Black soya beans could be the key to losing weight and cutting your diabetes risk, according to new research at Hanyan University in Seoul.

Rats were allowed to indulge in a fatty diet but were also given various amounts of black soya. After two weeks, rats that were getting 10% of their energy from black soy had gained only half as much weight as the control group. To top it off, the rats’ cholesterol went down, especially LDL levels. LDL or low-density lipids are considered the “bad cholesterol”.

Sounds like black soya beans could own the only true “eat all you want and still lose weight” diet claim.

Magic Beans - Anti-obesity soya could help prevent diabetes

I was talking to a friend the other day. She was telling me about her new experiences with night sweats and hot flashes, wondering if they signaled the beginning of menopause. “Try soy supplements”, I told her confidently, having read and written about research that indicates soy phytoestrogens cool hot flashes.

I realized that, in writing for Fifty-Something Women, I end up learning a lot of important information and occasionally just some fun facts.

For instance, during coffee breaks at work I often go outside despite the cold to soak up some of the sun’s rays. I figure this will banish the specter of S.A.D. as well as boost my cancer-fighting level of Vitamin D.

I learned how to read my nutrition labels and why doing so can help me avoid Sadness Snacking and the dangers of comfort foods.

It comes in handy too, when I can point out that my second cup of coffee is really a diabetes preventative in disguise or when I mention that the danish I am having with it is only to add those few extra pounds that will stave off menopause symptoms.

Okay, so maybe I also look for a few excuses but everyone needs a few excuses in life if they want to enjoy it at all. Life, as we know, must be taken with a grain of chocolate.

Email is a wonderful thing. It’s immediate and convenient and doesn’t require you to throw away the outer envelope or detach the lower portion and address the return envelope or even search for a stamp. Sure, eventually your junk mail folder bursts with spam mail and even your inbox gets an unhealthy amount of spam despite filters, but it’s easily disposed of with a simple click of the mouse.

Yet we bemoan the demise of the art of letter-writing and miss the excitement and anticipation of a letter long hoped for from a loved one far away. Even I wax nostalgic at times for such things. But the daily contents of my postal mail box is enough to cure me of that.

Inevitably it is filled with circulars, large cardboard coupons, flyers, junk mail, mail-grams, and sweepstakes entry forms that promise riches.
There is one set of sales circulars that takes up the whole mailbox and often the mailman is so generous, he gives me two of them. My real mail is wrapped up in this bundle of newsprint and usually spills out all over the porch when I try to remove the contents from the box.

Worst of all are the letters that disguise themselves as real mail. My telephone service provider sends several a week, sometimes several in one day. I have had to learn to look for the red line at the top of the envelope which indicates that it is a very important overdue bill notice. I have learned to keep those and throw the rest away. I figure that for every one real piece of mail, there are about six pieces of junk mail.

I realize this is not just a burden on me, but also on the US Postal Service and its dedicated mail carriers. Think of trudging through ice and snow just to deliver a bundle of sales offers and sweepstakes promos - how demoralizing.

And now and again there are the stories of mounds of mail being found in the homes of deceased mail carriers. I can’t really blame them, I wouldn’t want to carry all that garbage around either. This happened a few months ago in my area. A mail carrier didn’t return from his rounds and his supervisor went to his home to check on him. What he found was that the mail carrier had expired of a heart attack. He also found a lot of mail, years worth of it.

Most of it was junk mail, circulars, filler mail and mail for people who had moved with no forwarding address. Had he lived, the mail carrier would have faced federal charges but I for one, would like to say “thank you”.

I don’t have time every day to scrutinize the mail and sort out the important items from the junk offers and those addressed to “current resident”. I would prefer my mailman hoard my mail for me, instead of it being kept in piles at my house.

If my mail carrier secretly spirited away all my sales circulars and junk mail, I wouldn’t mind a bit. I might even give him a nice envelope with a tip at Christmas. Alas, the federal government takes a dim view of mail carriers sorting through the mail and only delivering the really important stuff.

Personally, I wish more mail carriers would do it.

A study published in the January issue of the Journal of Marketing tells us what all women already knew: when people are sad they tend to turn to “comfort” foods more often than when they are happy. Any woman who has spent her life experiencing the hormonal mood swings of PMS and menopause understands this very well.

Several studies compared the amount of buttered popcorn or grapes consumed by two groups, one that watched sad movies and read sad stories and another that watched an upbeat movie and read happy stories. Not surprisingly, those exposed to the sad movie and stories ate much more of the less healthy snack.

Okay, so we know that when we are down, we look for a quick shot of euphoria in junky but tasty snacks. The possibility of always remaining happy and upbeat is not a viable solution, there are times when everyone will experience some sadness or disappointment. So, what do we do about our tendency to self-medicate with unhealthy snacks?

Read the nutrition label, say the researchers. Those in the sad group that were exposed to the nutritional facts about the unhealthy snack curbed their consumption. Interestingly, those in the happy group didn’t eat less after reading nutritional information. They were already regulating their consumption by mood.

Personally, when I reach for the chocolate cake or greasy bacon cheeseburger, the last thing I want to think about is how unhealthy it is and how much I will suffer for it later. But the research indicates that when we do inform ourselves of the nutritional facts and consider the consequences, we can make better decisions - even when we are down in the dumps.

I am now going to reorganize my cupboards. I am going to turn all the food packages around so I see the nutrition labels first, rather than the tasty illustrations of the food inside.

Mood-Food Connection: We Eat More And Less-Healthy Comfort Foods When We Feel Down, Study Finds