Ribbons of Awareness

Since their introduction in the United States in 1991, colorful swirling Ribbons have quickly spread. They have wrapped their tendrils around the world to become lasting cultural icons of awareness, unity, support and hope.
Awareness Ribbon Color Meanings

Black= Melanoma Cancer, Sleep Disorders.

Blue (Navy) = Arthritis, Colon Cancer, Down's Syndrome, Osteoporosis, Osteogenesis Imperfecta, Child Abuse, Dysautonomia, Hystiocytosis, Erb's Palsy, Ankylosing Spondylitis, Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS), Dystonia, Interstitial Cystitis, Bracial Plexus Injury, Epstein-Barr Virus (EBV), Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Alopecia, Reyes Syndrome

Blue (Light) = Prostate Cancer, Men's Health and Behcet's Disease.

Blue Pin Stripe = ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease)

Burgundy = Myeloma, Hospice Care, Sepsis, APS (Antiphospholipid Antibody Syndrome), FVL, Thrombophilia, Headaches and to support the Permanently Disabled.

Gold = Childhood Cancer and COPD.

Green = Celiac Disease, Transplants, Depression (both Adults and Children), Bipolar Disorder, Mental Health or Illness, Eye Injuries, Tourette's Syndrome, Bone Marrow Transplants and Donation, Fanconi's Syndrome, Glaucoma, Leukemia, Fibrodysplasia Ossificans, Kidney Cancer or Kidney Disease, Neural Tube Defects, Mitochondrial Disease, Cerebral Palsy and to support Stem Cell Research

Gray = Asthma, Juvenile Diabetes and Brain Tumors.

Orange = Hunger, Leukemia, Self Injury, Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy, Skin Cancer (with a sun in the center of the loop), Addiction Recovery

Lavender = All Cancers (general cancer awareness), Epilepsy, Hypokalemic Periodic Paralysis, Rett Syndrome

Purple = Pancreatic Cancer, Chron's Disease and Colitis, Cystic Fibrosis, Leimyosarcoma, Macular Degeneration, Sjogren's Syndrome, Fibromyalgia, Lupus, Sarcoidosis, Thyroid Cancer, ADD, ADHD, Alzheimer's, Cancer Survivors (this is a general color that anyone who has survived cancer can wear), Chronic Pain, and Domestic Violence

Pink = Breast Cancer, Birth Parents, Cleft Palate

Pink/Blue = Prematurity, Birth Defects, Infertility, SIDS, Support for those who have had a Miscarriage

Puzzle = Autism.

Red = Aids/HIV, MDS & Aplastic Anemia, Substance and Drug Abuse (includes inhalants), MADD, DARE, Heart Disease, Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome (WPW), Pro-life, Hypertension, Evans Syndrome

Silver = Parkinson's Disease

Teal = Ovarian, Cervical, Uterine (all gynecological) Cancers, Sexual Abuse, Myasthenia Gravis and Panic Attacks.

White = Lung Cancer, Diabetes, Adoption, Bone Cancer, Osteoporosis, Scoliosis, Support and Remembrance for Victims of Terrorism, Blindness and Holocaust Remembrance

Yellow = Bladder and Testicular Cancer , Liver Disease, Hydrocephalus, Suicide Prevention, Down Syndrome and it represents Hope.

More Ribbons

National Honey Bee Awareness Day (August 22, 2009)

Can you imagine a world without the Honey Bee?

Busy Bee Facts:
- Worldwide we rely on honey bee pollination for one-third of our total food supply.

Think about it; without pollination from honey bees there would be one third less crops in the world than there is now!

- Honey bees as the main pollinators on the planet are responsible for seeding over 100 crops, including fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.

- The honey bee contributes $15 billion in crops every year in the U.S. alone.

- Honey bees must visit 2 million flowers and fly 55,000 miles to create each pound of honey

The Disappearance of The Honey Bee

Across the United States in the last three years, more than one in three honey bee colonies has died out. The disappearance of these natural little wonders are creating a risk to our food supply.

One cause of these losses is due to a mysterious ailment called Colony Collapse Disorder, or "CCD." When a hive collapses, the honey bees vanish and die. This has been reported in over 35 states across the U.S. and is a growing problem in Canada, Belgium and Spain

Researchers don't know exactly what causes CCD. Some think there may be many factors contributing to the problem; these include the Israeli Acute Paralysis Virus (IAPV), Varroa Mites- tiny, brown relatives of ticks that feed exclusively on honey bees, synthetic chemical exposure- affected hives show 45 different types of insecticides, fungicides and herbicides, and poor nutritional sources due to drought.

Learn How to Plant a Bee-Friendly Garden.

Sources: - "Disorder Caused 45% of Bee Losses." The Daily Green Online. 14 June 2007.
- Agnew, Singeli. "The Almond and the Bee." San Francisco Chronicle 14 Oct. 2007.
-"Tales from the Hive: The Buzz About Bees." PBS Nova Online. October 2000.

Monsoon Season in Southern Arizona

The word "monsoon", originally comes from the Arabic word, "mausim", meaning "a season". It was first used to describe the winds over the Arabian sea, which blow from the northeast for six months and from the southwest for another six months.

In Arizona, the monsoon, begins with the extreme dry heat of May and June, when temperatures rise to 100 degrees and above. As the atmosphere warms, the dry jet stream moves northward and the winds shift up from the south. This shift brings in humidity and moisture from the Sea of Cortez, and the Gulf of Mexico. Once the moist air arrives, the intense summer sun heats the air, creating columbous clouds, which lead to frequent afternoon and evening thunderstorms with a spectacular display of lightning.

Officially, the monsoon starts on June 15th and ends on September 30th.

Flooding causes more deaths in the United States than any other weather-related hazard except severe heat.

In Arizona and New Mexico, floods killed 57 people between 1995 and 2006, while hundreds of others have needed swift water rescues. The economic price tag is also high, costing Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah approximately $5 billion between 1972 and 2006.

The Dangers of Flash Flooding
Flash floods can occur within minutes after the onset of a rain storm. They can be deadly because water levels rise quickly and flow like rapids within minutes.

City streets become rivers, because with no drainage system, except for low-lying washes and arroyos the water has nowhere to go and cannot be absorbed into the ground.

Mountainous areas also experience flash floods, as the higher grounds funnel water into the canyons. One tragedy in 1981, killed eight people in the Sabino Canyon area in Tucson, Arizona.

Learn more here.

Children's Summer Swimming Guide To Stay Healthy and Fit

A Guide To Defining Healthy Activity Goals With Children
Parents should take the time to discuss health and activity-related goals with their children. You can use these tips as a starting point to develop goals with your child for swimming or adapt this outline for whatever type of activity your child is interested in.

Talk about swimming
Talk with your child about swimming and its positive effect on the body. Get them excited about engaging in a new activity. Your conversation may go something like this:
"It’s fun to be in a sport like swimming. Did you know that it also helps your body? When you play a sport, you build your muscles in three ways...
1. You make your muscles stronger.
2. You make your muscles stretch and pull without getting hurt.
3. You can work and play longer without getting tired. You can swim farther.
Did you know that your heart is a muscle? To build your muscles, heart and lungs, you must play a
sport at least three times a week. Before you play, you should warm up by walking, then gently stretching your muscles. This will keep your muscles from getting hurt when you play your sport. After you stop playing, walk and then stretch. This gives your body a chance to slow down and your heart rate to return to normal. The wonderful thing about swimming is that it’s one of the sports you can do your whole life."

Define goals
Next, define with your child goals for swimming. For example, you may choose to set a main, long-term goal, such as:
• Swim the length of the pool a certain number of times in one session.
• Get really good at one particular stroke, like the breast stroke.
• Practice swimming (number of times a month).
• Convince a friend to learn to swim and then do it together.
• Develop a new game your child and his or her friends can play in the water.
• Join the swim team or a synchronized swimming class.
Then, you can list the intermediate or short-term goals required to reach the main goal.

Write The Goals Down
Goals will become more real for your child if you write them down together. Here’s one way to do it. With your child, check off his or her goals as they are accomplished and post it in his or her room.

Sample Goal Sheet
My Swimming Goals
Name:
Age:
Swimming goal (what I want to accomplish):
In my next swim class, I will:
In one week, I will:
In one month, I will:
By the end of the session, I will:
By the end of the summer, I will:

Resources
The CDC has material on children and water safety, including information on swimming, using sun
screen and more, at www.cdc.gov/node.do/id/0900f3ec8016eb51. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has materials for parents and children, and many of the materials are available in English and Spanish, visit corpslakes.usace.army.mil/employees/watersafety/art.html.

Source: YMCA, Activate Tucson

10 Anger Management Coping Strategy Tips

1. Keep an "Anger Log":
How often during the day do you engage in aggressive actions such as slamming doors, honking your horn, yelling at other drivers, or barking at others? How often do you provoke people to yell, scream, or honk their horns at you?

How often do you have negative thoughts about other people? "What a jerk she is!" "I'd like to punch him!" "Why don't these morons move faster!"

How often do you blow your cool? Do you shout angrily, fantasize about physically assaulting someone, or even explicitly threaten violence? How often do you find yourself frowning, impatient, irritable, in a hurry, gritting your teeth?

Take an honest look at your anger level. Even if you think it is everybody else's fault, make note of the frequency and intensity of your anger.

Once you have kept your anger log for a week or so, you may see that you are angry more often than you thought, or you may see a pattern to your anger. This gives you the chance to deal better with your anger and to resolve some of the issues that are keeping you angry.

2. Talk to yourself:
Make a promise with yourself to try to delay getting angry. Don't you have better ways to spend your time than being angry? Usually many situations are not worth getting angry over. Your time and your health are much too valuable.

Don't jump to conclusions about the motives of the person who may be annoying you. The person who is not moving through the traffic light on schedule is not deliberately trying to keep you from getting to work on time and is probably not a stupid idiot either. He or she is probably just tired and momentarily distracted. Besides, you are probably not going to be late anyway.

3. Cool It!:
When you become aware of hostile thoughts or attitudes, tell yourself to "Stop!", "Chill" or "Cool it." Telling yourself to stop being angry interrupts your thought patterns, decreasing the chance that you will become angry.

4. Distract yourself
When you see that you really have created a 'tempest in a teapot', then back off from the situation and find some way to distract yourself. Listen to the radio when you are trapped in traffic or read a book when you are late. This will take your mind off of a situation you can't change.

5. Decide what you can do about the situation; then do it and let the anger go:
If whatever is making you angry is important, then do what you can to help change it and then get on with life. Holding on to anger after the event has passed just makes it all worse.

6. If you are chronically angry, take a look at yourself
Do you keep finding examples of situations where life is unfair?

It isn't fair. Life's unfairness is not a new discovery. What's the point of continually getting mad about it? It's also true that some people are jerks. Why bother getting mad about that?

7. Avoid over-stimulation.
- Get plenty of rest and exercise.

When you are always upset, you are more likely to feel and express hostility. Too little sleep, working under time limits, and too many items on your 'to do' list will keep you nervous and jumpy.

Watch your diet. Give up or sharply cut back on sweets, caffeine, cigarettes, and alcohol. All of these contribute to overreactions to people and situations.

8. Learn to listen
Start listening. Don't jump to conclusions. Fight the urge to break in with your own comments. Try to learn something new by listening. Don't turn conversations into cross examinations.

9. Assume other people have good intentions.
If you get angry a lot, you probably don't trust other people. You assume the worst of them. Many times your evaluation of their motives may not be correct.

Try to accept other people as they are and not how you want them to be. Try to look at the situation from the other person's perspective.

10. Learn to laugh at yourself.
We all do things that, in hindsight, are an over-reaction to something that is really a very trivial event. Laughing at ourselves helps to get rid of the anger and to keep the event in perspective.

Source: Fleet & Family Support Centers
Marine Corps Community Services, MTF Mental Health