Men creating artwork opportunity

Hello everyone,

If you or someone you know is keen to get involved in some community artwork have a look at the information below.

 

'Change And Adaptation is a program that forms partnerships between arts, health, environment and local government. It will explore how arts in community can enhance the delivery of the core business of these partners, and highlight new, sustainable and effective ways of doing business.

 

13 highly respected artists will work with a broad cross section of communities in the Murray Mallee, Coorong, Southern Fleurieu and South East.

 

Michael Tye is one of these artists and he is working with men in the Southern Fleurieu region to create an artwork exploring men's attitudes to their health. This artwork will be installed on the front of the Southern Fleurieu Health Service building during November.

 

To find out more, or to be a part of this project, please phone Michael Tye on             0438 800 066      .'

No surprise re larger waists need to wee more often

I was a reading a recent article in the 'Science Daily' website. It says Men with large waists urinate more frequently than their slimmer counterparts, according to research in the August issue of the urology journal BJUI.

This is no surprise as we have been reminded of issues related to weight (larger waists) for sometime now. However this is a timely reminder that men with waists measuring 100cm plus reported up to three times more urinary problems than men with waists of 90cm or less.

They also found that larger waist measurements were associated with a greater prevalence of high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and erection and ejaculation problems.

SO THE MESSAGE HERE IS GO HAVE A CHECK UP WITH YOUR GP - SOON

Men's Health Week

Next week from June 11th -17th is International Men's Health Week. Why is this important? Well according to the Men's Health Week Website..http://www.menshealthweek.org.au/En/Pages/ee4d91/Why-Men-s-Health.aspx

A boy born in Australia in 2010 has a life expectancy of 78.0 years while a baby girl born at the same time could expect to live to 82.3 years old.  Right from the start, boys suffer more illness, more accidents and die earlier than their female counterparts.

Men take their own lives at four times the rate of women (that's five men a day, on average).  Accidents, cancer and heart disease all account for the majority of male deaths:

Standardised Death Rate				Percent Of Total Deaths
	Male	Female	Male:Female	Male	Female
Underlying cause of death	Per 100 000	Per 100 000	Ratio	%	%
Prostate cancer	31	-	..	4.1	..
Suicide	16.1	4.4	3.6	2.3	0.7
Transport accidents	9.6	3.2	3	1.4	0.5
Skin cancer	12	4.7	2.6	1.7	0.9
Diseases of the liver	9.3	4	2.3	1.4	0.7
Parkinson's disease	7.8	3.7	2.1	1	0.8
Lung cancer	47.9	23.5	2	6.8	4.1
Ischaemic heart disease	126.7	72.7	1.7	16.9	15.9
Chronic lower respiratory disease	34.6	21	1.6	4.6	4.1
Stroke	49.5	47	1.1	6.4	10.3

The above figures are taken from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.  Furthermore, there are specific populations of marginalised men for whom the health status is far worse even that this.

These marginalised groups include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men, refugees, men in prison or newly released from prison and men of low socioeconomic standing.

Men's Health Week has a direct focus on the health impacts of men's and boys' environments.  It serves to ask two questions:

• What factors in men's and boy's environments contribute to the status of male health as indicated in the table above?
• How can we turn that around and create positive environments in men's and boy's lives?

Why come to the Men's Get Together and the Men's Engagement Network: One mans story

Here is a story from one of our men.

" Why I became involved with M.E.N.

Having piked when asked this question at the 1st Friday night BBQ, I have decided instead to write my answer as I am a far better writer than speaker.

Unlike all of the attendees who I heard, I was urged to join M.E.N. by my psychologist and strongly supported by my wife. Like a significant number of the men I too suffer from depression. Unlike most of them I knew I was depressed and asked my GP to refer me for counselling. This is not because I am smarter than those other men, simply that I have had more experience with mental illness and psychologists. My wife has also been a sufferer and I have twice attended counselling sessions previously.

The first time I was referred by my employer, the SA Housing trust, to a counsellor who specialises in Reike ( a special treatment that involves voice and body movements). It did very little for me but I kept my job at the time.

The second time was at the request of my wife who felt I lacked an understanding of abuse in our family. I saw a counsellor specialising in this area. My wife was not saying I was abusive, simply that I needed to have a better understanding of the impact of the abuse that children from her previous marriages had suffered. I have no children but she has four (and now grandchildren) so this was a very useful experience; and also made me examine my own childhood.

One of my own triggers for depression was a strong sense of failure in my paid working life. I was sacked from my first job in England and subsequent others including my first job in Australia. I was never promoted in any job and struggled to please my employers. I lasted 9 years in the SA Housing Trust but was ultimately forced to take a redundancy package.

To be continued:

Men, Gender, what does it mean?

I often see men that complain about being 'different' not 'fitting in' not being 'manly' enough.

I also see men sick of 'acting' like real men, sick of the pressure to conform. Well... I myself am tired of the pressure that we as men are continuously subjected to. The pressure to be tough, to not complain, to look buff, to be great lovers, to be to be to be.

I have found that there are many ways to be a man. Maybe the typical chesty bonds is one way. But so is being small and wiry. So is being caring and loving. So is being a nerd, a jock, a softy, an artist a hetero, gay, bi or anything in between.

Men are cool and its time to stop dividing us into different categories just to outcast some and accept others.

As an example watch this 1999 film 'tough guise' which can be located here at The Good Men Project.

The phrase “tough guise” implies that the tough guy act is just that: an act. In real life, toughness is not necessarily masculine, and masculinity is not necessarily tough, but if you ask American culture, it will tell you the two are the practically synonyms. The Marlboro Man. The Terminator. Rambo. Real men. Gandhi? You pussy.