Wellness Wednesday

Your to-do list is probably as long as your arm, you have a cold, and you have three tests to study for—it’s finals time. If you’re stressing big-time, we want you to first take a deep breath and relax. You’ve got this.

In this week’s installment, Ilana Schlesinger, a wellness coordinator at the Boston University School of Public Health, gives some great tips on how to de-stress while studying for final exams.

Hosted by Amy Laskowski. Produced by Alan Wong. Recorded and edited by Sarika Ram.

You might be considering pulling out your stretchy pants in preparation for next week’s Thanksgiving dinner. But instead of stacking your plate high with mashed potatoes, cornbread stuffing, pumpkin pie, and an extra scoop of rich gravy, a few simple changes can help prevent a food coma while making your holiday feast no less enjoyable. One example? Roasted veggies instead of a scoop of the sweet potato casserole with marshmallows on top.

For more ideas, we talk with Joan Salge Blake, a clinical associate professor of nutrition at Boston University's Sargent College of Health & Rehabilitation Sciences.

Everyone has setbacks. It might be a failed test, a bad breakup, or not getting that dream internship. You feel like crawling into bed, closing the shades, and never getting up. But that doesn’t make the problem go away, and how you respond to these setbacks is really important. Resilience is your ability to bounce back from challenges and keep going.

For this week’s installment of our “Wellness Wednesday” series, we talk with Avery Ofoje, a Student Health Ambassador with BU Student Health Services Wellness & Prevention. Ofoje and her fellow Student Health Ambassadors are leading a new workshop that teaches tips on how to respond to failure and how to build resiliency.

It’s the countdown to Halloween, and so for this week’s installment of our “Wellness Wednesday” series, we have candy on the brain. We caught up with Rachel Reynolds, assistant director and senior nutritionist at Boston University's Sargent Choice Nutrition Center, to talk about—what else?—sugar.

Is sugar always bad? How can you practice self-control? And is it OK to throw out the sugar rules for one day and go a little, uh, nuts? 

This week, we have a candid conversation with Liliana Torres, a student at Boston University who is living with depression. Torres is a student health ambassador, Boston University Wellness & Prevention Services peer educators who help develop, evaluate, and deliver wellness programs to the campus community. She shares what it feels like to live with depression and when and why she decided to seek help. It’s worth a listen. 

And remember that Thursday, October 10, is National Depression Screening Day. 

You and your best friends from home are now separated, not by a few blocks, but by hundreds or maybe thousands of miles, for nine months out of the year. Holiday breaks are nice, and Facetime and Instagram help you stay connected. But how do you keep up a close friendship long-distance? And is it really that important to stay in touch with those friends from back home?

Our wellness tip for this week is yes, you should absolutely maintain those long-distance friendships with the people back home. Of course it’s important to start making new friends on campus, but it’s important to keep up your old ties, too.

You hear it all the time. You know it’s true. Exercise has a positive effect on your health and mood. It delivers more energy than a cup of coffee, it can boost your memory, and it’s beneficial not just in the short term, but for your long-term well-being. It can help prevent or manage depression, anxiety, and many types of cancer, improves your self-esteem, and can be a good way to catch up with a friend.

So what’s stopping you?

Maybe you’re intimidated. That’s a common roadblock. You’re picturing hoards of slim, chiseled fitness fiends pounding out the miles on treadmills, rowing machines, and stationary bikes without breaking a sweat. Avert your eyes. It’s time you conquered the gym on your own terms.

A roommate is the first person you’ll see when you wake up, the last person you’ll see when you go to bed, and it’s more than likely you’ll eat plenty of meals together and maybe share friends, play video games, or binge-watch Netflix with each other. 

That’s a lot of time. If you have to live with someone new in a 100-square-foot cube and wellness is important to you, finding ways to make that relationship as healthy as possible is a surefire path to a comfortable and rewarding school year.

Boston University’s dining halls are all-you-can-eat mash-ups of cuisines, choices, and calories. Depending on your mood, dinner can be a baked potato loaded up with sour cream and chives, a couple of slices of pepperoni pizza, a bowl of Lucky Charms—or what the heck, all three if you’re waffling about what you’re craving.

But how you manage those decisions at the dining hall is important. They will impact your body all day, and every day.

Veteran nutritionist Joan Salge Blake (Sargent’84, Wheelock’16), a Sargent College of Health & Rehabilitation Sciences clinical associate professor of nutrition and host of the podcast Spot On!, has six wellness tips for navigating the dining hall, smartly.

You’ve brushed your teeth and said good night to your roommate—or roommates. If you’re like most of us, the last thing you’ll do before closing your eyes is plug your phone into the charger by your bed and take one more scroll through Twitter, SnapChat, Instagram, or WeChat. 

But if you can change your ways and do that last check just a little earlier, before climbing into bed, it might make the difference between a good night’s sleep and a restless night.

Sanford Auerbach, a BU School of Medicine associate professor of neurology and director of the Boston Medical Center Sleep Disorders Center, has some smart advice on how to get a better night's sleep.