Shelley Duffy

Striving to always be kind. Passionate advocate for equity in child health. Mum to 2 great kids

[Massimo @Rainmaker1973]

Arthur C. Clarke on BBC's Horizon in 1964, when he gave some astonishing predictions about the future.

[Anish Moonka @anishmoonka]

Your brain is built to forget almost everything that happens to you. It makes one exception, and you're looking at it.

Carole Peterson at Memorial University has spent over 25 years studying our earliest memories. She found that the first one most adults can recall comes from age 2.5, not 3.5 as the old textbooks said. The early memories that survive share three things: a strong feeling, a new experience, and a physical sensation. A wave, a dad's grip, and the weird feeling of riding a board check every box.

The mechanism lives in the amygdala. It's the brain's emotion sensor, sitting right next to the hippocampus, the part that files memories. When something big happens, the amygdala triggers a flood of stress hormones like cortisol. That's the signal to the hippocampus to file this one extra deep. James McGaugh at UC Irvine spent his career showing this works for happy moments too. The amygdala fires for pleasure the same way it fires for fear. What matters is how loud the feeling is.

Dads play a particular role here. Daniel Paquette, a developmental psychologist in Montreal, has spent 20 years researching what he calls the "activation relationship." Moms tend to be the safe base kids come back to. Dads tend to be the door to the outside world. They push kids into new and slightly scary situations, and stand right there as the safety net. Kids who grow up with this kind of dad end up more confident, less anxious, and more comfortable around strangers.

A 2017 review pulled together 16 studies covering 1,521 father-child pairs. Quality rough-and-tumble play, which means the wrestling and tossing and chasing kind, was linked to lower aggression, better emotion regulation, and stronger self-control. In rats, baby animals that don't get to play-fight grow up with an under-developed prefrontal cortex, which handles planning and impulse control.

Christina Bethell's 2019 study in JAMA Pediatrics took the long view. Her team at Johns Hopkins surveyed 6,188 Wisconsin adults about their positive childhood experiences. Adults reporting six or seven of those had 72 percent lower odds of adult depression than those reporting zero to two. The effect held even for people with serious childhood trauma. Good moments keep paying out for decades.

The original tweet is right. The moments that burn in are the ones with big feelings, new physical sensations, and an adult who is the bridge between safe and scary. Twenty years from now, the grip is what he'll remember.

[The Ways of A Gentleman @Gentleman_Ways]

"Eat at a local restaurant tonight. Get the cream sauce. Have a cold pint at 4 o’clock in a mostly empty bar. Go somewhere you’ve never been. Listen to someone you think may have nothing in common with you. Order the steak rare. Eat an oyster. Have a negroni. Have two. Be open to a world where you may not understand or agree with the person next to you, but have a drink with them anyways. Eat slowly. Tip your server. Check in on your friends. Check in on yourself. Enjoy the ride."

-Anthony Bourdain

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@NiallHarbison Beautiful Sienna!

[Patrick McGorry @PatMcGorry]

Spot on analysis @TracyWesterman

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

Wow

[Saganism @Saganismm]

On Valentine’s Day 36 years ago, at the request of Carl Sagan, NASA turned Voyager 1's camera back toward home for one last look.

From 3.7 billion miles away, it captured this: a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

Here is how Carl Sagan beautifully described it:

“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor, and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every 'superstar,' every 'supreme leader,' every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there — on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.”

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@NiallHarbison I have loved watching this beautiful smart girl come to life again! Happy New Year Sienna, Niall and the whole family at Happy Doggo Land 😍

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@NiallHarbison Those sad eyes 😢
Such a beautiful soul Sienna. You are now loved by so many all around the world

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@MentalUnleash Communication

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@WombatNShadow Pineapples
Freckles
Bullets
Snakes
Vanilla buds

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@jamieJBF @MegynKellyShow 😂

[Peter FitzSimons @Peter_Fitz]

RFK completely DEMOLISHED! Must watch. This is serious shit, on the fallout from Kennedy damaging vaccine rollout.

[ABC News @abcnews]

The latest Australian Early Development Census results show we are going backwards in all five key areas, sparking calls for urgent funding. https://t.co/7IMpcClbdV

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@debritz I blocked a text from them yesterday and got another one today from a different number.. #desperate

[Barack Obama @BarackObama]

Pope Francis was the rare leader who made us want to be better people. In his humility and his gestures at once simple and profound – embracing the sick, ministering to the homeless, washing the feet of young prisoners – he shook us out of our complacency and reminded us that we are all bound by moral obligations to God and one another.

Today, Michelle and I mourn with everyone around the world – Catholic and non-Catholic alike – who drew strength and inspiration from the Pope’s example. May we continue to heed his call to “never remain on the sidelines of this march of living hope.”

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@NiallHarbison Niall, have you ever thought about customising your dog bandanas to sell? You would have people falling over themselves to buy some for their own dogs and it could contribute to your fundraising efforts to help more Thai street dogs

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@MFWitches Clueless!

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@ProfRAScolyer You are remarkable human Professor. So brave and dignified in the face of a heartbreaking prognosis. I will keep you and your beautiful family and health care team in my thoughts and prayers.

[Shelley Duffy @bpslduffy]

@cptcapt @isobelroe One star for attempts to go with the colour theme? 😬

[KJM ❤️‍🔥☁️❤️‍🔥 @KJM_withaview]

From a man named Jordan Levick. Incredible must read:
I am not a Swiftie, but I am a human being, a Dad AND, a Monstrous Football fan.

I am extremely disappointed in so many of you who think that "not being a fan" of someone means you're entitled to shit all over them.

I want to remind you of something.

Your children are watching you complain about Taylor Swift sitting at a football game, being happy, and cheering for a man she loves in what appears to be a very loving, respectful relationship.

Your children are watching you judge a woman for literally just EXISTING and taking up space happily.

And you know what? Ms. Swift has won 324 awards. How many do you have?

She brought $5 BILLION dollars in consumer spending and boosted the U. S. economy so significantly, that leaders from other countries actually beg for her to play there?

Did you know that there are over 20 college courses about her skills as an artist, lyricist, and musician - including at places like Harvard, Stanford & UC Berkeley?

Did you know that Taylor Swift quietly donates mass amounts of money to local food banks in every city she performs in?

AND DID YOU KNOW …

That Taylor Swift was sexually assaulted by a radio DJ, and she got him fired? When he sued HER for over $3 million for defamation, she counter sued for a symbolic $1 in a court case that took 2 YEARS for her to win. And, she did that just to show women that fighting for what's right has no price tag and to never be silent in the face of oppression.

WELL IF YOU DON’T CARE BY NOW, YOU SHOULD.

Because your daughters, nieces, and your nephews are watching you run your mouth. And they are seeing the world hate a woman who does so much good, simply because she exists in their line of sight.

DO BETTER PEOPLE.

Teach your boys to respect women. Teach your girls that as women, they are ALLOWED to take up space.

Fix it.
Become aware of your words. Because we all have the ability and the obligation to fight for the future of our children with simple moments. And we need to consciously choose to be better for them.