The surest way to fitness without straining yourself is by following a planned routine on a gymnasium floor but if you feel you do not look too great stripped for action and cannot face the competition of fitter bodies, exercise at home. See the exercises that follow. Fitness Plan x 3 has been devised by London instructors whose interest is restoring fitness to men who over the years have lost it. The exercises must be repeated three times a week — hence the 3 in the title — and they must be taken gradually, building up the repetitions as the body becomes fitter.

Please note: if you have any reservations about your health or recently have had an operation consult your doctor first before embarking on the Plan. Never take unnecessary risks. These exercises may look simple and be easy to perform but they are nonetheless taxing routines designed to stretch, strain and firm up the whole body.

Until you can gauge how fit you are, take the routines slowly. Each session should last in the region of fifteen minutes. Never exercise if you have a cold, or are ill, tired, under the influence of drink or drugs, or in a cold room. Should you feel faint or dizzy while exercising, stop.

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There is little noticeable difference to be gained by using herbal shampoos or those with added ingredients like eggs or beer. These special ingredients are there to enhance the sales appeal of the product and are in minute quantities which, anyway, come off in the rinsing. However if you find you like using one of these shampoos and your hair looks and feels right as a result, stick with it.

Whichever shampoo you choose through experiment, it must make your hair look healthy and glossy and be good to the touch. The scalp must be clean without feeling tight, over-scrubbed or itchy. If your hair fails on one of these points you are using the wrong brand.

If you have fine or unmanageable hair try using protein-enriched or balsam shampoos as they are specially formulated to leave a slight residue on each hair shaft that will give the hair extra suppleness and body. Or you could try using a hair conditioner. These are prepared for hair that is brittle, dull or dry. Follow the instructions carefully. A conditioner used incorrectly can clog the scalp’s pores and cause additional problems. Note: any man whose hair is already in good, healthy condition does not need either protein-enriched or balsam shampoos — nor conditioners.

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problems exist it would be head in the sand, ostrich policy to ignore them and hope that by doing so they will evaporate. But invariably problems based on self-doubt, the very essence of the male-menopause, do exactly that. They resolve with time.

Trying to avoid thinking about problems is no easy matter. Some men find at home, whatever the time, an easy solution is switching on TV or taking the dog for a walk, or jogging for fifteen minutes. Many head for the kitchen to cook up a special dish. At work solutions vary from taking an extra coffee break to making a social telephone call.

By all accounts there are no shortcuts that will work for all men uniformly. Perhaps this is because problems vary man to man. Whatever works for you, only you can discover. But the aim is simple: to take your mind off internal panic and to be able to return to facing reality as it is, real and uncoloured by the gloom brought on by M-M.

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At around forty sex drive is in no way diminished although for many the demands may sometimes change subtly. Sex, although enjoyable and vitally important, starts to become less compulsive and an additional pleasure of life rather than a necessity like food and drink.

With true aging — and by that we mean from sixty onwards — the testicles sit low in their scrotum which hangs lengthily instead of snugly close to the body and it can take a considerable time to reach erection. By seventy the situation declines further and desire begins to tail off but, by then, most men will have taken up other night-time interests like sleep or reading a good book so they worry little about the change.

The ability to have a continuing sexlife depends mostly on keeping in practice. And a fit body is more likely to have the right vitality and energy to respond to sexual stimulus than an unfit one. It is not unknown for men in their eighties to enjoy a (comparatively) active sexlife and have themselves a ball.

In the United States doctors interested in such matters have concluded that the angle of erection changes with age. At thirty, they say, the average erect penis thrusts about twenty degrees above the horizontal, at forty it is only just above the horizontal line at ten degrees and at fifty, just a dip below. Whatever the angle, it neither interferes with achievement or pleasure, nor does it impair the ability to achieve orgasm.

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Many men will try to bring their family to their renewed faith but many will see it as a strictly private involvement preferring to practise without comment from other persons.

As the act of praying is essentially personal, one of the special comforts of faith is that prayers can be said privately at any time without necessarily visiting a place of worship. Communication and meditation is secret.

‘I always pray on the bus going to and from work,’ says a survivor, ‘and when walking the dog. It is the only time when I can feel totally alone. For me a really good few minutes of praying has a far better calming and comforting effect than two glasses of vodka ever did.’

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