In­testi­nal block­age, al­so known as bow­el ob­struc­tion, is a par­tial or com­plete block­age of the in­testines, which pre­vents the pas­sage of solids and liq­uids through the gas­troin­testi­nal tract. When nu­tri­ents and wa­ter are no longer be­ing ab­sorbed, the dog can be­come mal­nour­ished and de­hy­drat­ed. Block­ages can al­so de­crease blood flow and cause de­te­ri­o­ra­tion to por­tions of the in­testines, as tis­sue dies. Fur­ther­more, an ob­struc­tion can press on the in­testines, which can be very painful and even cause in­testi­nal rup­ture or in­flam­ma­tion of the ab­domen (peri­toni­tis).   

This week’s Guardian Book­Shelf spot­lights Di­ane Bertrand’s mem­oir “The Gospel Ac­cord­ing to Di­ane – Be­tween Vestibule and Al­tar”. I was mes­merised by this mem­oir in its nascent stages in a work­shop held by Earl Lovelace be­fore the pan­dem­ic. Bertrand has the lit­er­ary abil­i­ty to mes­merise the most hard­ened athe­ist – her sto­ry­telling is that com­pelling.

“You can­not con­tin­ue to suc­ceed in the world or have a ful­fill­ing life, un­less you choose to use your life in the ser­vice some­how to oth­ers . . . That’s how you nur­ture it.”

The JMMB Group Small and Medi­um-sized (SME) Re­source Cen­tre has an­nounced a six-month pro­gramme, PowHer­ful Women in Busi­ness, a rev­o­lu­tion­ary Small and Medi­um-sized En­ter­prise (SME) ini­tia­tive ded­i­cat­ed to sup­port­ing and em­pow­er­ing women en­tre­pre­neurs op­er­at­ing in T&T and Ja­maica.

Breast­feed­ing is a unique learn­ing ex­pe­ri­ence for every new moth­er and ba­by. While it’s thought to be a nat­ur­al ac­tiv­i­ty, the ex­pe­ri­ence and wis­dom shared from all new moth­ers, is that it takes prac­tice, re­quir­ing time, pa­tience and may not come as nat­u­ral­ly as one may think. How­ev­er, when that op­ti­mal latch is achieved, the ful­fil­ment ex­pe­ri­enced is unimag­in­able. It is a mo­ment one nev­er for­gets! The ben­e­fits of hav­ing a breast-fed ba­by is ex­ten­sive and you’ll re­alise it’s worth the time and pa­tience it takes to get it right!

Au­gust 1 - 7 marks World Breast­feed­ing Week, and the theme of 2023 is “Let’s make Breast­feed­ing at work, Work.”

This week WE fea­ture writer and po­et Jan­nine Hors­ford, win­ner of the 2022 Bo­cas Emerg­ing Writ­ers’ Fel­low­ship for Po­et­ry is on the cusp of be­ing an­oth­er break­through po­et out of T&T. Hors­ford is a fel­low of the in­au­gur­al Moko Mag­a­zine Po­et­ry Mas­ter­class 2018, the 2016 Callaloo Writ­ers’ Work­shop, and the Crop­per Foun­da­tion Caribbean Writ­ers’ Work­shop 2014. In 2016, Jan­nine Hors­ford was short­list­ed for the Small Axe Po­et­ry Prize.

“Courage is the most im­por­tant of all the virtues, be­cause with­out courage you can’t prac­tise any oth­er virtue con­sis­tent­ly. You can prac­tise any virtue er­rat­i­cal­ly, but noth­ing con­sis­tent­ly with­out courage.”

Dance pro­mot­er Keefin Rawl­ins con­tin­ues to use con­tem­po­rary-style dance as a form of es­capism to build the youth in to­day’s so­ci­ety.

While reg­is­ter­ing my hus­band on­line, I re­al­ized there are some fun­da­men­tal things one has to pay at­ten­tion to if you want to get your PIN num­ber and pass­word in a time­ly man­ner, oth­er­wise your reg­is­tra­tion be­comes frus­trat­ing if all the re­quire­ments are not met and you start get­ting emails from the tick­et­ing sys­tem.

“Pro­fes­sion­al women with car­ing at­ti­tudes and the re­solve to en­hance and strength­en op­por­tu­ni­ties for lifestyle changes of those less for­tu­nate, be­ing mind­ful of their par­tic­u­lar needs.” This is ethos of Women in Ac­tion for Needy and Des­ti­tute (WAND).

The T&T Fash­ion Com­pa­ny (Fash­ionTT) has achieved a re­mark­able feat by lead­ing ten of the na­tion’s finest de­sign­ers on a trade mis­sion to New York City and the Unit­ed King­dom.