Monday, March 28, 2011

Making Peace With My Body

By Pat Ballard, Author & Body Positive Activist

I think we can all agree that most women and a lot of men aren’t at peace with their bodies. How many women do you know who are totally happy with the body that they occupy? We’re always trying to change something about ourselves, no matter what size we are, no matter how beautiful someone else tells us we are – we’re determined to be at war with our body.


We don’t come into the world hating how we look. As babies and young children, we’re at total peace with our body. Hating our body is a learned exercise. And we have many teachers. Women’s magazines, television, movies and many other areas are constantly sending the message that if we aren’t tall, thin and beautiful, then we’re not adequate. But even the tall, thin and beautiful ones are at war with their bodies.


I was at peace with my body until I was eleven years old and saw a height/weight chart in a woman’s magazine. At that point, I realized that my “numbers” weren’t right, and I started down a long, almost deadly, road of eating disorders, self-starvation, laxatives and other attempts at staying thin. Why? Because a magazine said I was too fat.


But when my son was three years old, I decided that I’d had enough. I was on the last weight-loss diet that I would ever go on. I made up my mind that I would try to eat healthily, most of the time, and I would exercise moderately, when I felt so inclined. And I determined that I would learn to love the body that developed.

I knew this was going to be a challenge, because I had no idea what my adult body was programmed to look like, since I had dieted all of my adult life. But I was going to find out.


I also knew that I would need some help, going into this new adventure, so I wrote, what I called then, the “10 Commandments of Self Love.” These commandments later became the “10 Steps To Loving Your Body.” I used these steps when I’d start to think about going on another diet. Or when I’d start feeling frightened because my weight was continually climbing and I didn’t know where it was going to stop.

But a remarkable thing began to happen. As I practiced my steps, and started to gain confidence, I started to realize that people were reacting to me much differently than I had expected. I become aware that every time I left my house and interacted with the public, I got some form of compliment. What is this? I wondered. Don’t these people realize I’m fat? They’re not supposed to be complimenting me! But they did. And as my confidence grew, so did the compliments.


Then came the freedom. Freedom to actually enjoy and love the body that I was in. Freedom to accept the body that I was genetically programmed to have. Then came the peace. I felt as if I’d finally come home.


I’m going to share the “10 Steps To Loving Your Body” and I hope that everyone will start to practice these steps and learn to live at peace with your body.

  1. Never stand in front of a mirror and think negative thoughts about yourself.
  2. Never stand anywhere and think negative thoughts about yourself.
  3. Search carefully for your good points and when you have found them, nourish them and build on them and cause them to grow daily. 
  4. Close your mind to any negative words, thoughts or actions that someone might send your way. Don’t allow negative thoughts into your subconscious.
  5. Always conduct yourself in an honorable fashion and don’t allow your mouth to appear larger than your body.
  6. Always do your best to look like you care about yourself, as no one respects a slob, no matter what size that slob might be.
  7. Learn what your best colors are, what your best hair style is, and what your best clothes style is, and never leave your house without being dressed accordingly.
  8. Always, and without fail, smile and simply say, “Thank you,” when you receive a compliment. Never think or say that the compliment isn’t true.
  9. Stop apologizing about your size. Expect everyone to accept you, respect you, and be happy with you just the way you are.
  10. But most of all, you have to love yourself. When you love yourself, others will love you and respond to you in the exact manner as you feel about yourself.
A few years ago, I turned these steps into a book titled “10 Steps To Loving Your Body (No Matter What Size You Are). It may be hard to do some of these steps to start with, but try to force yourself to do at least one until you have it conquered, then move on to the next one. Pretty soon you’ll start to feel more at peace with the wonderful body that carries you through each day. To begin this progress, I suggest that you print out and sign my “Peace Treaty with My Body in the War on Obesity.” (Click Here)

Also, feel free to print the “10 Steps To Loving Your Body,” and put both articles in a place where you can see them every day. And always remember that you are a unique one-of-a-kind work of art. There never has been nor will there ever be another body just like yours. So treat it like the treasure it is.

Pat Ballard is Author of several Romance Novels With Big Beautiful Heroines & also the nonfiction book: 10 Steps To Loving Your Body (No Matter What Size You Are)
Website:
http://www.patballard.com. For Her FREE BOOK! Something To Think About - Reflections on Life, Family, Body Image & Other Weighty Matters by the Queen of Rubenesque Romances CLICK HERE!

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Thursday, March 24, 2011

Healing A Reflection of Self

Cecelia & Robin
By Robin G. White
After years as an adoptee spent feeling like Gulliver in Lilliput, I finally came to terms with my size, shape and way of being when I met my sister, Cecelia. As I jumped out of my car at the Miami Airport and raced into her waiting, big loving arms my transformation took place. For the first time I was face to face with an honest reflection of me, a mirror image of my huge dimpled smile, high big cheeks and warm brown eyes that radiate love to the soul, and of my hips, which garnered so much attention for most of my life. That day in 2008 was the ending of a life filled with self doubt, inefficacy and lack of self-esteem. I could finally make sense of who I was and be at peace with it.

We had waited a lifetime for this moment of sisters locked in embrace. From childhood Cecelia had hugged the solitary image of a stolen moment our mama had kept of an infant me smiling atop Nana’s blanket. I had waited in a vacuum praying there was someone out there who looked like me, someone out there to claim me as their own while I searched in vain the faces of my adopted family for recognition that I belonged to them.
   
Most of us grow up with someone who we are related to by blood. Those small details and comparisons begin at birth and shape our understanding of who we are and how we fit in the world. “You have Daddy’s nose.” “You do well in school just like I did.” That running commentary organically nurtures a sense of belonging, self esteem and self efficacy. For me the comparisons were a constant reminder that I didn’t fit: “No one in our family has that hair.” “Can’t you do something about that behind?” 

Beyond my physical attributes, mine and my siblings’ differences further set me apart. I was a wild child given to messes, storytelling and adventures. Hard as I tried to fit my family’s life, I bulged past its edges until the seams split. Eventually, I learned to sew a quilt from those pieces and others and have lovingly draped myself in it.

So, after waiting a lifetime, in that solitary spark of time; every fear, every lonesome feeling, every idea that I belonged to no one was eliminated. When we embraced I knew a sense of belonging I had never felt. We pulled apart and grinned reflecting ear-to-ear smiles in all our wide hipped loveliness our mother’s and paternal grandmother’s blessing mirrored. In her eyes I saw my loving heart, in her voice my own timbre; my heart beat wildly like hers and our brains – let’s just say we think a lot alike. The years since have been filled with revelations and more family. I would meet my parents, siblings and a host of relatives each with more of the quilt which lovingly engulfs an increasingly complete me.

Boston-born writer, Robin G. White “Bobbie!” is the award-winning author of two volumes of poetry, Resurrection: A Collection of Work (Kings Crossing Publishing) and Reflections of a Life Well Spent (Sunset Pointe Press) and a forthcoming collection of short fiction, Intersections (Sunset Pointe Press). She is also the author of the forthcoming Omphaloskepsis Twelve Powers Journal a tool for focused transformational writing. In addition, Robin has pseudonymously authored seven children’s books. For more info on her work go to www.robingwhite.com. 

Monday, March 21, 2011

Healthy Pleasures

She-Driven Photography
By Fiona Zedde, Authorist
For as long as I can remember, I’ve always loved myself. My insides were flowering seeds. My outside was the perfect covering. I never dwelt on what I wasn’t, but I knew what I was. I knew what I had. And, for the most part, I knew myself.


Then, in November 2008, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Before that, I had been the healthiest person I knew. I’d never been to the hospital, never broken any bones, had no surgeries, and felt completely secure in those ten years prior that I had lived without health insurance.

That diagnosis changed me. It ripped through everything my thirty-two years of confidence and walking well in the world had led me to think I was. My body had turned against me. I was not as strong as I thought. I was not as whole. With that tumor inside me, I felt like walking weakness. It shamed me.  

Facing surgery, I had the choice of a single or double mastectomy, both equally terrifying. In the days before going into the hospital, I spent hours on the internet looking at pictures of mastectomy operations, of women with their bodies ripped open, their lymph nodes, muscle, and tissue exposed. Their lives never again to be the same.

Fiona Zedde
I had my surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation, eventually coming out on the other side of those experiences a healthy woman. Having gone through chemo which took my locks and radiation that wore me out and burned my skin, I felt lucky to have survived. But that was all. I still deeply felt my body’s betrayal.

But things changed. One day, I sat at my desk at work feeling ravaged and weak and miserable when my co-worker in the cubicle across from me said, “you’re handling this so well. I would have fallen apart if I had to go through what you did.”

I realized then that I wasn’t handling it all so well. I was letting self-pity carry me along on its toxic tide. Each day after work, I went home, only did the bare minimum of living before getting in bed and waiting for morning and another work day to come. My body was no longer what it was. I felt deformed. Less than. This was surviving; it wasn’t living.

That morning at work was my first time really looking at myself post-cancer. I didn’t like what I saw. So I vowed to stop surviving my life and start living it.

I started taking time with my body each morning. Re-learning it as I smoothed lotion into my skin, touched my breasts, my scar, the radiation burns. The weak strands of post chemo hair, I lovingly massaged and oiled, claiming this unfamiliar baby hair as mine, a part of my healing body.

Over the months of healing, I’d almost become afraid of touching my body, fearing its fragility and unfamiliar scars. But full sensuality begins with self-touch and self-love. Although I was far from being ready to share my body with a lover again, I knew that for me to be able to get to that place, I would need to love myself.

Self seduction can be difficult at first. But after one swims in that river for the first time, the current and the warm wet weight of the water become familiar and desired.

A secret part of me had always loved poetry. The poems of Audre Lorde and Pablo Neruda occupied a tiny portion of my shelf. In my search for the self I had lost, I re-discovered these two poets.

Speak earth and bless me with what is richest, Audre says. And I listened.
make sky flow honey out of my hips
rigid as mountains
spread over a valley
carved out by the mouth of rain.

            ~ Audre Lorde “Love Poem”

Kiss by kiss I cover your tiny infinity,
your margins, your rivers, your diminutive villages,
and a genital fire, transformed by delight,
slips through the narrow channels of blood
to precipitate a nocturnal carnation,
to be, and be nothing but light in the dark.

            ~ Pablo Neruda “Carnal apple, Woman filled, burning moon”

With these things; poetry, red wine, and a hot blue beginning to my new toy collection, I reclaimed who I was. I reclaimed my sexuality. This rediscovery opened me to the sensual possibilities of life, so much so that when I traveled to Spain for a quick two week trip, I allowed myself for the first time in months to feel attraction, to flirt, to touch another woman and walk with her to the edge of possibility.

No matter what a woman has to deal with—cancer, taxes, the sameness of everyday living—it’s important to nurture the sensual body. With or without a lover in your life, these frequent expressions of eroticism, of sexiness, are as important as air. For me, this nurturing was the road leading me back to myself.

Fiona  is the author of six novels - Bliss, A Taste of Sin, Every Dark Desire, Hungry For It, Kisses after Midnight, and Dangerous Pleasures – and three novellas (Pure Pleasure, Going Wild, and Sexual Attraction) published in the collections Satisfy Me, Satisfy Me Again, and Satisfy Me Tonight, respectively. Her short fiction has appeared in various anthologies including Necrologue: DIVA Book of the Dead and the Undead (DIVA), Wicked: Sexy Tales of Legendary Lovers (Cleis), and Fist of the Spider Woman (Arsenal Pulp). Find info on her at www.fionazedde.com 



Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Health & Happiness @ Any Size?
Part Two

12 Steps to Health At Every Size
By Peggy Elam, Ph.D.

The ultimate payoff to shifting your focus off of weight and toward health at whatever size you are right now is better emotional and physical health. Why not give it a try? Try this: 


1)  Stop weighing yourself. Shift your focus from weight & body fat to healthy behaviors & fitness.
2)   Fire the food & body police.
3)  Stop critical self-talk. Would you speak to a friend or loved one the way you do to your body?
4)  Increase positive talk. Talk to & treat yourself & your body the way you would a cherished friend, loved one, or child.
5)  Clean out your closets. Give or sell or throw away everything that doesn't fit, is uncomfortable, or that you haven't worn in years. Fill your closets with beautiful, comfortable clothing in your present size.
6)  Eat well & mindfully. Enjoy your food. Let nothing be off-limits; there are no forbidden foods. Don't restrict what you eat in order to lose weight, as those behaviors & attitudes have negative consequences. Focus instead on eating & living well.
7)  Be active. Find, create, or rediscover activities that you enjoy, and engage in them regularly.
8)  Listen to your body. It is the means by which you subconscious communicates with you. No one can discern your body's messages better than you can, although you may need to re-learn its language. Pay attention to "gut feelings."
9)  Respect your body. It is a manifestation of and a conduit for your soul. Ensure that others respect it, too.
10)  Reconnect mind & body. Increase your body awareness through yoga, walking meditation, Tai Chi, Qi Gong, massage & bodywork, and/or movement therapy (such as Feldenkrais). Focus on what your body can do and how good it can feel.

11)  Address any emotional eating independent of weight change.
12)  Invest in and support yourself rather than the weight loss, pharmaceutical, healthcare, fashion or beauty industries.

Dr. Peggy Elam, Ph.D., is a Psychologist, publisher (Pearlsong Press, www.pearlsong.com), editor, author, artist. More on her work can be found at her blog at www.onthewhole.info. 

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Health & Happiness @ Any Size?
Part One

By Dr. Peggy Elam, Ph.D.

Americans have been preoccupied with weight control for several decades, fueling and no doubt being fueled by a now-$60-billion-a-year weight loss industry. Yet almost all people who lose weight will regain all they lost and often more within two to five years, frequently ending up fatter than when they began.

 Body size is much more complex than the old "calories in minus calories out" equation behind recommendations to lose weight by eating less and moving more. Think calculus rather than simple arithmetic, with dozens of variables -- heredity being most heavily weighted (pun intended) -- figuring in the equation, and probably more than one unknown.
Yet from the exhortations of most health and fitness professionals and even the federal government to "Eat Less! Move More!" -- advice I'm now seeing some fat people refer to as "The Nightmare on ELMM Street" -- you'd never know that weight-focused health campaigns actually harm health by increasing the stigma, discrimination and stress fat people face every day, contributing to the rise in body shame and eating disorders, and failing to address the health needs of thin people.

The emotional well-being of women, especially, has taken a beating from public and private pressures to be thin. Even those who don't develop potentially life-threatening eating disorders often end up alienated from their natural appetites and self-regulatory processes, feeling like failures if they're unable to achieve what they or others consider "ideal" weight. And what are we to make of the rise in eating disorders hospitalizations for children under 12? Could it have anything to do with the way children across the country are being taught via "childhood obesity prevention" campaigns that chubby bodies are unacceptable and should be eradicated?

Prejudice toward very large people keeps many from exercising or sometimes even appearing in public for fear of being the object of sniggers and cruel comments -- or being featured as a headless torso in news stories about the "obesity epidemic." Others may give up any attempt at regular exercise if it doesn't result in a societally prized lean body.

Children who are bullied or teased about their weight are less likely to be physically active. Adolescents who diet end up fatter than those who don't diet, regardless of their original size. Adults, children and teens who diet are more likely to develop eating disorders than those who do not try to lose weight. Maintaining a stable "over" weight is healthier than losing and regaining weight, which can compromise the immune system.

Fat hatred and discrimination in medical, public and private settings negatively affect health in several ways. Sadly, fat women are likely to receive poorer quality health care than their thinner sisters. They are less likely to undergo preventive screenings and tests than thin women, even given the same number of doctors' visits. But many fat women avoid visiting medical professionals because they're tired of being told they need to lose weight even if they have no weight-related health problems. When they do have health problems, weight loss is often  prescribed with no acknowledgement of the poor track record of weight loss diets, programs, drugs and procedures, or the health risks associated with weight loss and regain.

Health professionals have often acted as though weight control is simply a matter of willpower and discipline ("Eat Less! Move More!"), which implies all fat people are undisciplined, lazy, or lack self-control, while pop psychology often sees fatness as the physical manifestation of emotional conflicts. Both views ignore decades of research and clinical experience indicating biological factors strongly contribute to body size and fatness, and that the body fights to return or stay at its usual size. Even professionals who do recognize the failure of ELMM approaches may encourage surgical mutilation of healthy gastrointestinal tracts in the pursuit of weight loss.

No wonder many people -- of all sizes -- give up on their bodies altogether, or alternate weight-loss-oriented restrictive eating with semi-starvation-induced bingeing.

Of course, people of any size can and do sometimes eat for emotional, rather than solely physical, reasons, but how such food intake is translated into body size is determined by a combination of factors, with, again, heredity being the most prominent. Feed -- or over-feed -- a roomful of people the same amounts and types of food and hold their activity levels constant, and you will see a roomful of people at different weights.

How can people of size -- or anyone tired of feeling miserable in and about her body -- maintain good health and emotional well-being without getting caught up in fat hatred and the pursuit of weight loss?  The answer lies in the growing Health At Every Size(SM)* movement, which advocates abandoning weight loss attempts in favor of weight-neutral healthy behaviors and respecting natural diversity in body size.

That means providing oneself with food and drink that satisfies both body and soul, regularly engaging in enjoyable physical activity, and getting plenty of sleep, rest, recreation, and other physical, emotional and spiritual nourishment. With such consistent love and caring one's body will settle at its natural weight, which for most people will be more than model-thin and for many will be what's considered "overweight" or "obese."

Rather than trying to lose weight or pare your body down to fit a clothing size or number on a scale, accept your body (and yourself) as you are and pay attention to what it (and you) really want. Sometimes that might be ice cream or a second helping at dinner; other times it will be fresh fruit or vegetables or the opportunity to move about with joy and abandon.

The ultimate payoff to shifting your focus off of weight and toward health at whatever size you are right now is better emotional and physical health. Why not give it a try? Check in on Thursday for Part 2 & Tips on How to Be Healthy @ Any Size & Resources from Dr. Elam...

Dr. Peggy Elam, Ph.D., is a Psychologist, publisher (Pearlsong Press, www.pearlsong.com), editor, author, artist. More on her work can be found at her blog at www.onthewhole.info. 

*The Association for Size Diversity & Health (www.sizediversityandhealth.org) is seeking the service mark for the concept of "Health At Every Size."







Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Can You Be Fat & Fit?


Take Xina Sy's body weight and divide it twice by her height in inches. Then, multiply that number by 703. Using this formula, you'll find that her "body mass index," or BMI, is somewhere around 32.
The National Institutes of Health indicates that adults who have a BMI of 25 or more are at risk for premature death, a consequence of their surplus weight.
So, considering Sy's calculated BMI, you could say she's a hefty gal, indeed. But Sy has another mathematical theory for you: Contrary to popular belief, "hefty" does not automatically equal "unhealthy."
"I'm a big girl," said Sy. "I have a big presence. Big is beautiful, sexy and bold!" The facts are cliché now -- America is officially fat (and, no, that's not with a "ph"). But here's the skinny anyway:
Recent studies have shown that American males and females of all ages, races and socio-economic backgrounds are more obese than ever. And those tens of millions of obese American adults, if they want to live longer, had better lose that weight before they turn 35, according to a study published last week in the Annals of Internal Medicine. Dutch researchers analyzed thousands of vital statistics collected from Massachusetts volunteers from 1948 to 1990. They found that people who are overweight when they hit their mid-30s have a greater risk of dying prematurely than do normal-weight people.
Also, the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 15 percent of children and adolescents ages 6 to 19 years are overweight and inactive. Overweight and obese people are at a much higher risk for developing diabetes or hypertension, or having a heart attack or stroke.
"Most striking is the explosion of diabetes," said Dr. James R. Gavin III, president of Morehouse School of Medicine.
But even though being overweight and obese is becoming "epidemic," according to the CDC, there is a growing scientific interest in finding out whether exercise and eating well might reduce some of the dangers touted by the studies.
For example, with "regular physical activity like simply walking for 150 minutes a week, and losing a relatively modest amount of weight -- 10 to 15 pounds -- a 200-pound person can reduce his risk of developing diabetes by 60 percent," Gavin said.
Sy -- an Atlanta fitness expert -- also believes that regular exercise might dispel much of the obesity-equals-sickness equation.
"I'm not selling a quick fix for losing weight overnight," she said. "I'm talking about a lifestyle change, a realistic, healthy alternative for a real-life situation."
Sy, mother of three girls ages 19-25, fell into the beauty trap at a young age. She spent years trying to become the woman she never could -- a size 2 voluptu-waif with those laughable 38-22-36 measurements that only the likes of Barbie could boast.
"Name the diet, I was on it at some point or another," Sy said. Her love affair with food was motivational; it calmed her self-doubt while simultaneously pumping her up to a morbidly obese 300 pounds. Sy would occasionally find a program that helped her shed some of the weight, but in time the pounds would find their way back.
"Finally," Sy said, "I decided to heck with all the diets and exercise machines. I'm going to start doing what feels right and realistic to me."
She became certified as an aerobics instructor and started Women's Fitness Plus, an exercise program catering to full-figured women. Sy, now a size 16, worked particularly with large women, helping them build their bodies and spirits.
"These women are an underserved market," she said. "My main mission was to help them feel good about themselves, not just to lose weight."
College Park resident Lynda Bright lost 155 pounds with Sy's help. After cozying up to obesity for, like, forever, the 6-foot-tall mother of five decided to give health a chance. Today, she's reaping the rewards.
"I've been invited to do a marathon for the American Stroke Association," she beamed. "Xina helped me to get here."
Charlotte Moore is a freelance writer & contributor to The Atlanta Journal Constitution.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Lessons From Lupus:
An Interview with author, Natasha Munson

 I do not recall how I came to be friends with author, Natasha Munson,but I do call her "friend." Over the years we have talked extensively about business, books, and building vision. We have shared endlessly about love and relationships, our children, and an array of personal issues that I am sure both of us feel comfortable will always stay between us. We have laughed and cried and encouraged one another through our own struggles. She is my friend. I am also a fan. She is the author of a series of several books,Life Lessons For My Sisters: How to Make Wise Choices and Live a Life You Love!, her second, Love Lessons For My Sisters: How To Find and Keep All  The Love You Deserve!, and her latest, Spiritual Lessons For My Sisters: How to Get Over the Drama and Live Your Best Life!

Her work encourages and empowers women towards becoming their highest selves and living their best lives. She is a Light in a world that often strives to darken and dampen the feminine Spirit. So, when I reached out and didn't hear anything back, for months, from one of my favorite chat buddies, I was confused until the email came through my social networking inbox. Natasha had been diagnosed with Lupus late in 2009 and was having a hard time maintaining her own life on a daily basis. After a house fire, and losing everything, the episode began and has continued to impact her life in a significant way. 
BBB: How has Lupus impacted your world?
Munson: It feels like my entire life changed when I was diagnosed with Lupus. Some days I walk a bit funny because of swollen feet and joint pain. Some days I am literally in the bed crying because of intense pain. I do believe that we attract situations into our lives based on our belief systems, so in-between these Lupus episodes I will ask what I am supposed to learn. The answer has been to 1) learn to ask for help 2) have patience 3) stop waiting so long to ask for help 4) allow myself to be taken care of 5) take care of my body and treat it well.
BBB: How has it affected your family; your daughters?
Munson: My daughters are amazing. They help me so much in dealing with Lupus. From literally making me a meal or carrying me to my room, helping me walk and get around. I believe Lupus has allowed me to let them be young adults. Instead of always taking care of them I can let them take care of me too, and they do a great job at it. As far as affecting my life and family goals, this has really allowed me to stop pushing and simply let things be. I make plans but it's not a catastrophe if they need to change. I have learned to speak up and express myself even more so. In many strange ways it has given me even more of a peaceful approach to life and challenges because I know for sure that I cannot do it all and it's all not that serious.
BBB: What tips for others facing the same types of challenges would you like to share?
Munson: I would tell others who are dealing with life changes to:
Embrace it. Yes, as difficult as it may be, accept that this is happening to you. Don't go into woe is me mode. But realize that you will have to deal with whatever is affecting you.
Accept help. If someone wants to help you, let them. Trying to be super strong is not helpful to you at this time. It's ok to show weakness, cry, say I need help, or just ask someone to hug or hold you.
Live in the moment. Appreciate every moment and breath you are given. Illness surely shows you what is important and what you cherish.
Have faith. Know that you can and will get through this. The moment will pass, the life challenge will pass. The one thing you will always have is the memory of how you dealt with those moments. Allow the God within you to show up and handle these difficulties for you.

Natasha has been promoted and featured in TheNew York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today Weekend, Publishers Weekly,  Atlanta Journal Constitution, Writer’s Digest, Essence, Ebony, Heart & Soul, Black Issues Book Review, and Sister Power magazine. She has also appeared on Lifetime Live! (Lifetime Television), BET Nightly News, At Home – Live! with Chuck & Jenni,  Mornings with Scott & Lorrie, Mom Talk Radio, Written Voices radio, Biography Channel and CBN.com (The Christian Broadcasting Network). She resides in Atlanta, GA with her two daughters.