodorants cause cancer.”

  These rumors have two basic premises. They claim that antiperspirants (because they block perspiration) prevent the body from flushing “toxins,” which then accumulate in the lymph nodes of the armpits and cause cancer. Other reports speculate that potentially harmful ingredients in some of these products, including a group of chemicals called parabens, might enter the body through nicks caused by underarm shaving and cause breast cancer.

  A small study did find parabens in eighteen of twenty samples of breast cancer tissue. But since the study failed to establish whether the samples were from women who used deodorants or antiperspirants containing parabens, or even the source of the parabens in the samples (parabens are present in a variety of foods, medicines, and cosmetics)—it certainly doesn’t provide proof of any relevant hypothesis.

  A recent study involving breast cancer survivors found that women who used underarm antiperspirants/deodorants and shaved their underarms frequently were diagnosed with cancer at younger ages, but the study stopped short of showing a clear link.

  In 2002 a study was conducted at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle. This research, which involved some 1,606 women—813 with breast cancer, and 793 controls—indicated no relationship between breast cancer and use of either an antiperspirant or a deodorant.

  WHY DO WOMEN’S TOES CURL AFTER YEARS OF WEARING HIGH HEELS?

  The torments women will endure in the name of glamour! Never mind the fact that when you’re wearing high heels, you actually have to realign your spine so you don’t fall over. Or the fact that a research team at Harvard University found a link between high heels and knee osteoarthritis, a degenerative joint disease. Or the fact that they can shorten your Achilles tendon and cause something called metatarsalgia—chronic pain in the ball of the foot. Let’s just focus on those toes for a moment. Do you want a bunion (a painful inflammation of bone and tissue on the side of your big or little toe)? Wear heels. How do hammertoes sound? Hammertoes is a permanent foot deformity. When you crunch and crowd those poor toes of yours into a narrow shoe and clench them to grasp the shoe, over time the tendons in your toes will curl up and stiffen into a clawlike shape or a…hammer. Who needs Home Depot, when you can transform your own appendages into tools?

  Granted, there’s a mutual fantasy in the world of high heels. Wearing heels makes women feel sexier, and men love leering at hotties navigating the city in their stilettos. And for every Manolo-shod woman who dreams of being Carrie Bradshaw, there’s some haggard straphanger out there whose inner Mr. Big is just waiting to emerge. But until men trade their flats for 4-inch spiked heels, it’s women, and women alone, who’ll bear the brunt of the pain.

  WHY DOES YOUR SKIN GET SO DRY IN THE WINTER?

  Winter is rough enough with the snow and the sleet and the hacking away at ice-encrusted windshields in the dark, frigid mornings. But that dry, chapped, cracked skin just adds insult to injury…or is it injury to insult?

  Because the relative humidity—moisture in the air—gets so low in the cold season, winter weather dries out our skin. And there’s not much relief to be found inside—indoor heating also lowers humidity, depriving the skin of moisture. In the cold weather, many of us develop something commonly called “winter itch” or xerotic eczema—dry, itchy, flaky skin. To help cope, dermatologists have three words for you: moisturize, moisturize, moisturize.

  Apply moisturizers to your skin right after you get out of the bath or shower. And don’t bathe or shower too frequently. Exposure to hot water can actually further dehydrate your skin, and detergent-based soaps and cleansers can remove the skin’s natural moisturizers. Also, you might want to consider purchasing a humidifier.

  And, if all else fails, you can always just pack up and move to Maui.

  IS IT TRUE THAT HAIR GROWS BACK THICKER AFTER SHAVING?

  No. And if this were true, wouldn’t women who’ve shaved for years have legs like gorillas and armpits like Chia Pets?

  One of the reasons for this common misperception may be that new grown stubble seems thicker than uncut hair. But the truth is, all hair growth takes place below the skin, down in the hair follicle. The section of the hair we lop off is just dead protein. Shaving doesn’t make your hair grow back any faster or thicker or darker or coarser.

  If there were even the slightest chance that shaving caused thicker regrowth, men suffering from male pattern baldness would be hacking away at their shiny pates with the latest five-bladed razor from dawn till dusk.

  WHAT CAUSES INGROWN HAIRS?

  Oh, you must mean pseudofolliculitis barbae. C’mon, wouldn’t you rather have pseudofolliculitis barbae (PFB) than “ingrown hairs” or “razor bumps”? (If this reminds you of a traditional Italian song, you’re thinking of “Funiculi, Funicula,” which refers to a funicular railway, a kind of mountainside cable car, and has nothing to do with ingrown hairs or razor bumps.)

  All these terms refer to basically the same condition, which occurs when the end of a hair shaft is cut, giving it a sharpened edge, and that hair shaft, as it grows, curls, either piercing the adjacent skin or a hair follicle. (This would be your extrafollicular penetration or your transfollicular penetration.) Either can cause a foreign-body inflammatory response and infection. PFB is frequently the result of shaving, hence the term “razor bumps.” And the condition is more common in people with curly hair (it affects some 60 percent of African American men).

  Obviously, people who have to shave each and every day would be especially likely to contract PFB. And who has to shave every single day, like it or not? Men in the military. (Here’s a cheerful grooming tip from a recent issue of Military Medicine magazine: “The combat environment, with the recent threat of biological and chemical weapons, requires the servicemen to be clean shaven for appropriate gas mask fitting around the face.”)

  So the military has actually developed and implemented a written PFB Treatment Protocol. No, it’s not “Don’t Shave, Don’t Tell.” It’s more like: “Sir, request permission to totally avoid shaving for three to four weeks until all lesions have subsided, while applying Vioform-HC cream each morning; and to soften whiskers, begin a nightly application of Retin-A Cream 0.05–0.1% to beard skin while beard is growing out; and implement a circular brushing of the beard area with a polyester skin-cleaning pad or medium-firm toothbrush, four times a day for three to five minutes; and, once shaving bumps subside, to avoid a close shave by water-softening beard first with a hot, wet washcloth for five minutes, and then using a lubricating shaving gel and a PFB razor, and shaving with the grain of the beard, not stretching the skin, and using only one stroke over each area of the beard. Sir!”

  10:02 A.M.

  Gberg: ¿Que pasa, amigo?

  Leyner: Working on our latest blockbuster…finishing up A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Spa today…

  Leyner: Just reviewing a 25-page document.

  Leyner: The navy’s protocol for handling pseudofolliculitis barbae.

  Gberg: I am deep in the research myself. Reading an article, “Humor, Laughter, and Physical Health: Methodological Issues and Research Findings.”

  Leyner: Does that include dark, misanthropic laughter?

  Gberg: No solid evidence but I might start wearing a beanie w
ith a propeller on it to work.

  Gberg: Absolutely.

  Leyner: The health benefits of schadenfreude, etc.

  10:05 A.M.

  Leyner: And schnitzle.

  Gberg: You know my thoughts. Happy complaining.

  Gberg: Spaetzle.

  Leyner: I was just about to type that…but I hesitated at the spelling…damn!

  Gberg: He who types first types…

  Leyner: There’s a new place we should try…where the ol’ Le Zinc used to be.

  Gberg: Siegried’s Spaetzle House.

  Leyner: German…nice spaetzle, I bet…but…

  Leyner: Probably not so good in the zaftig horny German waitress department.

  Gberg: You were the head of that department in your last job, weren’t you?

  Leyner: Weird fantasy of mine…sort of lonely PTA mom/St. Pauli Girl beer maid.

  Leyner: Yes!

  Gberg: You are watching too much Heidi Klum on Project Runway.

  Leyner: I also did postdoctoral work in zaftig horny German waitresses in 19th-Century American Poetry.

  Leyner: Whitman…I Sing The Body Zaftig.

  10:10 A.M.

  Gberg: I am at a loss. I have a cold and lack the energy to respond to your Leynerisms.

  Leyner: Heidi finally “had” the baby…I mean you finally appeared on an episode not looking like a swollen about-to-burst alien pod-creature.

  Leyner: Not you, she…sorry.

  Leyner: Maybe ’cause you’re expecting.

  Gberg: I can’t believe that this time next week we will have a baby.

  Leyner: I’m sure she induced her own labor by shouting in that accent: You out! You out! And the poor little fetal designer came slithering into this world.

  Gberg: Not we meaning me and you but we meaning me and Jessica.

  Leyner: Yes, we’ll have our baby, darling.