Prime Time: The African American Woman's Complete Guide to Midlife Health and Wellness [Paperback]

African American women are prey in disproportionate numbers to a range of preventable illnesses in middle age, according to Assistant Surgeon General of the U.S. Marilyn Hughes Gaston and clinical psychologist Gayle K. Porter. Also in their prime, and recognizing the lack of good information on the subject, they offer support and advice to their sisters in Prime Time: The African American Woman's Complete Guide to Midlife Health and Wellness. Because many black women are without partners and have been caretakers for their children, parents and extended families (along with, the authors acknowledge, most likely having dealt with racism, sexism and other isms), they may not be fully aware of their own needs and well-being. This is the perfect time to take stock and to make the changes necessary to fully experience and enjoy the next chapters of their lives. With facts, discussions of the various health risks, remedies, psychological underpinnings, tests, anecdotes, advice and generous lists of resources and further reading, they extend a plethora of knowledge and support to their readers. 8-city author tour.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Written by an assistant surgeon general of the United States and a clinical psychologist, respectively, Prime Time is a wellness book aimed at African American women over the age of 40, covering issues such as heart disease, diabetes, menopause, and depression. The usual prescriptions of diet, exercise, and stress reduction are included, but each focuses on the medical and emotional needs of older black women in particular. Statistics dealing specifically with this group are used when available, and the authors do a good job of identifying certain diseases that may be more significant for African American women than for the general population. The authors intersperse their medical advice with personal stories about quitting smoking and dealing with the death of loved ones. This guide is similar to other books like Body & Soul: The Black Women's Guide to Physical Health and Emotional Well-Being (HarperPerennial, 1994) and The Black Women's Health Book (Seal, 1990) except that it focuses on older women. Affordable, comprehensive, and focused on a very specific population, this is recommended for public and consumer health libraries. Elizabeth Williams, Fresno City Coll. Lib., CA
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

“Groundbreaking . . . One of the most comprehensive books on Black women’s health ever.”
—Essence

Today seven million African American women are living in their prime, experiencing the joys and challenges of middle age. Now, at last, here is the book that addresses our total health needs—physical, emotional, and spiritual. Written by a distinguished physician and a clinical psychologist, Prime Time is the first complete guide that empowers us to take charge of our lives and attain the well-being we deserve.

In many ways, it’s true that we are better off today than our foremothers were: We earn more money, command more respect. Yet in spite of these advances, we still experience more chronic health problems, endure more stress, and live shorter lives than women of other races. That’s why Prime Time is both urgent and essential. This groundbreaking book not only lays out a detailed, practical plan for overall healing and for maintaining wellness, it also addresses the underlying attitudes and assumptions that lead so many of us to neglect ourselves and undermine our own health. Prime Time will help you

• Reframe priorities to put yourself and your own health needs first
• Interpret the latest medical findings on the Big Four killers and how they affect black women in middle age
• Profile your current health with worksheets, quizzes, and assessment tools
• Renew sex at midlife by eliminating restricting myths and taboos and finding new paths to pleasure
• Reduce anger and “attitude” that block you from attaining good health
• Identify the nontraditional signs of depression and anxiety common to African American women

Comprehensive, straight-talking, and grounded in science and spiritual truth, Prime Time is at once a guide to total health in middle age and a celebration of the strength, wisdom, and beauty of African American women in their second half of life.

“Groundbreaking . . . One of the most comprehensive books on Black women’s health ever.”
—Essence

Marilyn Hughes Gaston, M.D., is Director of Primary Health Care, Health Resources and Services Administration, in addition to her duties as Assistant Surgeon General of the United States. She has served in the Commissioned Corps of the United States Public Health Service since 1977 and currently holds the rank of Rear Admiral. Since 1987, she has served on the faculty of the Uniformed Services University of Health Science and Howard University.  Working in the medical field for more than thirty years, Dr. Gaston is a member of the National Medical Association, has received numerous awards, and is a member of the prestigious Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.

Gayle K. Porter, Psy.D., is a clinical psychologist and a Principal Research Analyst and Mental Health Advisor for the American Institutes for Research. Dr. Porter has been on the faculty of Johns Hopkins University/Hospital, and is an adjunct professor at Howard University and the University of the District of Columbia. Throughout her thirty years as a health professional, she has won awards from many prestigious organizations including the Black Mental Health Alliance and the Association of University Women.  She is a member of the Association of Black Psychologists. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Chapter 1

YOUR PRIME TIME JOURNEY

The real act of discovery consists not in finding new lands but in seeing with new eyes. —Unknown

Finally, here is a book about us!

It is for and about us—the almost six million African American women who are experiencing the opportunities and challenges of the middle years. Yes, there are millions of us, but there is very little information published about our unique physical and emotional health issues.

African American women have had no Golden Girls television program to reflect and celebrate the diversity, the richness, the joy, the pain, the laughter, and the love that are part of the lives of many of us who are over forty. To paraphrase Barbara Smith, Gloria Hull, and Beverly Smith, editors of But Some of Us Are Brave: As African American women in the middle years, we are often part of all women, all Blacks, or Black women of all ages, but rarely is there just a space for us.

This book—Prime Time—is our space.

NAVIGATING THE PRIME TIME YEARS

Like you, we, too, are African American women in our middle years. Together we authors have more than sixty years of experience in providing health services to the African American community. Marilyn is a medical doctor with more than thirty-five years of experience in primary health care. She has provided direct health care to African American communities and served as medical director of health programs supervising the care of families. Marilyn has planned and administered health programs for African Americans at the local, state, and national level and has served on the faculties of three medical schools teaching students and residents.

Gayle is a clinical psychologist who has been on the faculty of two medical schools, providing clinical supervision to medical students, psychology interns, and psychiatry residents. With more than twenty-five years as a mental health professional, Gayle has served as a director of two outpatient mental health clinics and been involved in numerous research projects while managing a private practice that includes providing individual and group counseling and psychotherapy to numerous Black women.

We have made changes and midlife corrections in our own lives. Marilyn stopped smoking after twenty-five years: "Yes, even though I am a physician who knew well the negative effects of smoking, I was forty-five when I was finally able to stop."

Gayle started exercising on a regular basis when she turned fifty: "I knew when I was in my thirties that exercise had a positive impact on my emotional and physical well-being, but it wasn’t until I reached the middle years that I started to own my responsibility for keeping myself healthy."

Our personal and professional experiences have convinced us that we are now in the prime of our lives. And so are you!

At this age, we're all wiser and more confident than in our younger years. Most of us are healthier and more financially solvent than our mothers or grandmothers. A growing number of us have enjoyed educational and professional opportunities of which our foremothers could only dream. Yet, despite our advances, there remain major disparities between the rates of morbidity (disease) and mortality (death) for Caucasian for African American women. We have more chronic emotional and physical health problems, and we die earlier. We also endure the stress of racism, sexism, and ageism, which negatively affect our well-being.

OUR MISSION TOGETHER

An appearance on a Black Entertainment Television (BET) program, Our Voices: Prime Time Beauty Inside and Out, which focused on African American women in midlife, intensified our need to understand these intolerable disparities and to be a catalyst for change.

We had been recommended to the producers of the call-in talk show because of our expertise in African American women’s physical and emotional health. Both of us had been speakers and panelists on numerous local, national, and international programs related to this topic.

The panel of four women (all in our middle years) was moderated by Doris McMillon, an award-winning journalist. The other two panelists were Sharon Pratt Kelly, the former mayor of Washington, D.C., and actress Pam Grier. Ms. Grier discussed the difficulties faced by seasoned women film stars. Her comments indicated that most scripts with female characters reflected Hollywood’s infatuation with pubescent girls. Ms. Kelly described her experiences as a businesswoman and a politician. These all are demanding careers for anyone, but especially for African American midlife women, who often are expected to juggle their professions and nuclear and extended family responsibilities without complaint.

However, despite the specific concerns expressed by each of us, there were clear declarations about the benefits of this age. Ms. Grier said that she was happier, felt better, and was more aware of herself than she had ever been. Ms. Kelly talked about her decision to take time to make important lifestyle changes—"I’m exercising more, drinking eight glasses of water a day, and just being still." We all felt that we were truly in the prime time of our lives.

Following the show, we were deluged with invitations to present lectures and seminars on this theme. We received numerous calls from African American and Caucasian women and men across the country. The women expressed their delight at seeing a program that illuminated and documented their experiences and asked provocative questions, such as "Am I being selfish because I’m tired of taking care of everyone else?" "I didn’t know Black women were dying at a younger age than other women. Why?" "Do Black women get osteoporosis? I thought only white women did."

The men bombarded us with questions about how they could be helpful and supportive of the significant midlife women in their lives. They also asked very directed questions about their relationships with women in midlife, such as "Is she ever going to want sex again?" "Is she mad all the time because she’s going through the change, or is it something else?" All of the callers requested more information, specifically, articles, books, or tapes about this topic. But because there are so few articles—and no books— focusing specifically on the second half of life for African American women, we were frustrated by our inability to help our audience more.

And so we decided to write a book that would help us midlife Black women integrate our minds, bodies, and spirits and save our own lives.

To find out more about the reasons for the untimely deaths and high incidence of illness of our sisters, we authors held focus groups with other midlife African American women between the ages of forty and seventy. What our sisters perceive as their primary stressors and concerns was quite consistent. As a group, we worry about our physical and mental health, our finances, changes in our physical appearance, and our personal relationships or lack of them. Our focus group participants also emphasized their need for strategies to help them confront the challenges and resolve the stress that most of us face in our middle years.

The most significant conclusion of these discussion groups was that racism and sexism are not the primary negative influences in Black women’s lives. Their comments confirmed that two other factors are more deleterious to our physical and emotional health: We don't make ourselves our number one priority, and we live unhealthy lifestyles. These culprits contribute in major ways to the development of unhealthy bodies and minds and to our overall dis-ease (a state of being either ill or simply not at ease). Most of us spend so much of our time, energy, and money focused on the well-being of others—our spouses or partners, children, parents, relatives, friends, and jobs—that we have very little time, energy, or money left to care appropriately for our own physical and emotional needs.

Armed with this information, and knowing we can change our lives and take responsibility for our own health, we established two primary goals for this book. First, we want Prime Time to help you make your own physical and emotional needs your main priority. How often do you put your needs second or even last after tending to the needs of your family and friends and your responsibilities at work? We want you to be aware of when you’re taking a step backward or off course along your Prime Time journey, so you can adjust your stride and get back to living healthier and living longer.

Second, we want this book to help you make "midcourse corrections" in how you’re living, so that you can maximize the Prime Time of your life. Your midcourse corrections can include making positive changes in how you think about yourself, how you view the period of middle age, how you incorporate a philosophy of wellness in your life each and every day, and how you change habits that are negative or self-destructive.

All African American women—and this includes you, no matter what your educational, social, or financial status might be—can live a healthier, longer, happier, and more balanced life. Accentuating the positive and celebrating the opportunities of this time in your life will also help you respond more effectively to its challenges. As we go through the book, we will look at each challenge in more detail, and introduce some midlife women who have successfully confronted these issues.

ISN'T IT TIME FOR YOUR MIDLIFE CORRECTION?

You took the first step on your Prime Time journey when you bought this book. The next step is to use this book to plan this exciting passage through your middle years. Think of Prime Time as a road map designed to help you chart the landscape through which you must trav... --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.