MSI Press Blog

  excerpt from  Exercising in a Pandemic   by Pat Young:  (note: good information for any time where opportunities are limited)  Exercising Outside My good friend and a retired nurse, Merisa, lives on acreage in a remote area of the Southwest. She has some exercise equipment in her home, bought long before the pandemic became a reality, but she is also an advocate of exercise outside. “Of course, exercise enhances and improves health and wellbeing,” she says. “It also improves appearance and mental health.” “If you can’t go to parks, or use tennis courts or golf courses, then walk,” she says. “It’s possible to keep your distance, even when walking in your own neighborhood. Varying the pace is a good thing to do, too.” If you live in an area near resources, swimming, dancing, yoga or other exercise classes are a good alternative to walking. Many gyms reopened as the pandemic waned, while limiting the number of people in each class to keep social distancing in pla...

  excerpt from Exercising in a Pandemic   by Pat Young:  (note: good information for any time where opportunities are limited)  Healthy Advantages             A leading medical journal, Lancet, states that people who are physically active have only 35 days of poor mental health per year on average, compared to those who are not physically active, who have closer to 53 down days.             Another medical establishment, Nuvance Health, states that exercise boosts the immune system and keeps it functioning optimally. This is certainly an advantage during a pandemic such as the corona virus outbreak. Exercise reduces stress, prevents weight gain and improves sleep. Many exercise enthusiasts say they are actually energized after a workout. Exercising also offers the opportunity to enjoy social activities, something curtailed by pandemic safety precautions...

  This week's blog post is the next in the series of book back stories and is the story behind Passing On: Preparing for the Afterlife  by Joanna Romer. From the publisher -  Joanna Romer, an author who had already written seven books for us and was, at the time, working on two others, Helping the Disabled Veteran and Life after Losing a Child (with Pat Young ), which were ultimately finished and published, came to me with a book proposal for a book on preparing for death. As a popular MSI Press author and retired professor of journalism, her books were well researched, and I was intrigued by how she might go about researching this one. But go about it she did, resulting in another popular book. Little did I know that she might have a very personal reason for writing this book. She passed away not longer after it was released, and her two final books were released posthumously, one with the help of one our copyeditors, who is already a developmental editor, Mary Ann Rae...

  This week's blog post is the next in the series of book back stories and is the story behind Life after Losing a Child (Young & Romer). From the author -  A former editor of mine, as well as a good friend, lost her son. When she called to tell me, I walked around my house for an hour before I wrote her a poem. It is the first page in a book I co-authored with another good friend, my late friend Joanna Romer. We agreed, before writing the book, that a loss such as that was even more painful – and different – than the loss we both shared as widows.  We set forth to interview parents who had lost children and followed each chapter on loss with a healing chapter, depicting ways each parent dealt with the loss in a positive way to help with healing. Several of the interview chapters were friends of ours, which made it all the more real, and painful. I hope this book has helped a parent who lost a child in a good way. Paperback copies of this book can be purchased at the...

  Excerpt from Life after Losing a Child by Pat Young and Romer - Losing a Second Child Cristy got her transplant and seemed to be doing very well. She enrolled in college and went on with her life, but then her lungs failed again. She had a double lung transplant at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida. Then, she needed a kidney transplant because the anti-rejection medicine caused her kidneys to fail. Kathleen was relieved when she was able to donate one of hers to her daughter. If nothing else, it would buy them more time.            The day before she was to receive her bachelor’s degree, the doctors told Cristy her lungs were failing and there was nothing else they could do. “Mom,” Cristy had said to Kathleen in tears, “I’m dying, and I don’t want to die.” Cristy moved back home where her mom could take care of her. Kathleen made her car into “a little ambulance” and took her daughter to Pittsburgh, hoping to get another t...