Inside Gloria's Mind

China negotiating on female condom

Female-condom maker courts China

CHICAGO (AFP) - The US company that makes the female condom said it is looking to launch its product in China, a country that experts say is facing a potential AIDS crisis.

The Female Health Company has signed a letter of understanding with Beijing Zizhu Pharmaceutical Co. to make its product available to Chinese women through aid groups and also commercially on the open market.

Get more information about the female condom.

The perfect complement to a dildo

I'm all for sisters doing it for themselves. But sleeping with a creepy fake amputated arm snuggled around you...I just don't know.

After a long night at work as a radio DJ, Junko Suzuki likes to snuggle at bedtime — and she says she's found the perfect partner: a man-shaped pillow.

Linen maker Kameo Corp.'s new "Boyfriend's Arm Pillow" — which consists of a headless torso and a stuffed arm that curls around the sleeper — might make some people uneasy.

But not Suzuki, or about 1,000 others in Japan who have bought the pillow, which Kameo says is the first of its kind. The product went on the market last December.

"I like to sleep holding someone's hand," Suzuki, 34. "And this pillow makes me feel relaxed because I can hold the arm and feel something warm at my side."

Kameo, based in the southern Japanese city of Fukuoka, says the pillow is not only an emotional comfort, but that its shape keeps the body balanced by supporting the sleeper from both sides.

Photo: AP Photo/Koji Sasahara

What some enterprising sex merchant should do is motorize that hand, or make it clutch another famous Japanese, uhhh, sleep-aid, the rabbit pearl, and basically you would never need a boyfriend at all.

(Of course, it'd help if the pillow could take out the garbage or build bookshelves but what the heck, men never get the recycling right anyway and real women know how to use power tools....)

German men will be men

German men want partners to be more adventurous in the bedroom

...According to the survey published in "Journal Fur Die Frau," (Journal For The Woman) more than half of the 1,000 men questioned would also like their partner to be able to distinguish between important and unimportant purchases.

The survey also revealed that 51 percent of men would like a partner who does not lose her temper easily, while 48 percent said they never wanted to be asked "What do you think?" by their girlfriends or wives.

And one German man in four said their ideal woman would be one who could cook like their mothers.

The medical debate over circumcision

The cruellest cut of all

As the medical case for circumcision fades, angry campaigners are calling for a ban on a practice they claim violates human rights, says Jerome Burne

....Forty or 50 years ago, circumcision was unremarkable - as many as half of newborn male babies in the UK were circumcised on the grounds that it was more hygienic and could protect them against conditions such as penile and prostate cancer as well as urinary tract infections. Such claims proved to be unfounded, and the number of circumcisions has plunged to between four and six per cent, most of which are said to be done for therapeutic reasons. (Figures are hard to come by, as records are based on medical, not religious, circumcisions.) Recent guidelines issued by Canadian surgeons declare that "circumcision performed on a healthy infant is now considered a non-therapeutic and medically unnecessary intervention", and UK doctors' associations agree.

The change is a triumph for evidence-based medicine, but it raises some tricky questions. If circumcision is medically unnecessary, is it right to subject small babies to it?....

Doctors began to promote circumcision in the 1850s as a cure for masturbation, then seen as a cause of insanity, epilepsy, hysteria, tuberculosis, short-sightedness and death.

In Finland, where no one is circumcised at birth, only one man in 16,667 has it done subsequently.

Foreskins removed from babies are in great demand by biomedical companies who use them in the manufacture of insulin and for producing artificial skin. A single foreskin is said to be able to grow 250,000 square feet of skin....

Do you hear I'm sexy?

Voice 'Reflects Our Sex Life'

The human voice can reveal secrets about our sex lives, scientists have revealed.

And people really can tell if another person is attractive simply by listening to them, according to the American researchers.

In a study, volunteers were asked to rate, out of 10, the “attractiveness” of different voices which were played on a tape.

The researchers at the State University of New York, in Albany, found that the voices which received the highest ratings belonged to people who had more active sex lives....

Anne Rice's blood boils

Vampire queen versus Amazon

The now defunct Eaton's department store used to advertise that satisfaction was guaranteed or your money refunded. But no novelist we know of has ever made a similar offer to the public — until now.

Writer Anne Rice, whose extravagant fictions about vampires and witches have made her famous and rich, vents her anger at readers who dare criticize her latest book Blood Canticle on the Amazon.com website and ends her lengthy, single-paragraph tirade by giving her home address in New Orleans and promising refunds to the disgruntled.

"And if you want your money back for the book, send it to 1239 First Street, New Orleans La. 70130. I am not a coward about my real name or where I live," she writes in a message posted Sept. 6 in response to the harsh criticisms and expressions of disappointment from dozens of readers. "And how glad I am that this book is the last one in a series that has invited your hateful and ugly responses."

Blood Canticle is the ninth and final instalment in the Vampire Chronicles, the series Rice began in 1973 with her first published novel Interview With A Vampire. Three books in the series have become feature films....

(Thanks to my little kittypet for the link!)

Liar liar! Yikes! House on fire!!

There are Bubbas. And then there are Bubbas like this:

Man Sets Home Ablaze Burning Wife's Pants

PINE BLUFF, Ark. - A man who set his wife's pants on fire because he believed she was having an affair accidentally torched his mobile home and has been charged with arson, police said.

The sad sexual state of Uganda

Of all the countries in the world, poor Uganda has had some of the hardest knocks at all. As if Idi Amin Dada hadn't wrought enough horrors on this land, Uganda has been devestated by AIDS. This opinion piece spells out some reasons why.

Facing the Dilemma of 'The Sexually Illiterate'

It's 2004 and HIV/Aids has been present for a couple of decades but people still feign ignorance of what it is all about.

They prefer to proclaim sex as the utmost entertainment jig around.

This would not be a problem, however, if people knew how to do it right and did not wind up hanging their condoms on window pens with the hope of re-using them.

....One Apuuli, aged about 37, has no pleasant words for condoms. To him they are a limitation to true love. His argument is buttressed by a tradition of natural sex. But it gets more absurd. One other man, who preferred anonymity, argues that marrying only one woman is a shame to manhood....

One Maria Atwooki says a woman has no right over sex and cannot say no to a man's advances. It is a dictate of culture, she says.

When issues of modern sex techniques are mentioned - like masturbation and oral sex as avenues of limiting the spread of HIV/Aids - an elderly man almost loses his step and charges that it's not only obscene but ridiculous.

"How can I do such a thing when there are women every where, I would rather buy the sex then do such," he asserts.

Visiting Bundibugyo proves that the rural mind is deeply set in tradition practice. This kid of situation renders people vulnerable to infection. Nobody wants to talk about HIV/Aids.

Many men take pride in having several women as sexual partners. The essence of polygamy is cultural and it's worse when one woman mentions that children as young as nine often get pregnant....

The Curious case of Pitcairn's child sex history

This story has been unfolding for a couple of weeks. It raises some interesting questions about the conflicts between local custom and international law, and how outside legal bodies can force morality on people who don't believe they are immoral in the first place.

Until now, Pitcairn was most famous for being the island where Spencer Christian, leader of the infamous "Mutiny on the Bounty," settled. Recently, British prosecutors have gone after the men of Pitcairn Island (which remains a British dependency) on charges of child sexual abuse. Residents, however, claim that girls have always been sexually active from a young age on Pitcairn. Now the wives, mothers and other female relatives of the accused are decrying what they see as a witch-hunt of their men.

Here are two reports on the situation from Australia and New Zealand, respectively.

Island women stand by their men

...As one of the world's most remote territories prepares for the trial of seven island men on child sex charges, their wives, daughters, sisters and mothers yesterday gathered in the tiny settlement of Adamstown to declare their innocence.

In this tiny community of 47, everyone has a relative who will go on trial for his freedom tomorrow.

One woman will see her father, son and husband in the dock, accused of participating in what prosecutors say is an ingrained culture of Pitcairn men using young girls for sex. Yes, underage sex has always been part of Pitcairn culture, said three generations of Pitcairn women at yesterday's meeting, but it was consensual.

Sex starts young on Pitcairn, say women

PITCAIRN ISLAND - The women of Pitcairn Island are angry. They say the outside world has a skewed perception of how their tiny community functions. They are furious that their men, seven of whom go on trial tomorrow on child sex abuse charges, have been depicted as hardened criminals.

So determined are they to get their views across that they invited the detested media to a public meeting yesterday. In raised voices that cracked with emotion, they claimed that no girl on the island had ever had sex against her will.

The seven men face 55 counts of rape, indecent assault and gross indecency against children aged as young as five.

But the island's women said yesterday that Pitcairn, Britain's last dependency in the South Pacific, had had a tradition of under-age sex since it was settled by the mutineers from HMS Bounty in 1790.

The meeting, attended by 13 women from three generations, was held at Big Fence, the home of Olive Christian, the wife of Pitcairn's mayor, Steve Christian. The message was that local girls mature sexually early on, and all the alleged victims had been willing participants....

Meralda Warren said she believed the prosecution was a British plot to jail the community's able-bodied men and "close down" the island.

For more information on Pitcairn Island's history, visit:

Utopia Britannica: Mutiny in Utopia

Andy.Christian.pn, is run by an eighth generation descendent of Fletcher Christian, who has gorgeous photos of his native land.

You can also find a more in-depth history of the HMS Bounty mutiny at The Bounty and Pitcairn Island

Aussie Tax Office demurely withdraws

Aw, gee, what a pity. Only a couple of weeks ago, they said they would.

No sex for us, says tax office [28sep04]

THE Australian Taxation Office has dropped plans to sponsor the sex industry's award night.

Sex and aging: lifetime companions

Sex keeps older couples connected, experts say

...Almost half of Americans 60 and older are sexually active, according to a survey by the National Council on Aging, and about 40 percent of these people indicated a desire for more sex. The frequency of sex dips in older years. Among men and women aged 75 and older, about 25 percent engage in sex at least once a week, down from 60 percent of people between the ages of 45 and 59, according to an AARP Modern Maturity Sexuality Survey conducted in 1999.

Many experts believe that as long as their health allows a couple should be able to enjoy the same sexual frequency as in their younger years. Many experts steer clear of offering specific numbers when discussing sexual frequency. Sughrue puts it this way: "It can't be put on a shelf weeks or months at a time."

Although some health issues create serious challenges for couples wanting to be sexual, experts say other forms of intimacy can be a perfect substitute to intercourse. They suggest kissing, sleeping naked together, even simply snuggling....

Israeli sex trade scandal

40 arrested in 'olim' sex scam

Jerusalem police have uncovered a sophisticated international network of trading in women, which operated under the guise of new immigrants from the Ukraine who took on fake Jewish identities, swindling the state of millions of dollars, police announced Monday.

The affair came to light following a months-long undercover police investigation which found that Israeli Jewish men, including new immigrants, were enlisting young Ukrainian women in financial duress to take on the identities of Jews living in the Ukraine in order to receive the absorption basket afforded by the state to new immigrants, police said. The young women, who put in requests for aliya with their fictitious husbands at the Israeli Consulate in the Ukraine, agreed to pay the ringleaders $40,000 as well as the full absorption rights they would receive in return for the fake papers and the phony identities enabling them to immigrate.

After the women arrived in Israel as new immigrants, they would work as prostitutes while their 'husbands and children' would return to the CIS, police said.

Police believe that at least 70 families were "absorbed" in Israel in such a fashion...

Why is Big Tex smiling?

Worker repairing Big Tex.

Intersex Initiative: UCLA study was hooey

Thanks to Emi @ Intersex Initiative for commenting that the study results I posted the other day have since been discredited by the Intersex Initiative. And, while the article I cited showed a date of September 27, 2004 at the top, it appears they were reporting on an OLD study! Eek. I hate getting it so wrong... :-(

I will correct the old post. Meanwhile, here are snips from the article Emi is referring to:

Reuters Report About the UCLA "Brain Sex" Study Baseless

In the article titled "Sexual Identity Hard-Wired by Genetics," Reuters reported on October 20 that one's sexual or gender identity is "wired into the genes," citing the new research by UCLA geneticist Eric Vilain and colleagues. According to Vilain, the findings would suggest that "sexual identity is rooted in every person's biology before birth" and that this knowledge may be used to ensure that intersex babies are assigned the correct gender. "If physicians could predict the gender of newborns with ambiguous genitalia at birth, we would make less mistakes in gender assignment," Vilain said. However, none of this is actually established or discussed in the actual research paper this news report is based on.

The actual research published in Molecular Brain Research (Vol. 118, pgs. 82-90) is titled "Sexually dimorphic gene expression in mouse brain precedes gonadal differentiation," and this title summarizes the entire paper accurately: this study shows that female and male mice develop different brain structure even before their gonads are formed. The significance of this study is that sex differences in the brain have been traditionally said to be caused by the different levels of hormones produced by the gonads--testes for males, ovaries for females....

Testosterone patch for women

I'm a little concerned by how they are marketing this new testosterone patch for women. Calling it "Female Viagra" is not accurate. It will not have the same effect on all women who take it and really is intended for women who are unable to become aroused because of a hormone imbalance--most usually the result of having both ovaries removed. If your problems with arousal stem from emotional or psychological issues, you are not the person for whom this treatment was designed.

That said, raising a woman's testosterone level will likely cause an increase in her libido, so we can expect that this drug will begin to be widely used by a much larger market that technically should be using it. No doubt, the pharmaceutical company is depending on that fact too.

So if you intend to take this pharmacological route to increased female libido, be aware that repeated use of testosterone can have other extremely unpleasant side-effects on women. Masculine traits (body and facial hair, coarsening of skin, and other unwanted effects, such as acne) may show up. Make sure you consult carefully with your physician to determine how much you can take, at what intervals, to avoid these common side-effects of testosterone.

'Female Viagra' may enter market

The first prescription treatment for women with a flagging libido could enter the market next year, and a second, related product might not be far behind.

Both deliver testosterone through the skin and are aimed at women who have had their ovaries removed, causing them to go into menopause. (Although testosterone is thought of as a male hormone, women's ovaries and adrenal glands produce small amounts.) The resulting low testosterone levels are associated with decreased sexual desire - thus the new products' nickname: "female Viagra."

Some observers are concerned that women who don't have low testosterone but want to boost their sex drive will get prescriptions. Already, some doctors have prescribed testosterone treatments approved only for men to postmenopausal women.

"It does need to be emphasized that this is not a benign drug in women..."

Buying Viagra on-line? Don't.

Half of Internet Viagra Could Be Fake - Study

LONDON (Reuters) - As many as half of the Viagra anti-impotence pills sold on the Internet could be counterfeit, British scientists said on Tuesday.

They analyzed samples of Viagra sold on the Web and found that some of the little blue pills contained different components or less of the active ingredient than the top-selling drug made by pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc.

"On our initial estimate, around half of those Viagra samples could be counterfeit," Dr Nic Wilson, of the University of London, told the British Pharmaceutical Conference.

If you've been purchasing Viagra on-line, and it hasn't turned your little "Bruce Banner" into "The Incredible Hulk," it could be because it's fake. Same goes for those big blue pills you've been buying from a friend of a friend who knows someone who knows someone. People are passing these pills around like jelly beans. But they are by nature controlled substances because, for example, if you have heart problems or potential heart problems, they can be fatal. Meanwhile, scam artists the world over are formulating phony look-alikes.

There is only one way to be sure the the Viagra (or Cialis or Levitra) you are purchasing is the real quill and is safe for you to use: get a real prescription from a real MD who either knows your health status or checks you out before writing the script. I have yet to hear of a single physician who will not prescribe these to men who ask for them unless the men are at risk.

Don't let shyness or embarrassment prevent you from protecting yourself from fraud or potentially fatal complications. Remember what your momma said: don't put anything in your mouth if you don't know where it's been. (Aha! An extra little plug for safe sex!)

Sex and mentally disabled kids

If you or someone you love is raising a mentally disabled child, this article is a must-read.

Young, in love and mentally disabled

MOUNT PLEASANT - Dating can be nerve-wracking enough for any parent. But when a dating son or daughter is mentally disabled, imagine how the potential anxiety rises.

However, the developmentally disabled do have the right, and often the desire, to date, fall in love and have sex....

Interestingly, legal guardians do not have the right to restrict access to sexual activity by their charges, Barnard said - unless it is impossible for the person to show consent to that activity. Many people with moderate mental retardation can consent but also have legal guardians, she added....

This thorny area is made more tortuous by contradictory laws, Barnard said. A legal guardian can say that the disabled adult may not have a child.

"But the legal guardian does not have the right to say you must use birth control," she said, nor can it stop the person from having sex. "The law is very confused on that."

A legal guardian also cannot require that a disabled adult be sterilized. The disabled person, upon reaching 18, may consent to that operation, if consent can be given....

Curriculum on gender differences

This curriculum outline from the University of Plymouth (UK) offers an easy-to-follow annotated and illustrated analysis of gender differences and genetic disorders, including congenital adrenal hyperplasia. Highly recommended for students of sexuality, intersexed individuals, helping professionals, and others who are interested in the science of sex.

Biological perspectives on gender differences

Sexual identity linked to genes

IMPORTANT UPDATE:

Despite the September 2004 date for this story on the source below, this is an old story which has since been discredited by the Intersex Initiative. I am leaving the following here but please follow up your reading by checking out: Intersex Initiative: UCLA study was hooey.

Study suggests gender

UCLA research shows 54 genes influence sexual identity; challenges idea of homosexuality as lifestyle choice

Questioning 30 years of research that attributes the differentiation between male and female brains to the influence of sex hormones, a study by researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles claims to have identified 54 genes that may trigger the differences between male and female brain development long before birth.

The authors of the study claim that their findings may offer physicians a tool for gender assignment for babies born with ambiguous genitalia and may lend support to theories of biological determination of gay and lesbian identity.

The findings are included in the October issues of Molecular Brain Research, a scholarly journal....

"It's quite possible that sexual identity and physical attraction is 'hard-wired' by the brain," Vilain said.

Determining that sexual orientation is biologically controlled should lead to political and social changes, he said....

Actors no longer hiding their quirks

Naturally, I was hoping for something a tad kinkier, but this was still fun celebrity gossip.

Attention-seeking stars becoming the norm

Movie studios used to work with the press to hush up their stars' eccentric behavior. The theory was that if the public knew about an actor's penchant for, say, edible cross-dressing, they'd be less likely to enjoy him in a romantic comedy.

So stars kept their idiosyncrasies undercover, except in very rare cases. Like Marlon Brando. The late, great actor once said, "I am myself, and if I have to hit my head against a brick wall to remain myself, I will do it."

Which actually explains a lot.

The guy was so quirky that he retreated to Tahiti, only emerging every few years to make movies such as "The Island of Dr. Moreau" (in a role that -- he felt -- called for a bucket on his head).

Martin Scorsese is making a movie about another Hollywood eccentric, due this winter. "The Aviator" stars Leonardo DiCaprio as the multifaceted Howard Hughes: oil man, playboy, filmmaker, billionaire.

But all you really need to know about him is that he wore Kleenex boxes for shoes.

Now, it turns out, Brando and Hughes were before their time.

These days, odd behavior is a viable career move. Pioneered by Angelina Jolie and her "Yeah, I enjoy a little erotic knifeplay, what of it?" attitude, she is the godmother of the Gotta Be Me movement.

Why is the timing right for peculiarity? Show business has never been more competitive. Mutant good looks are no longer enough. So today I'd like to hail those stars who are setting themselves apart by making audiences very, very nervous....

Bridget Bardot fetish

She truly was gorgeous once upon a time but hasn't she turned into a racist of some kind in her advancing years?

Fan auctions his collection of 8,100 items on Bridget Bardot!

London, Sept 26 : A 74-year old man is auctioning a collection of 8,100 items on one of the greatest sex symbols of all times, Bridget Bardot, which he has collected over a period of 58 years.

Mr Cees Storm has revealed that he developed an interest in the "And God Created Women' star as a sixteen year old boy and has since kept every article and photograph that he ever saw of the actress....

Storm says that it was not love or obsession that made him spend a lifetime collecting Bardot's pictures and dedicating two rooms of his house to the items, instead it was her charisma he says, although his wife thinks it was the breasts.

Car fetish from Venturi

For one heady second, I thought Venturi was going after the SM market...

Finally on the roads: Venturi Fetish

Symbol of renewal, the Fetish concept-car, unveiled in 2002 at the Geneva International Motor Show, embodies the new turn Venturi has taken in terms of design.

Presented at the Paris Motor Show the same year, the Fetish concept-car was awarded a “Talent du Luxe” as well as the “Michelin Challenge Design”, therefore making Venturi ambassador of France during the 2003 Detroit Motor Show....

Where public opinion considers an electric vehicle to be ugly, Fétish is the first electric car to be beautiful and desirable. Where public opinion believes that an electric car lacks performance, Fétish offers a remarkable acceleration and a maximum speed of 170 Km/h, well above the maximum speed limit.

Activism changes the face of women's health

Good read on how women's health activism has changed the medical landscape and new trends in the ethics and standards of medical care for women.

Previously unmentionable: A change in attitude about women's health care ... American Medical News

The impact of the women's rights movement changed women's care -- making formerly taboo topics now a part of everyday medicine.

By Kathleen Phalen Tomaselli, Oct. 4, 2004.

In the blush of post-war 1950, women were silent about their bodies. Topics such as menopause and sexual health were rarely discussed, even in the exam room.

Gender-based treatment differences were not considered disparities. And, until recently, the understanding of the feminine experience with illness and disease generally came from studying men.

Women's health activism triggered cultural shifts on many levels. For instance, the advent of the birth-control pill ushered in reproductive freedom and even helped fuel creation of women's health clinics. More recently, women have backed successful drives to fund research for heart disease and breast cancer, shedding light on prevention and early detection. Their advocacy also led to policy changes to lengthen hospital stays and overturn managed care restrictions, giving rise to terminology such as "drive-through deliveries" and "overnight mastectomies."

One particularly poignant example: the fight to gain insurance coverage for breast reconstruction. "They said the breast was an organ with no function," says Christine Horner, MD, then a Kentucky-based plastic surgeon. "Yet they paid for penile reconstruction and penile implants." She considered this situation unacceptable and, in the early 1990s, became involved in organizing a grassroots campaign, founding the Women's Health Advocacy Project and eventually garnering support from the American Cancer Society, the American Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons, and others.

Ultimately, the Women's Health and Cancer Rights Act was passed in 1998. Because of it, all health plans covering mastectomies are required to pay for breast reconstruction.

But the coming of age of women's health is not only reflected in the directions of public policy. It also can be seen in individual behavior. Now more than ever, women are informed consumers -- they read, research and gather information from the Internet, from daily news, women's magazines, and even medical journals. Armed with data, they freely question physicians. At the same time, their presence at the other end of the stethoscope has increased, too.

Literature: Graham Greene's sexual appetites

A peek into the restless private life of a great novelist.

Novelist Greene a 'sexual raider'

THE tangled and messy love life of novelist Graham Greene is revealed in the final volume of his official biography, which portrays him as a voracious "sexual raider" who once listed 47 prostitutes he had slept with.

While Greene, regarded as one of the late 20th century's greatest English writers, remained married for 64 years, the extent of his adultery was extraordinary.

The new book - the third volume of the Life of Graham Greene - reveals that as well as having four long-term affairs, he was quite brazen about his relationships with prostitutes.

When in 1948 Catherine Walston, his mistress, challenged him about rumours that he paid women for sex, he scribbled down a list of his 47 favourite prostitutes and gave it to her. In the list the women, whom he had procured on the London streets since his marriage in 1927, were given names such as Russian Boots, Channel Islands Girl, Blackmail, Bishop Hooper, Black Pants, Bond Street French and Caesarian.

Artful nudity

Art lovers urged to strip off

...Kevin Money is offering 25% off any purchases of works from his Bodyline exhibition to anyone who bares all.

So far, locals at Gallery 39 in Swindon, Wiltshire, have been reluctant to take the gallery owner up on his offer, reports Sky News online.

"I'm happy to close the blinds and if they want to take their clothes off, I'll give them 25% off," he said....

Encouraging customers to strip off is a way of helping them to experience the art in a more profound way, Mr Money said.

Car sex climaxes in fatal crash

Quebec man killed in head-on crash while having sex at the wheel

ST-JOACHIM, Que. (CP) - A 25-year-old man was killed and his partner was seriously injured Friday in a head-on crash that police said took place while the driver was having sex behind the wheel.

Another car veered into the couple's path in this town 25 kilometres northeast of Quebec City, shattering both vehicles and trapping the occupants....

Witnesses said the deceased man and his female passenger were partially undressed, leading police to believe the couple had been having sex prior to impact.

"The two people at this moment were in the midst of having sexual intercourse at the wheel of the vehicle, which makes driving that much more dangerous," said provincial police spokesman Richard Gagne.

Although the couple's car never veered out of its lane, police said their manoeuvre was dangerous and potentially illegal.

How depression is different for women

An excellent summary of the issues specific to female depression, with self-diagnostic tools, from the Mayo Clinic.

Women and depression: Understanding the gender gap

The female body itself may influence the development of depression. That's because hormones may alter mood through various stages of life. In fact, before girls and boys reach puberty, they share similar rates of depression. It's only after puberty that the gender disparity in depression-related disorders truly becomes pronounced. By age 15, for example, girls are almost twice as likely as boys to have developed depression.

Because this gender gap coincides with puberty and disappears after menopause, some researchers believe that hormonal factors can increase a woman's risk of developing depression. On the other hand, puberty is also often associated with other changes that could play a role in depression, such as emerging sexuality and identity issues, parental conflicts and evolving social expectations. These psychosocial factors could interact with hormonal changes in women and result in an increased risk of depression.

Drastic fluctuations in hormones can have a profound effect on a woman's life. Coupled with personality factors, relationship issues, socioeconomic factors and other issues, women are more vulnerable to depression than men. Here's a look at how these factors influence depression in women.

Impotence and heart disease

The article below doesn't make the point directly so I will: never buy or use anti-impotence drugs unless you have consulted your physician and know you are not at risk of complications. The men most likely to run into serious problems with Viagra, Cialis or Levitra are those who self-medicate after obtaining the drugs on the Internet or from a friend. A trip to a family physician or a urologist is a step you cannot skip if you plan to use these drugs, no matter your age or health status.

Impotence: A Red Flag for Heart Disease

SUNDAY, Sept. 26 (HealthDayNews) -- For men, flagging potency can be a red flag that something's not right in the cardiovascular system. And experts say men who rush to fix the problem with impotence drugs may be ignoring a bigger threat to their health.

"Erectile dysfunction [ED] is frequently a manifestation of underlying cardiovascular problems. It even precedes angina -- it can be an early warning, in that respect," said Dr. Andrew McCullough, director of male sexual health, fertility and microsurgery at New York University School of Medicine in New York City.

....men with erectile difficulties should stop and consider the possible underlying cause of that dysfunction, McCullough said....

"One of the most serious things, in my mind, is the guy who fails Viagra, Cialis, Levitra. Because to me, that suggests he's got more serious underlying disease than some guy for whom it works," he said.

McCullough's advice? "Go see your doctor."

Gutterman agreed. "Some folks with undiagnosed heart disease might not get chest pain first, but they'll get erectile dysfunction. It's just another way of picking up on early coronary disease."

Sex differences impact health issues

Men, Women More Different Than Thought

CHICAGO - Beyond the tired cliches and sperm-and-egg basics taught in grade school science class, researchers are discovering that men and women are even more different than anyone realized.

It turns out that major illnesses like heart disease and lung cancer are influenced by gender and that perhaps treatments for women ought to be slightly different from the approach used for men.

These discoveries are part of a quiet but revolutionary change infiltrating U.S. medicine as a growing number of scientists realize there's more to women's health than just the anatomy that makes them female, and that the same diseases often affect men and women in different ways.

Opposite sex games help kids grow

Fascinating study!

Playing 'Boy' Games Helps Girls, and Vice Versa

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Ten-year olds who spend more time engaging in activities typically associated with their gender tend to have more stereotypical academic interests, skills and characteristics two years later, new research reports.

For instance, girls who logged many hours on "girl" activities like reading, knitting, dancing or playing with dolls tended to get better grades in English, show more signs of sensitivity, and were more likely to have low self-esteem, which is more common in girls, the Pennsylvania-based researchers noted.

However, girls who spent more time on sports -- a traditionally masculine pursuit -- tended to become more interested in math two years later, regardless of their interest in math at age 10.

Likewise, boys who spent more time playing music -- a traditionally feminine activity -- got relatively good grades in math 2 years later....

McHale added that adopting many traditional gender roles and interests can "foreclose possibilities" for kids. Therefore, parents may want to encourage their children to pursue activities not typically associated with their sex to expand their horizons....