How to Heal Lower Back Pain

You’ve done it again–hurt your lower back. Admit it, you are not 25 any more. Let a few ground balls go through your legs once in awhile in softball. Don’t worry, you can blame your errors on your eyesight. That’s another problem for the more mature blokes.

Rest, Ice & Heat

Lower back pain is no joke. Your injury can stem from physical activities, repetitive tasks on a job or even sitting too long, a problem an athletic guy or gal like you might not admit. Lower back injuries run the gamut. The most common injury is a back strain. You can also sustain more structural problems such as bulging or herniated discs. Tendinitis and arthritis are also common problems in the lumbar or sacral vertebrae of your lower back. All lower back problems can be alleviated through various treatments. First and foremost, you need to stop all physical activity for awhile and rest your back. If you have severe pain, use a back brace when you need to be mobile, or if you sit in front of a computer at work. During the first 48 to 72 hours, use ice on your back. Ice will help reduce any inflammation or swelling. It narrows the blood vessels and temporarily restricts the flow of blood. This is important during the early stages of a lower back problem because of possible broken blood vessels, which can increase swelling and pain. When the swelling has subsided, a heating pad will help promote blood flow to your lower back. Blood carries oxygen and nutrients such as vitamin C that are necessary for healing.

Medication

No treatment would seem right without a little medication. An anti-inflammatory such as ibuprofen or naproxen should do the trick. These medications can also help heal your lower back pain. They are Cox-2 inhibitors, which limit the effects of Cox-2 enzymes on prostaglandins (chemicals). The interaction of the enzymes and chemicals are the body’s natural response to injuries.

Massage

Massage is another effective treatment for healing lower back strain or structural problems. Massage also increases the flow of blood to the lower back. Have your significant other spend five or ten minutes several times a day massaging your back. It may just do more than relieve your ailing back. Finally, stretching and strength-building exercises can help cure lower back problems.

Exercise

Exercise is the best way to increase blood flow to the muscles and bones in the lower back. However, you should not start exercising until you have your inflammation and pain under control. Stretching will increase flexibility and mobility in your muscles. Muscles do tighten with age. It is also important to build strength in your lower back and adjacent muscles, which will add stability to your spine and lower back. This will help alleviate pain in your lower back.

These lower back remedies should be used in the order outlined above. There is no set time frame curing lower back pain, but you can enhance your recover the more proactive you are in your treatments.

How to Heal Cold Sores

If there is one thing that everyone can agree on, it would probably be the fact that everyone hates getting a cold sore. Let’s face it they are uncomfortable and they don’t go with any of our outfits or fit into any of our daily plans at all. The trouble with cold sores is getting them healed up, so here are a few tips.

There are many over the counter and prescription medications that one could take. Abreva is one, Orajel, Zovirax, Denavir, Valtrex, Famvir and Vyroxin are some others. There are many other ways to help heal your cold sores, one of these is Lysine. Lysine is very inexpensive and you can usually find it in the vitamin section. Take four 500mg Lysine at the first sign of a cold sore. Take one each morning and one each evening. If you catch it early enough it will go away completely. If you don’t catch it early enough it will still reduce the amount of time and the severity of the outbreak. Also recommended during the time of an outbreak is to get a new toothbrush.

Since a cold sore is a virus you could possibly be exposing yourself to it every time you brush your teeth. Boosting your immune system is also a good way to help prevent them, since they are triggered by stress. Try taking some vitamin C about three times a day. Also use a sunscreen on your lips, because exposure to sunlight can also be a factor in triggering cold sores. Zinc has also been proven to reduce the duration of cold sores. Applied topically, it can help speed the healing. Lemon balm has also been known to reduce the symptoms and speed up the healing process. If you like yogurt, then eat it also, it is high in Lysine, but make sure to get some that is gelatin-free.

How to Buy a Foreclosed Home

In real estate there are multiple ways to buy a house or property. You can buy a house or property that is sold on the market in a conventional transaction. Buyers can also buy real estate by first renting it and then agreeing to buy it once the rental term is up. People can buy real estate such as fixer uppers, commercial properties and duplexes, and four plexes.

One of the most common ways to buy real estate nowadays due to the housing bubble burst and recent recession is a foreclosed home. A foreclosed home is a house that has been seized by the lender due to the buyer/owner’s inability to pay the mortgage. In this situation the buyer has not made a payment for the mortgage for three months and is now 90 days past due on the mortgage. As a result the lender takes the homeowner to court and by law is allowed to seize the home. This can be devastating to the original occupant, and burdening for the lender but it can also be beneficial for the parties involved.

A popular way to buy a home in foreclosure is to buy it before the lender officially seizes the property. Prospective buyers can get a listing from the county recorder’s office of homes on the verge of foreclosure and contact the distressed owner. They buyer usually approaches the owner and negotiates with him/her. The two parties work out a deal where the buyer can give the owner a lump sum and enable the distressed owner to pay off the mortgage and start over again without going through the process of losing the home and getting significant blemishes on their credit. A buyer can also rent it, pay the mortgage on time and pay any past due mortgage payments and enable the owner to get an income while he/she gets another property and eventually sells it within a few years. This process and way is a bit tricky and challenging though.

Another way to buy a foreclosed home is to contact a real estate agent who is experienced with foreclosures and have them assist you in locating foreclosed homes. You can also look at newspapers and magazines under the real estate section for foreclosed properties. Once you find a property to your liking you contact the lender and request to purchase the property. In this case you usually get the property inspected to make sure it is in livable condition. The next thing you do is request the agent to give you comparables of foreclosed properties in the area to make sure that the asking price is reasonable and a legitimate bargain. You must also check to see if there are any liens or past due/back taxes on the home. The rest of this process is very similar to a conventional home purchase. You first submit your credit report and get prequalified. Then you fill out and submit a mortgage application to get reviewed. After this you then get approved and give the lender the down payment, pay the closing costs, get the property in escrow and then move in.

A third way to purchase a foreclosed home is to network with real estate agents and investors at investing events. In this situation you would talk to investors and agents who know about foreclosures in the area and they then show you the information about the foreclosed home and engage in the process mentioned above.

You can also buy a foreclosed home through a foreclosure auction. When you go to an auction, the county clerks tell you about a home for sale and then you bid on the property. The winning bidder gets the property and he/she needs to pay the bin amount up front and right then and there at the auction.

There are a good four ways to buy a foreclosed home and these ways can be very beneficial to the seller, buyer and lender.

How to Get Your Bachelor’s Degree Online

Going to school can be difficult, especially when holding down a full-time job. Sometimes it’s just not possible to work a campus schedule around a work schedule. However, that doesn’t mean you need to give up on schooling altogether. Online degrees pose the flexibility that allows full-time employment as well as the learning needed to succeed in a job field, but there are a few things to keep in mind when pursuing a degree online:

1) Finding the Right College

There are a slew of online colleges and finding the right one can be as daunting as finding any college. The important thing is to try to narrow it down. First look for the colleges that offer the degree you’re looking for. If you’re not sure on your degree, find one that offers a large variety of degrees so you can experiment before making your final decision. The most important thing is making sure that the college is accredited because otherwise you’ll have a difficult time finding jobs with that degree. All accredited colleges should be able to prove their accreditation when asked without any difficulty.

2) College Costs

As surprising as it may be, earning a bachelor’s degree online is not necessarily cost-effective. Many online schools can still cost $10,000 to $20,000 a year, which is more than a lot of state colleges, but less than private colleges. The good news is that most online colleges do have some sort of funding and scholarships available and you can apply for government aid through the FAFSA and earn more support that way.

3) Time Management

While earning an online degree may, at first, sound like a miracle solution to being able to work to afford everything, don’t forget that it’s still school and it still requires a good deal of time invested in it. A lot of online classes have at least one seminar every week that you attend like a “class”. Plus, there is still homework, projects, essays, and studying that need to be done. What’s more, you won’t have as much daily contact with teachers and classmates to remind you of due dates, so it’s important that you be able to manage your time in order to get everything turned in when it’s due.