Your top lifestyle/self-help type book recommendations!

[Marina]

I'm looking for recommendations from Mumsnetters for their most trusted/helpful lifestyle/self-help books.
This is for students rather than parents (although I know these aren't at all mutually exclusive!) so I would really appreciate:

• Stuff on being away from home for the first time
• Managing your finances
• Keeping physically healthy
• Problem drinking
• Drug misuse
• Relationship issues
• Gender and sexuality issues
• Mental health issues, esp. dealing with depression
• Healthy eating on a budget

Thought some mums on here with older children might be able to help with these, but all ideas warmly welcomed!

Thanks, Marina

PS IN PRINT and currently available please

A couple of cookery favourites:

Cas Clarke's famous Grub on a Grant has been updated to More Grub On Less Grant , there's a veggie version too although the original book did have quite a lot of meat-free stuff anyway.

One I bought an ex-boyfriend was How To Boil An Egg , it improved his cooking but that was probably the least of his problems

Thanks Twink - I never saw my sole reply, but these look great.

I am reviving this because I spotted anorak about and she always seems so wise and knowledgable about these things - and I'm sure others do too.

HELP please! I asked some counselling professionals for their input and they promptly suggested hefty counselling manuals that most students would run a mile from.

Please?

for the fiancial side... everything whose title ends in "...in a shoe string"?

Get Everything Done and Still Have Time to Play

The Money Diet

Not specifically for students, but I wish I'd read both as a student!

Thank you both, especially those titles Georgina! That is exactly what I was hoping for! Mwah. X

Men are Mars Women are from Venus - this should be on the national curriculum!

Oliviab - I have this book and have never read it - is it really that good?

The veggie version of Grub on a Grant is "Mean Beans" and I used it all the way through uni.

Finances - "Your Money or Your Life" by Alvin Hall (from the TV program of the same name) - no nonsense ways of explaining getting out of debt, saving, pensions etc

Health - Allen Carrs "Easyway to Stop Smoking" - the only thing that worked for me (and many others I know)

Depression - Dorothy Rowe "Breaking the Bonds" - although it is really heavy and not easy to deal with when severely depressed. But also a useful 'life' book when not depressed. Has exercises to help you decide what you want in life.

Sus, x

Thanks again all. We do in fact already have Men are from Mars...or rather we did until someone nicked it
Keep em coming, this is exactly what I was hoping for

Self help book : Counselling for Toads - Robert De Board. It is FANTASTIC. here I read it from cover to cover and would read it again. It is the most helpful and inciteful book i have read it terms of self exploration and also understanding others. Is not heavy text book but easy reading (based on Toad from Wind and Willows), is also funny and sad too. I am a full time mental health student nurse too marina. Another book if looking specifically at mental health is Mental Health Matters by A Reader, very good to pick up and read a bit the put down. Very much more text booky tho but not too heavy.

hth. x

Marina, have just been sent a review copy of this book about addiction , would you like me to pop it in the post? (I don't do much stuff on mental health so it'll just languish here!)

Oh YES PLEASE bundle, thank you so much
You guys have already been way more helpful than my colleagues who supposedly have an interest in getting up to date material in to stock...

Mummycan - yes, I've been experimenting on DH this month with the tips for scoring points with men (basically being nice lol!) and he's really noticed and been quite appreciative. It's made me see how some of the things I do that another woman would find helpful, he would find belittling.
Just got to get him to read it so I can benefit from the tips for men on women .

Hi Marina. Fat is a Feminist Issue by Susie Orbach. Original and best book on emotional over/under eating.
Off this particular point, we are hoping to come to your workplace for a concert next weekend so DS can have a look around before he starts his classes in Sept.

Kind Bundle sent me this book on depression which I found very helpful

Oliviab - I will read it then.

Thanks

MC
x

Thanks for the further recommendations everyone, especially nice to hear from you Arabica as have not seen you around much lately and was wondering how things are.
Glad all is still on course for next September! Hope he really enjoys it.

prozac nation (but not if suffering form depression at the time)
zen and the art of motorcycle mechanics ( to learn about life and patience)
change the world for a fiver
the dalia lama's book of wisdom

We have Zen and the Dalai Lama gothicmama but Changing the World for a Fiver is a brilliant suggestion, thanks...

Hi Marina, I have been around far less than I used to be--I'm feeling much better and have more energy for RL activities than I did in the weeks immediately following my miscarriage.
Another book I found useful as a student in the 80s was Our Bodies Ourselves--a health guide written by/for women, which was really excellent on menstrual stuff and emotional wellbeing. I wonder if there is an up-to-date version?