Journal of Nursing Jocularity

LIGHTEN UP!

The Authentic and Fun Way to Lose Your Weight and Your Worries

By Loretta LaRoche

Weight loss, exercise, and stress management have become a national mania. Not a day
goes by without an article appearing in the media that reveals how certain foods could
be harmful or helpful to our health. Our meals have become either demonic or divine.
We’ve forgotten how to be in a “right relationship” with one of the greatest pleasures
we have in life: eating. As a result, we’re fatter than ever and more stressed out
about being fat!

Loretta LaRoche is sick to death of diets and diet books . . . so why is she writing a
book about losing weight?

“One of the reasons why I feel compelled to write this book is simple: I can’t stand
it anymore! The other is the desire to encourage you to develop a more pragmatic and
optimistic approach in relation to food, movement, and life’s inevitable ups and downs.

I’ve struggled with this problem, I’ve watched countless friends suffer because of it,
and I’ve helped tens of thousands of people deal with the stresses that bear down on
their lives, often because of weight and health issues.

There are a variety of solutions in LIGHTEN UP! that you might not have explored up to
this point. They require taking action. These answers aren’t simple, but they’re much
easier to incorporate into your life than expending your time and energy on useless
diets, gadgets, and faux scientific cures. They take commitment, common sense, and the
ability to learn emotional self-regulation.”

Learn to eat well, move with joy, and live a more balanced life. Order LIGHTEN UP!
Now! Here!

In this humorous and informative book, Loretta shares her expertise as an international stress consultant, former aerobics instructor, and owner of a wellness center. LIGHTEN UP! can offer you perspective and help you set healthy, realistic goals with its numerous tools and techniques.

* Develop a sane relationship with food

* Stay committed to your goals

* Be passionate about eating nutritious meals

* Develop tools to reduce stress

* Focus on your successes

* Experience more mindfulness in the way you approach food

* Create health AND well-being

Weight loss is a physical, mental, and spiritual process. Learning how to work on these aspects together will help you maintain a relationship with food that will nurture you, fuel you, and give you joy.

Lighten up, slow down the pace, and make mealtimes a vital part of your day. Order LIGHTEN UP! and start down the path to a happier, healthier life!

In celebration of the release of LIGHTEN UP!, Hay House is offering a variety of prizes, including a chance to see Loretta LIVE! View all of the Prizes and Enter to Win:  here!

Don’t miss Loretta’s latest Public Television special! If you haven’t seen Loretta LaRoche in action, you’re in for a rare treat. Loretta’s seventh public television special, “Juicy Living, Juicy Aging,” begins airing this month. Armed with her amazing wit and refreshing candor, Loretta challenges us to embrace our lives by being wiser, healthier, happier, more enthusiastic, and juicier! Check your local listings to find out what times Juicy Living, Juicy Aging will be broadcast in your area!

Too Live Nurse is a musical group providing education through music and humor for healthcare professionals. A past AATH Award winner!

Dear Nurse Marge

So lately, I haven’t been feeling so great, so I finally did what most nurses hate to do: I went and saw the doctor. In the 2.2 minutes I spent with him, he determined that I’m fine, I just have too much stress. His recommendation is that I get more exercise. What’s the best way for a nurse to exercise?

Wondering about Workouts

Dear Wondering

Personally, I’ve found that kickboxing and most martial arts to be great exercise — ask your doctor about the health benefits you’ll be enjoying while you’re knocking him over his clueless head! More exercise? You mean running to codes, jumping to answer every call light, and carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders isn’t enough exercise?

If that’s the case, you could consider expanding your exercise regime to include:

Running, rather than walking, to hide in the bathroom when a ‘frequent flier’ comes to the unit.

Climbing the walls (most common after the computer system is ‘upgraded’ — but this healthy activity is available anytime!)

Shifting responsibility onto other employees for your workload. (A popular exercise, this serves as some people’s sole physical activity!)

Of course, you’ll want to find the exercise routine that’s best for you. It might even be worth consulting with your doctor!

Good Luck

Nurse Marge

Education doesn’t stop when you leave nursing school — and we’re not talking about continuing education, either. Some of the most critical lessons we learn as nurses are taught by our patients, including: (more…)

A man goes into the doctor for his annual physical. The nurse is taking his basic information.

“How much do you weigh?” she asked.

“One fifty, same as when I was in college!” he replied proudly.

“Why don’t you just step on the scale, and we’ll check,” she said. Turns out, he was one hundred and eighty seven pounds.

Then she asked how tall he was.

“Six foot one.”

Upon measuring, however, it turns out that he was closer to five foot nine.

It was time for the blood pressure check, which came in at 190/110.

“That’s a little high,” she told him.

“Well, what do you expect? When I came in, I was tall and lanky! Now I’m short and fat!”

Hey, all you ER nurses out there!  How many of these sound familiar?

(more…)

Humor in the Classroom: Don’t Tell … ASK!

R U ready to drive your students nuts? (Wouldn’t your students be shocked to read even a couple words from an “digital immigrant” in their texting shortcuts?) And r u excited about driving them nuts with a teaching purpose so profound that you’ll get the BIGGEST KICK out of it (while your students get totally annoyed … until they understand the message you’re sending)? (more…)

Dear Nurse Marge,

I am so angry about this I am still shaking.  I work on the orthopedic floor.  One patient, who is quite elderly,  got a visit from her son.  He wasn’t there five minutes before he started shouting that someone had stolen his mother’s jewelry.

I can promise you his mother arrived on the floor without jewelry.  She’d been transported over from the nursing home, and of course they have a procedure to keep track of these things, and there was no way this woman arrived in our facility wearing a $45,000 bracelet!!!

Still, all the big wigs got involved.   I doubt this woman ever had $45,000 worth of jewelry in her life, much less on one wrist, but it has to be taken seriously.  I get that.  What’s really got me is that the administrator, IN FRONT OF THE PATIENT AND HER SON, looked me right in the face and said, “So, did you take the bracelet?”

Of course I said no, but why would he even ask that? Now my reputation is shot — if my own administrator can’t believe in me, why should I even stay here anymore?

Signed,

Not a Thief!!!!

Dear Not a Thief

Cool! Now that the heat is off, you can fence that little bit of bling, we can hop a cruise ship to the Caribbean, and go have a whole mess of fun!  Or maybe you can use the proceeds to shore up that flagging retirement plan.  Or do they pay so well at your facility that an extra $45,000 won’t make a difference?

In that case, I’ll take the money!

Seriously, don’t sweat your administrator’s question.  It’s not YOU he’s worried about.  It’s THEM.

Them in this case being the patient’s son.  I’m not sure what his game is, but he’s up to something.  Your administrator knows that, too.  There are any number of reasons why he asked you if you took the bracelet, but genuine curiousity is not likely one of them.

Good Luck!

Nurse Marge