Oh, my goodness... Here all this time I thought you were a dude. 
Posted on 04/19/2008 1:56:53 PM PDT by blam
Housework helps combat anxiety and depression
19 April 2008
From New Scientist Print Edition.
FEELING down? You might be able to dust away your distress. Just 20 minutes a week with the vacuum cleaner or mop is enough to help banish those blues, and sport works even better.
That's the message from Mark Hamer and his colleagues at University College London, who wanted to find out what benefits arise from different types of physical activity. They examined data from questionnaires filled in by almost 20,000 Scottish people as part of the Scottish Health Surveys, carried out every few years. Some 3200 respondents reported suffering from anxiety or depression, but those who regularly wielded the mop or the tennis racket were least likely to suffer, the researchers report (British Journal of Sports Medicine, DOI: 10.1136/bjsm.2008.046243).
One 20-minute session of housework or walking reduced the risk of depression by up to 20 per cent. A sporting session worked better, reducing risk by a third or more. Failing housework or sport, says Hamer, try to find something physical to do. "Something - even for just 20 minutes a week - is better than nothing."
(Excerpt) Read more at newscientist.com ...
I understand that, Cindy. I am more than totally perked up if someone else does it for me.
And please, I am not being snotty.
If you lived in the Rep of Panama, you would also have this type of help as you sat at your computer reading FR while they clean around you, through you, and above and below you.
This is not a bad thing. By hiring them, I am also contributing to their social security which includes hospital care (such as it is) and their retirement (such as it is). It is not a one-way street.
Yes, I can see why you wouldn’t be depressed, but you aren’t spending your twenty minutes cleaning the house as the article suggests.
Are the cleaning people happy or depressed? They should be deliriously happy according to this article, if not from the actual work, at least from their pay checks. Ha.
Waiting for an upswing in aluminum prices to motivate them.
Good, legal help is hard to find around here. I’ve been looking. The last time I had a housekeeper I had to get out of the house. I would get up early and clean before she came to clean. If I stayed I had to help. Just couldn’t help myself:’)
That sounds like me. Had to go to our daughter’s house to let her cleaning lady in to clean, and I would end up helping her. She loved me! lol.
Excellent point LucyJo.
I leave them alone to do their work…period. I do not interfere because I know they know what they are doing.
Since I like to cook (it relaxes me), I cook lunch and there is a lot of joking going back and forth at that time. I always need to know who was the latest to get whacked in their neighborhoods (it is always about drugs).
My cleaning lady’s last job assignment from me (a few months ago) is to sit in front of the TV local news starting at 11:50 and report to us the latest scandals. By that time, she has finished ironing my clothes.
What a great job she has.
If I lived in the U.S, I would never, ever be able to afford this help.
P.S.
Panamanian women are notoriously nasty to their house employees.
I don’t understand it. This is why I lucked out with my male employee. He couldn’t take the abuse anymore from his last employerette.
You should have smooshed that peanut into the carpet and called it peanut butter.
Oh, my goodness... Here all this time I thought you were a dude.
I can relate to that.
I finally said to myself, the heck with that.
Although, before they come (7:00 am), the cats are fed and kitty litter cleaned. Why? Because I know my cats’ habits, and they don’t...although they have offered to do that for me.
Besides, cleaning kitty litter is a nasty job, and I will not joist that job on anybody else. It is my nasty stuff to clean, and it is for me to do it.
LOL!!!
I am sorry to disappoint you…I think.
But I can hold my own against anybody.
Certainly, in the mean time I do superficial cleaning.
Cats like to vomit. That needs to be cleaned posthaste.
I spill something on the floor. I am not going to leave it there for Monday or Thursday.
Etc.
But there are things that can wait. Overall general cleaning can wait.
Sure it does. I could guess at the next healthful habit but let’s not be crude.
Sure as h*ll does. Ask my Husband and kids during that magical time of the month. They are grateful that I like to clean.
I love that show! Couldn’t watch it though when I had morning sickness. The filth made me throw up. I also like “You Are What You Eat.” No PC crap from that host. She tells fatties exactly what they are and how they got that way.
“Housework helps combat anxiety and depression”
Not as much as paying somebody else to do it!
My husband calls me “The Bleach Queen”. I seriously have a compulsive cleaning disorder when it comes to my house.
Does it have to be administered orally ?
=running away=
LOL!!! : )
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