Gabrielle Kassel

Duration, speed, and weight are among the most common metrics people use to measure their workouts. But new research suggests there may be another variable worth paying attention to: variety.
The January 2026 study, published in BMJ Medicine, found that people who regularly engaged in a wider variety of physical activities had a significantly lower risk of premature death compared with those who stuck to fewer types of exercise.
Health experts aren’t necessarily surprised by these findings. A...

We’ve all been there: The endorphins that carried you through your training session have faded, leaving you feeling a little worse for wear.
The sore muscles, sensation of heaviness, and fatigue that can follow a grueling workout aren’t random. Exercise breaks down muscle fibers, depletes energy stores, and triggers short-term inflammation, explains Brittany Michels, R.D.N., M.S., C.P.T., a registered dietitian and certified personal trainer with The Vitamin Shoppe. As a result, you might fee...

12 min read
BETWEEN TECHNICAL TERMS—cunnilingus, fellatio, analingus—and more colloquial descriptors—giving head, going down, sucking off—oral sex has no shortage of names. But the lips-to-bits sex act has even more physical and emotional benefits.
Most obviously: Pleasure. “Receiving oral sex can be pleasurable because the mouth, lips, and tongue provide soft, warm, and highly controlled stimulation that is different from hands or penetration,” says Carolina Pataky, PhD, LMFT, a sexologist a...

Big muscles are my lighthouse. Over the last decade, I’ve worked diligently towards a monster back squat, impressive pull, and banana bench—and with success. But when I started graduate school last spring, my two-a-day training schedule had to drop to a single hour a day, and my goals had to shift from building muscle to preserving it.
Time and time again, research has shown that eating 0.7 to 1.0 grams of protein per pound of target bodyweight is optimal for building and preserving muscle. T...

10 min read
THREE YEARS AGO, at 52, Tina Tang could deadlift 310 pounds without blinking and squat 210 like it was part of her warm-up. She had discovered powerlifting in her early 40s, and by all appearances, she was the picture of strength.
So when her annual physical revealed osteopenia—low bone density—she was stunned.
As a coach who trains women over 40, Tang believed she was doing everything right for her bones: lifting heavy, paying close attention to her form, eating enough protein to...

While pleasure products like dildos, Wartenburg wheels, and pumps are ambiguously named, butt plugs do exactly what they say: they plug a bumhole because it can feel good. These beginner-friendly anal toys are made to be inserted into the nerve-rich anal canal, where they stay in place during play to offer sensations of fullness, pressure, or vibration that can feel sensational. Here’s everything you need to know about using and purchasing one.
Why butt plugs?
What does it do? Butt plugs are ...

It’s no secret that high stress levels are a major issue in modern society. Nearly half of U.S. adults report experiencing “a lot of stress” daily, according to a 2025 Gallup survey. And roughly one-third of adults perceive that stress negatively impacts their health to some extent. Given that, it makes sense that the primary hormone involved in the stress response—cortisol—has become a hot topic in wellness.
Colloquially known as the stress hormone, cortisol is produced by the adrenal glands...

Finally, I’m going to meet the parents of my new guy. My friends have taken to calling him Country Club, so I’m dressed the part of the future daughter-in-law: white Ralph Lauren, subtle studs, smudge of blush.
As I’m fastening my kitten heel, my phone lights up.
“I struggle with how I’m ever going to introduce you to my family,” his text starts. “In one quick Google search of your name, they’d fall into a rabbit hole about pegging and fisting….If this is a major part of your life, I can’t se...

A lot of airtime is given to what you should eat before and after workouts. For good reason: The former gives you a boost of energy for your workout, while the latter helps you recover from it. But what about what you eat (or drink) in the middle of your workout?
In recent years, intra-workout supplements have become a booming business—there are endless options of gels, chews, and powders designed to be consumed smack-dab in the middle of a sweat session. But for certain exercisers, workout s...

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If you had to sum up the word sexy, Bad Bunny at the Super Bowl would likely come to mind faster than your job. Yet for many of us, managing our love lives has started to feel like clocking in for work—a phenomenon called the “fifth shift.”
“The ‘fifth shift’ refers to the invisible work women tend to do in heterosexual relationships to maintain romantic and sexual connection with their part...

Does your partner pen the birthday card for your pops, pick and paper the holiday gifts for the kiddos, pester you about making plans with your recently-dumped pal? Do they play the unofficial role of your therapist, life coach, and social secretary? Hate to break it to you, my friend, but you might be mankept.
Mankeeping is a relatively new term for the often-invisible emotional, relational, and logistical labor that people do to maintain their male partner's social and emotional lives, says...

Many people in long-term relationships have used the same phrase to quiet thoughts of leaving: But it’s already been so long! If I leave now, all of that time and effort will go to waste. As it turns out, there’s an economics term that perfectly describes why years together can start to feel like a reason in itself to stay: sunk cost fallacy.
“The sunk cost fallacy refers to the tendency to keep investing in something because of what has already been invested—rather than because of its curren...

8 min read
POV: You started working out a few months ago, and you've been consistently hitting the same reps of the same movements. You have a goal of reaching a deadlift PR in a few months, and while you do feel stronger now, you find your strength has plateaued. To the rescue: periodization training.
Put simply, periodization training is an intentional exercise program with “strategically fluctuating variables like volume, intensity, speed, and weight,” says strength and conditioning specia...

10 min read
Stopping the safer sex convo at condoms and birth control is like describing Heated Rivalry as a hockey show—it’s not wrong, per se, but it is incomplete.
Preventing unwanted pregnancy and reducing the risk of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) is just one part of the equation, says Dr. Jennifer Lincoln, a board-certified OB-GYN and author of Let’s Talk About Down There. “Safe sex is about protecting your physical, emotional, and mental well-being.”
In fact, you can’t have one...