A five-year-old of our acquaintance once offered this gem of advice to his harried mother during the pre-holiday season: "Why don't you just sit down and delax for a while." That sums up our first tip for having a stress-free holiday.

The Mayo Clinic defines hoarding as "... the excessive collection of items, along with the inability to discard them" and states that "compulsive hoarding and compulsive hoarding syndrome, may be a symptom of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)." We are not talking everyday household mess and clutter here, or collections of specific objects that may, in the opinion of other family members, be taking up too much space in the house.  True hoarding can be a sign of mental and/or physical illness that manifests itself in the obsessive accumulation of things—items that can range from mounds of clothing, unopened shopping bags, stacks of newspapers, magazines and mail, to piles of trash and rotting garbage that are dangerous to the health of an individual or a family.

It's true - volunteering and helping others in need not only makes a difference in the lives of recipients, it can improve our own mental and physical health and well being. The good feeling we get from lending a helping hand benefits us in a variety of ways:

There is the social aspect of joining with others in our communities, making friends and assisting worthy organizations in achieving their goals.

Sometimes being a nurse isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Mostly by that I mean that you find out things you wish you didn’t have to know. And once you learn it, the idea sticks in our brain like flypaper.