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Scientists have long known that stress can influence your heart health, but exactly how this relationship takes place has been something of a mystery -- until now. Activity in the amygdala, a region of the brain associated with fear and stress, can predict your risk for heart disease and stroke, according to a study published in the journal The Lancet on Wednesday.

The ups and downs of this election are stressing me out! Our side (Civilization) and their side (Chaos) Our two sides are so diametrically opposed it literally will mean a completely different way of life if Hillary were to win. I feel like I can't trust ANY media to tell me what's really going on If we lose . . The stakes are HIGH.

Ohio State has seen a 43% jump in the past five years in the number of students being treated at the university’s counseling center. At the University of Central Florida in Orlando, the increase has been about 12% each year over the past decade. At the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, demand for counseling-center services has increased by 36% in the last seven years. ... It is unclear why the rates of mental-health problems seem to be increasing among college students. Therapists point to everything from the economy and rising cost of tuition to the impact of social media...

Stop reading the news and take up yoga. That's what some therapists in the United States are telling patients stressed out by a nasty presidential campaign in which two unpopular candidates are in a tight race for the most powerful office in the world. While some patients are unhappy with the idea of a Hillary Clinton presidency, most are worried about Donald Trump, a blunt-spoken, insult-spewing New York businessman who has never held public office, according to interviews with seven therapists across six states and the District of Columbia. The therapists said their patients have complained of difficulty sleeping, irritability...

Let me offer a few paleopsychological observations at this juncture: First, it is a medical and scientific fact that stress is powerfully correlated with the causes of a wide range of physical and psychological pathologies, and it can also aggravate just about any pre-existing condition. Moreover, chronic and prolonged stress of the kind plaguing Hillary is especially problematic, and it is reaching a fever pitch as her polls sink and the debates are days away. I am amazed that she has not completely fallen apart already. Second, traumatic and unexpected events contribute to stress, and Hillary never expected to meet...

First lady Michelle Obama has been encouraging healthy eating and exercise for years, but her efforts have failed to make a dent in the national obesity rate, which has increased since President Barack Obama took office. According to the results of the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, released Wednesday, the obesity rate in the U.S. increased 2.5 percentage points from 25.5 percent in 2008 to 28.0 percent in 2015. While the national obesity rate is on the rise, millennials (those born between 1980 and 1996) are the one generation that has seen its obesity rate decline. Since 2008, the obesity rate among...

STORRS >> The University of Connecticut is providing its students with therapy dogs to help relieve the stress of final exams. The dogs will be available for petting at the school’s Homer Babbidge Library from Monday afternoon through Friday afternoon. ... The school says it is keeping the dogs in a space that won’t impact students with allergies who may also need to use the library.

We just want you to have a good senior year!" I hardly heard the words leave my guidance counselor's mouth as I stumbled out of her office. I could barely walk back to my classroom without collapsing. I tried to process what just happened and to make sense of the fear inside me. No such luck. I was a mess of emotions, held together haphazardly by black coffee and teenage angst.

DEVELOPING -- As the manhunt unfolded for a suspect in the Paris massacre Monday, his surviving brother said he had no idea where the fugitive was hiding. Police were seeking the suspected attacker Salah Abdeslam, 26, and any possible associates. Officers set off explosions in Molenbeek, a suburb of Brussels, Belgium, but they say they failed to make any arrests Monday. "My parents are in shock and don't realize what happened," Abdeslam's brother, Mohamed, told reporters. He added, "We don't know, because of the current tensions, if he will dare to turn himself in." Mohamed Abdeslam was detained over the...

Full title: Mother of Paris suicide bomber says her son did not mean to kill anyone... and claims he may have blown himself up because of STRESS The mother of a Paris suicide bomber says her son 'did not mean to kill anyone' - and claims he may have blown himself up because of stress. Ibrahim Abdeslam, 31, launched a solo attack outside the cafe Comptoir Voltaire, close to the scene of the Bataclan concert hall massacre on Friday night. His brother Mohamed Abdeslam, a former council worker, was arrested in Molenbeek in western Brussels, a day after the attacks...

A growing body of research highlights the importance of how kids feel and how they manage those feelings, or not. Emotions drive attention, learning, memory, and decision-making. They affect relationships and psychological well-being. Learning to handle emotions well is especially important in adolescence, a time when neural networks are being sculpted that will influence behavior patterns for life.

RALEIGH, N.C.- A North Carolina woman who bought a cockatoo from a divorcing couple said the bird keeps reenacting its former owners' arguments. Elaine Sigmon said she and her husband, Don, recently obtained Peaches the Moluccan cockatoo from a couple who separated and the former owners apparently weren't shy about having arguments in front of the bird. Sigmon said Peaches reenacts her former owners' squabbles "once or twice a day."

George S. Patton once came upon a dying man at the 15th Evacuation Hospital at Sant’ Agata during the Sicilian invasion. He sparked a cigarette and placed it in the young soldier’s mouth. He smacked a shell-shocked trooper for cowardice moments later.The slap surely would have ended Patton’s career were he serving in today’s Army. The act of comfort to the dying man probably would as well.The Department of Defense is trying to extinguish the cigarettes of our nation’s servicemen. The War on Terror reversed some of the gains in the fight against tobacco as smoking rates jumped 13 percent...

The secret to stress relief? Kitties! These stressed people are invited to step inside a big glass “therapy” office and are surprised with some kitten playtime. ( 3 min video at link )

The Senate’s most vulnerable Democratic incumbents, caught in the crosscurrents of immigration reform, are urging President Barack Obama to show restraint in using his executive powers to slow deportations. Obama is locked between a progressive base demanding aggressive action and voters in conservative states that will decide the fate of the Senate and hold outsized importance in shaping the final two years of his presidency. The White House is weighing how far it can go, legally and politically, in delaying deportations for millions of undocumented immigrants. His decision will be announced just weeks before Election Day, and the timing is...

A new gene linked to suicide risk has been discovered, and researchers say the finding could lead to a blood test that predicts a person's risk of attempting suicide. The model correctly identified 80 percent to 96 percent of people who experienced suicidal thoughts or attempted suicide. It was more accurate among people at severe risk for suicide. If the findings are confirmed and lead to a blood test for suicide risk, such a test might be used to screen people in psychiatric emergency rooms or to determine how closely a person needs to be monitored for suicide risk, the...

A bull elk is back in the wild after a wild night in Garden City. The Idaho Department of Fish and Game says someone called police to report seeing an elk in a vacant lot at 42nd and Adams Street. The responding officer called Fish and Game. A conservation officer found the elk, which appeared to be stressed. Fish and Game says people were getting too close and trying to take "selfies" with the animal. Because of the stress, the elk ran off through the neighborhood including Veteran's Parkway. "When people get this close to a wild animal, the stress...

When the periscope of the USS Montpelier rose from the water during training off the coast of Florida on Oct. 13, 2012, the submarine crew saw a Navy cruiser approaching a mere 100 to 200 yards away. The cruiser USS San Jacinto tried to reverse, but it was too late. The Montpelier-San Jacinto collision was one of 906 submarine accidents from late 2004 through 2013, according to data obtained from the Naval Safety Center by The Day through a Freedom of Information Act request. The submarine's commanding officer was relieved of duty, and the costly mistake also led to changes...

White House science adviser John Holdren, a Stanford-trained physicist who taught at UC Berkeley and has studied the effects of environmental change for much of his career, says President Obama will address climate change in his visit to Fresno on Friday. “You can certainly expect that the president will talk about the connection between the increasing frequency and intensity of droughts and climate change,” Holdren said Thursday in a conference call with reporters. Although droughts are common in the West, California’s current episode is among the strongest of the past 500 years, according to paleo-climate records, and the worst since...

**SNIP** Many of the teenagers surveyed said they were suffering from irritability or angriness (40 percent), nervousness or anxiety (36 percent) or depression and sadness (33 percent) because of their stress. Sturgill told USA Today she sometimes skips meals because of high levels of stress. “Our study this year gives us a window in looking at how early these patterns might begin," clinical psychologist Norman Anderson, the APA’s CEO told USA Today. "The patterns of stress we see in adults seem to be occurring as early as the adolescent years — stress-related behaviors such as lack of sleep, lack of...