Jessica Mulroney is done caring about what other people have to say about the way she looks.

The 39-year-old stylist and close friend of Meghan Markle re-posted a photo of herself wearing a blue bikini by the pool on Saturday, shortly after taking it down because of negative comments.

“I took this down after posting it yesterday. Too many trolls attacking,” she wrote, adding that she decided to share the image for a second time after realizing that she “didn’t care” about their opinions.

RELATED: Meghan Markle Swears This Workout Class Transformed Her Body—So I Tried It

“I work hard on every aspect of my life and I’m proud of my body,” she wrote. “I’m proud of the work I do. I’m proud that I do. I’m proud that I’m driven. I’m proud of it all. And if we can’t be proud of ourselves, then what’s the point.”

Mulroney went on to share that she was finished with letting her critics win.

“No more apologies,” she wrote.

RELATED: This Plus-Size Influencer's Stunning Bikini Post Is the Body Positivity Inspiration You Need

Many of Mulroney’s friends and followers applauded her decision to stand up to her critics.

“Took it down?? Hell no. You have 3 children! This is inspirational content girl! Your workouts are my fav!!” commented Sara Foster.

Bachelorette alum Kaitlyn Bristowe added, “You’re a strong, motivated, driven, hands on mom who works her ass off. With a killer bod that you also work for. You show off your family proud and you show off that bod too.”

RELATED: Influencers Ashley Torres and Kristina Zias Modeled Aerie Swim to Prove Every Body Is a Bikini Body

Another standout comment was from the stylist’s husband Ben, who simply wrote, “Proud of you, honey.”

The mother of three previously spoke out against body shamers in June, after posting a photo on Instagram that led some critics to accuse her of being too thin.

Setting the record straight with another photo, Mulroney explained that what some had believed to be a protruding bone was actually a toned muscle in her stomach.

“To all those body shamers from my last post, that is called an oblique. Not a spleen, not a rib, not a hip bone (please learn your anatomy),” she wrote, adding that regardless of the way a person’s body looks, “body shaming is not ok.”

“If I see it anywhere, on any feed, I will call you out,” she added. “I normally wouldn’t pay attention to it, but saying something is actually important because addressing it will hopefully make someone think twice before posting such stupidity.”

RELATED: You Can Score Meghan Markle’s Beloved White Sneakers for Just $33—Today Only!

Mulroney, who is based out of Toronto, has styled Markle for years, before and after the new mom’s romance with Prince Harry.

The stylist was also a big part of Harry and Meghan’s wedding, acting as the “unofficial maid of honor.” Additionally, all three kids had a big role in the ceremony. Mulroney’s 5-year-old daughter Ivy carried Meghan’s bouquet before the ceremony, and her 8-year-old twin boys, John and Brian, were in charge of holding up Meghan’s lengthy veil.

To get our top stories delivered to your inbox, sign up for the Healthy Living newsletter

As far as scientists know, humans are the only species that get heart attacks linked to clogged arteries.

Now, new research suggests that just one DNA change occurring 2 to 3 million years ago may be to blame.

The finding might give insight into how to prevent and treat the attacks, according to researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). Already, they say, the findings implicate the consumption of red meat as a factor in heart attack risk.

One heart specialist said the findings are intriguing.

“There now seems to be a plausible link between genetics, diet, inflammation and atherosclerosis [hardening of the arteries],” said Dr James Lafferty, who wasn’t involved in the study. “This may truly be the missing link.”

The UCSD team noted that no other species is known to suffer heart attacks due to atherosclerosis. Even chimpanzees in captivity – which, like humans, are often inactive, collect cholesterol in their blood and can have high blood pressure – don’t get heart attacks due to fat-clogged arteries.

So why humans? To find out, researchers led by professor of pathology Dr Nissi Varki and professor of medicine Dr Ajit Varki looked to a gene known as CMAH. The gene’s job is to produce a sialic acid sugar molecule called Neu5Gc, which in other mammals appears to greatly reduce the likelihood of atherosclerotic changes in blood vessels.

Trouble is, CMAH doesn’t function in humans – it appears to have been “switched off” by evolution millions of years ago.

The researchers theorised that this genetic event occurred because a dangerous malarial parasite recognised – and thrived- in the presence of Neu5Gc. So the human genome evolved to shut down CMAH and Neu5Gc production.

However, that meant humans became more vulnerable to fatty deposits in arteries, the Varkis and colleagues reported.

Medical mystery

To test the theory, the UCSD team compared rates of atherosclerosis in normal mice, which have a working CMAH gene, and mice genetically tweaked to have a switched-off gene.

The result: Mice without active CMAH showed a near-doubling of fatty buildup in blood vessels.

That unhealthy activity rose even higher when mice without a working CMAH gene were fed red meat, which naturally contains Neu5Gc.

According to the researchers, that finding could explain the link between diets high in red meat and an upped risk for heart disease in humans. They believe that contact with Neu5Gc could set off an immune reaction in the human body, which in turn leads to a chronic state of inflammation in blood vessels.

“When the chemical that is missing from our bodies is ingested in the form of red meat, since other animals can still produce this, it seems to create an immune reaction, since we no longer produce it,” said Lafferty, who is chair of cardiology at Staten Island University Hospital in New York City.

But even folks who eschew meat can get heart attacks, the UCSD team noted.

All in all, the new findings “may help explain why even vegetarian humans without any other obvious cardiovascular risk factors are still very prone to heart attacks and strokes, while [humans’] other evolutionary relatives are not,” Dr Nissi Varki said in a university news release.

Lafferty said the research may help explain an enduring medical mystery.

“As cardiologists, we are always profoundly aware that even if all risk factors do not exist humans still have reasonable chance of developing atherosclerosis,” he said.

But the study also points to new hope for patients.

“There are also some new therapies that are aimed at reducing inflammation,” Lafferty said, and these treatments “have been shown to reduce cardiac events, even in patients whose risk factors have been maximally modified.”

He believes research like the new study “will lead to filling our knowledge gaps and lead the way to new therapeutic interventions.”

The findings were published July 22 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

^{Image credit: iStock}

If your love for coffee runs deep, but you’re worried about you favourite beverage keeping you awake at night, life is about to get better.

A new study has found that nicotine and alcohol use within four hours of bedtime was negatively associated with the quality and quantity of subjects’ sleep, while coffee and other caffeinated beverages didn’t significantly affect their chances of catching a good night’s sleep – in most cases anyway.

The researchers do warn, however, that some individuals are more sensitive to caffeine than others, and that caffeine can still make a difference to some people’s sleeping patterns.

The study, published in the journal Sleep, examined the consumption of alcohol, caffeine and nicotine among 785 African-Americans over a period of 5 164 days and recorded sleep outcomes in their natural environments. Participants also recorded how much alcohol, caffeine or nicotine they had consumed within four hours of bedtime. The results were observed in individuals unselected for sleep problems, and who generally had high sleep efficiency.

The study was led by a researcher at Florida Atlantic University with collaborators from Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, Harvard Medical School, Emory University, the National Institutes of Health, and the University of Mississippi Medical Center. It is one of the largest investigations to date to examine the consumption of these three substances and their effect on sleep. 

A terrible quality of sleep

Having a drink or smoke before bed is fairly common and might help you to fall asleep faster – but it won’t necessarily be restful sleep.

The study noted worse sleep continuity when participants used alcohol or nicotine, compared to a night without these substances. The results remained fixed regardless of age, gender, obesity, depressive symptoms and other factors.

If you needed greater incentives to quit, here’s another one – nicotine was found to be most strongly associated with sleep disruption. If you already suffer from insomnia, the effects could hit you even harder. According to the results, using nicotine at night leads to more than a 40-minute reduction in overall sleep duration. 

Sleep deprivation and health problems

According to Science Daily, up to 70 million Americans have a sleep disorder. While there are no statistics for South Africa, it was reported last year that sleep-deprived South Africans cost the economy billions each year, and insufficient sleep is linked to 15 leading causes of death, including heart disease and certain cancers.

Apart from this, chronic sleep deprivation could potentially affect your sex drive (especially in women), and cause depression and obesity in the long run. Short-term problems include impaired memory, a reduced quality of life and an increased likelihood of causing accidents, a previous Health24 article notes.

Skimping on sleep has also been linked to premature skin ageing, depression and ADHD in kids, and negative effects on metabolism.

Past studies

Past studies have found that evening consumption of alcohol, caffeine and nicotine leads to disrupted sleep, but many aspects weren’t thoroughly investigated, were limited by small sample sizes and weren’t racially or ethnically diverse.

Compiled by Zakiyah Ebrahim

A major report says the West’s high consumption of meat is fuelling global warming.

Plastic surgery is no longer the sole domain of women, and men now have even more incentive to try a little nip-and-tuck on their faces: New research suggests they look more attractive and trustworthy to others.

The study included 24 men, average age 49 years, who had one or more of the following procedures: upper eyelid lift, reduction of lower eyelids, face-lift, brow-lift, neck-lift, nose reshaping, and/or a chin implant.

Reaction rooted in evolution

More than 150 people were asked to look at photos of the men before and after their surgery and rate them on personality (aggressiveness, extroversion, likeability, risk-seeking, sociability, trustworthiness), attractiveness and masculinity.

The photos of the men after their procedures scored significantly higher in perceptions of attractiveness, likeability, social skills and trustworthiness. There was no significant change in perceptions of masculinity, the investigators found.

The study, conducted by plastic surgeons at Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, D.C., was published online recently in the journal JAMA Facial Plastic Surgery.

“The tendency to judge facial appearance is likely rooted in evolution, as studies suggest evaluating a person based on appearance is linked to survival – our animal instinct tells us to avoid those who are ill-willed and we know from previous research that personality traits are drawn from an individual’s neutral expressions,” said study senior investigator Dr Michael Reilly. He is an associate professor of otolaryngology and a facial plastic and reconstructive surgeon.

‘Mirror of the soul”

“Taken together, our findings suggest that both men and women undergoing facial cosmetic surgery can experience not only improved perception of attractiveness, but other positive changes in society’s perception of their persona,” he said in a Georgetown news release.

In recent years, American men have changed their attitudes about “appearance maintenance”, from it bordering on narcissism to a part of well-being, according to Reilly.

Men now account for 15% to 20% of the cosmetic surgery market, he noted.

“Cicero described the face as the ‘mirror of the soul’, meaning that a person’s physical appearance is the personal characteristic most obvious and accessible to others in social interaction – so it’s not surprising that subtle changes in neutral facial appearances are powerful enough to alter judgments of personality,” Reilly said.

^{Image credit: iStock}

Around 50% of young people in the UK lose their mental health when they turn 18

A cancer charity says the struggles faced by women with physical disabilities are unacceptable.

Ministers pledge £250m for AI, saying it has enormous power to improve England’s health service.

University of Houston researcher Chandra Mohan is reporting in Arthritis Research and Therapy that clotting proteins, both those that promote blood clots (pro-thrombotic) and those that work to dissipate them (thrombolytic), are elevated in the urine of patients who suffer from lupus nephritis (LN).

One young woman describes what it was like to be told she had the virus as a child – and how she coped.