If you need open-heart surgery, as I do, the best person to perform it is a plumber.

Who also happens to be a cardiovascular and thoracic surgeon.

In my case, that would be Dr. John Goncalves, whose impressive credentials qualify him to operate at Home Depot.

“I’m a plumber,” the good doctor told me in a meeting to discuss my upcoming ...Read more

CHICAGO — Legs trembling ever so slightly, it took less than 3 minutes for 66-year-old Beth Genet to reach the top of a 30-foot rock climbing wall built on one of many historic concrete walls at Steelworkers Park in South Chicago. The ascent held the promise of an unimpeded view of hawks and other raptors flying along Lake Michigan’s south ...Read more

Children get all kinds of books from their parents while growing up. But a book mine gave me when I was around 10 years old would have a significant impact on my life — even if I didn’t realize it at the time.

It was around 1980 when they gave me “Why Was I Adopted?” by Carole Livingston. The book is meant to help parents like mine ...Read more

Dear Anna,

I’m a 21-year-old woman, and I’ve been with my boyfriend for almost two years. We’re really happy together, but there’s one huge problem: His family does not like me. I’ve tried everything to make a good impression — bringing thoughtful gifts, offering to help with family dinners and always being polite. But no matter ...Read more

WOODSIDE, Calif. — Generation Z has been heralded by some as the “sustainability” generation — more likely to pay a premium for eco-friendly products and more likely to make purchase decisions that incorporate their personal, social and environmental values.

Some studies indicate they’ve scored off the charts when it comes to their ...Read more

Many of us have heard the phrase “define the relationship,” often shortened to “DTR.” One might say, “We had the DTR talk,” or “We DTR’d it.” But it turns out that one person’s DTR talk is another person’s confusion… often when those two people are in the same exact relationship!

Every Monday on Instagram, I host “Ask ...Read more

BOISE, Idaho -- Bonnie Violet Quintana worked for months to organize Idaho’s first official march for transgender rights and visibility during Boise Pride Festival. Having attended trans marches in other states, she hoped for one in Idaho with massive attendance, to show trans people in Idaho they have widespread support.

“As trans people ....Read more

PHILADELPHIA -- At five feet, two inches tall, Julia O’Reilly was 190 pounds, prediabetic, and her blood pressure was elevated. Her only real exercise was chasing around her little ones.

She met with her doctors, who started O’Reilly on weekly Ozempic shots. She lost 50 pounds.

But with the weight gone, O’Reilly said, her face sagged, ...Read more

Q. I have noticed in other columns that you have suggested that parents should be the only ones attending 504 special ed meetings for their children. Bonus parents should not attend. My ex believes his wife should attend, but last time we tried it, she was very opinionated and took over the entire meeting. Our meeting is coming up, and I would ...Read more

LOS ANGELES -- Two things are certain in pet parenting: 1) your furry loved one will one day have to visit the vet and 2) the cost of veterinary care is increasing, rising more than 60%, over the last decade, according to a recent New York Times report.

Stacie Straw, in Long Beach, California, spent about $30,000 in 2022 on her English Bulldog ...Read more

Heat waves still emanate from the grill. Paper plates, smeared with ketchup, mustard and remains of burgers and hot dogs, litter the tables.

One of the grands is sitting on her aunt’s lap. The grand just turned 14 and is a good three inches taller than her aunt. She is in an uncomfortable looking plank position with her long, lanky legs ...Read more

ATLANTA -- Monica Imani McCullough was an extremely shy child. The Atlanta resident lost her father when she was a teen and years later watched her mother lose a battle with Parkinson’s disease. She survived an emotional divorce, and in 2022 she was diagnosed with follicular non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Though she had written a book on loneliness ...Read more

Water-hungry lawns are symbols of Los Angeles' past. In this series , we spotlight yards with alternative, low-water landscaping built for the future.

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LOS ANGELES -- When Aurora Anaya bought her little Art Deco house on a corner lot in Whittier, California, she was excited about the chance to create her own garden. And then she met a man...Read more

This column is the latest in a series on parenting children in the final years of high school, "Emptying the Nest."

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After weeks of preparing myself for the emotions of "the last first day," the start of my youngest child's senior year was distinctly anticlimactic.

I did make her a hot breakfast, over which she received my bittersweet ...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — When you see Lisa DePaulo's byline, you don't think of the Cupid beat. In her career writing for publications like GQ, Vanity Fair, and New York and Philadelphia magazines, this tough cookie's element has had more to do with thugs and scoundrels who whack their girlfriends than nice guys looking for one.

But when her neighbor ...Read more

LOS ANGELES -- Madigan Traversi’s world changed in the fall of 2017, but the forces responsible for her transformation had been brewing for a long time.

Late at night on Oct. 8, her family received a robocall about an evacuation warning — not an order — as more than a dozen wildfires tore through eight Northern California counties at once...Read more

Dear Kid Whisperer,

I need some advice in dealing with a first-grade student who never listens to me. I tell him to not blurt out; he blurts out more. I tell him not to grab other kids while he’s in line; he does it more. I have tried everything. Nothing works. I’ve even had the nurse check his hearing. She says it’s fine. His grandma ...Read more

As much as I appreciate receiving a daily barrage of email pitches for fat removers, teeth aligners, night vision binoculars and other amazing products I can’t possibly live without, I subscribe to the theory that I can’t unsubscribe from stuff to which I never subscribed.

That’s the quandary I can’t seem to get out of even with a 20-...Read more

We’re still asking people with COVID to jump through far too many hoops to get their hands on Pfizer Inc.’s Paxlovid.

I experienced the barriers first-hand this month after my mother texted to say that this summer’s COVID wave had finally caught up with her. My first thought was to make sure she quickly started taking the antiviral. You�...Read more

First of all, immigrants aren’t eating people’s pets in Ohio.

It’s the sort of thing that should go without saying. The sort of thing that makes you wince a little when you say it (or type it) because it breathes fresh oxygen into a lie that dehumanizes us and desensitizes us and should’ve been starved of air long before it entered the ...Read more