Though you might think something as ordinary as feeling winded after taking the stairs is normal, Dr Katherine Pohlgeers previously told HuffPost that if your breathing “stay[s] elevated past three minutes or a prolonged period of time, that’s when it becomes more concerning”.

But what about feeling dizzy when you stand up?

We asked Dr Donald Grant, a GP and senior clinical advisor at The Independent Pharmacy, what it could mean and when to see a doctor.

“Feeling dizzy when you stand up can be normal, and it usually occurs due to blood pressure changes, which means the brain gets less blood flow for a brief moment,” Dr Grant explained.

“This is particularly common after standing or sitting for extended periods, but outside of that, several potential causes shouldn’t be ignored.”

One of the most “common” of these, he added, is “postural hypotension” (also known as orthostatic hypotension), or a sudden lowering of blood pressure that happens when you go from sitting to standing.

“Other common signs of this include blurred vision, general weakness, confusion and nausea,” he explained.

The NHS said it’s important to see a doctor if you get repeated signs of low blood pressure, like dizziness and fainting.

“Dizziness may also be caused by dehydration, so it’s important to drink enough fluids each day, especially as we approach the warmer months,” Dr Grant continued.

“While it can vary depending on age, health conditions and the weather, people should generally aim to drink six to eight cups of fluid each day.”

Additionally, some medications and pre-existing health conditions, like anaemia, diabetes, and heart problems, can make you feel dizzy when you stand up too.

“If dizziness occurs regularly or suddenly worsens, seek urgent medical attention. A qualified health professional can provide more tailored advice on potential causes and treatment,” shared Dr Grant.

In general, the NHS suggests you should see a doctor if your dizziness or vertigo keeps coming back or lasts a long time, or if hearing or speaking becomes difficult.

You should also visit your doctor if you experience tinnitus (ringing in the ears); double or blurred vision; numbness or weakness in the face, arms or legs; changes in pulse; fainting; headaches or nausea, according to the health service.

Walking on grass and sand helps you connect with nature, but it also has one unexpected benefit you might not know about.

Turns out, walking on uneven surfaces will activate your body’s alert system known as proprioception, an overlooked but critical sense that subconsciously tells you where your limbs and body are at all times.

If a surface is suddenly slanted, proprioception tells your body that “the position of your joint is different and so it would activate muscles in a different way so that you don’t fall over to the right,” said Claire Morrow, a physical therapist with Hinge Health.

When proprioception is working well, it’s automatic. Your feet will know where to land on the slope of a hill to keep your ankles stable without you looking.

But proprioception declines as you get older or after an injury, which is why you don’t want to ignore training this internal awareness system. You might just lose it if you stop using it.

For example, if you sprain your ankle, you can lose ligament stability and the proprioception “feedback loop” that prevents you from re-rolling your ankle and injuring yourself again, Morrow said. The good news is that with a few simple adjustments, you can hone this sense and train it to get better.

You don’t need to hike up a mountain to train your proprioception. Simply look for uneven surfaces that nature provides with grass, dirt or sand to give your body small challenges on your walk.

Walking on beach sand or soft grass in a park instead of predictably flat pavement can “give your body a challenge to react to something that was a little unexpected,” Morrow said, which is what’s needed to train your lower body’s proprioception.

She suggests starting on pressed dirt and then graduating to grass and sand. “If you don’t mind getting your feet dirty, then doing it barefoot is sometimes a fun way” to practice proprioception too, Morrow added.

If you’re nervous about your balance, you can use hiking poles on unstable surfaces to have the benefit of your foot testing different positions while still having support, Morrow said.

Since proprioception can decline with age, older adults at risk of falling should focus on honing this ability. One 2017 study of adults over 70 found that the loss of reliable proprioception was a key factor in why those adults were more likely to sway on their feet while standing.

Proprioception “can improve your balance, and with increased balance, you decrease the fall potential, especially in elderly people,” said Patrick Maloney, the lead athletic trainer at Tulane Institute of Sports Medicine in New Orleans.

“The danger of that impaired proprioception is you get into a position where you need to catch yourself, but you don’t have the quickness to catch yourself,” Morrow said.

Here is a quick proprioception test for yourself: Can you balance on one leg for 10 seconds? If you can’t, Morrow suggests working with a physical therapist who can give you exercises to improve this skill.

She also suggests consulting with a therapist if your walking pace has significantly declined or if you need to touch a wall or a railing while walking to stay balanced.

So the next time you go for a walk, try walking next to the sidewalk on some soft grass or dirt. It will give you a break from your usual routine and will also help train your body’s awareness to protect your health in the future.

If you’ve ever had to walk into a room full of strangers or speak in front of a crowd, you’re familiar with social anxiety. It’s a fear of being judged or negatively evaluated. In the future, you might avoid situations like these or manage to get through them, sweating and trying to swallow the lump in your throat.

For people with avoidant personality disorder (AVPD), the fear of being judged is so intense that they retreat from people and activities they might otherwise enjoy.

“Avoidant personality disorder is a mental health condition where someone avoids social situations because they feel extremely insecure and afraid of rejection,” said Nona Kocher, a board-certified psychiatrist in Florida. “Even though they may want close relationships, their fear holds them back.”

Relying on avoidance as a coping strategy can provide temporary relief, but it can also reinforce negative views of yourself as being inadequate or unworthy of satisfying relationships.

Below, we asked experts about the signs of avoidant personality disorder and what to do if it’s affecting your work and relationships.

“Personality disorders cause people to think, feel and behave significantly differently from what is considered normal in their culture,” said Lienna Wilson, a licensed psychologist in New Jersey.

She explained that these differences are long-standing and persistent. Typically, this pattern of thinking and behaving begins in early adulthood and tends to affect work, friendships and romantic relationships. In the case of AVPD, they might feel unattractive, inferior or socially awkward.

“They often believe they’re not good enough or that others will judge them harshly,” Kocher said.

Since they’re extremely sensitive to criticism or disapproval, people with AVPD shy away from social engagements and are hesitant to try new activities to avoid feeling embarrassed, said Patrice Le Goy, an international psychologist and licensed marriage and family therapist. For example, they rarely take social risks like texting first or inviting someone for coffee. The possibility of rejection is too much to handle.

“As a result, they experience persistent self-doubt and struggle to establish close relationships unless they are absolutely certain of being accepted,” Le Goy explained. They prefer to keep their distance, believing that they’re socially inept or unappealing to others.

“Avoidant personality disorder is characterised by a persistent and intense fear of rejection, profound feelings of inadequacy, and social inhibition,” Le Goy said. Although there is some overlap between social anxiety and AVPD, there are key differences between these conditions.

For instance, someone with social anxiety might be shy around new people. “However, they often have a close group of friends with whom they feel comfortable,” Wilson said.

As with AVPD, socially anxious individuals might worry about embarrassing themselves and experience significant distress in certain situations. “But they do not necessarily hold an overall belief that they are fundamentally inadequate or inferior,” Le Goy said.

Kocher agreed, adding that social anxiety is usually situational, meaning it happens in specific social situations and performance contexts. For example, someone with social anxiety might get nervous at a job interview where they’re being evaluated, yet feel comfortable at a friend’s birthday party where someone else is the centre of attention.

Conversely, AVPD tends to affect almost all areas of a person’s life. For example, their habit of skipping parties and work events might be part of an overall pattern of avoidance. Though they might be craving connection, their deep sense of personal inadequacy prevents them from forming close relationships.

Accordingly, AVPD is more persistent and tied to the way these individuals see themselves, Kocher explained.

For example, someone with social anxiety might worry about making a mistake while giving a presentation. In contrast, someone with AVPD will think of themselves as being “bad at public speaking” and assume the audience shares their opinion, Wilson said.

“People with AVPD are usually highly self-critical and have low self-esteem,” Wilson said. This view often carries over into their relationships. For example, if someone expresses a romantic interest in them, they might avoid the person. If they do end up dating someone, they might distance themselves or break off the relationship early because they don’t feel worthy of love.

Moreover, they rely on avoidance to protect themselves. “By staying away from social situations, individuals temporarily reduce the anxiety and fear of being judged, rejected, or exposed as being not good enough or unworthy,” Le Goy said.

She said that avoidance only reinforces their fear of being negatively evaluated. That’s because they miss out on opportunities for positive interactions that could challenge their negative self-perceptions.

“Social comparison can intensify these self-perceptions, reinforcing feelings of inadequacy and making vulnerability feel unsafe,” she added.

Poor self-esteem, characteristic of AVPD, can stem from constant teasing, criticism or rejection in childhood. “A child may begin to believe they are not good enough,” Kocher said. “Over time, this can turn into a strong fear of judgment or rejection.”

Research confirms that social exclusion negatively affects people’s self-perceptions. Likewise, experiences with bullying or social humiliation can make someone fearful of social situations. Eventually, avoiding people can make a person feel safer since they expect others to mock or exclude them, Kocher added.

Biological and genetic factors may also play a role in developing AVPD. Biological factors can influence your temperament or personality starting at birth, Wilson noted. Kocher agreed, adding that people may inherit traits such as anxiety or high sensitivity, which increase their likelihood of developing AVPD.

If you think you have AVPD, Kocher recommended speaking to a mental health professional who can assess your symptoms with interviews, questionnaires, or checklists. “It’s important to be honest about your fears, avoidance, and how it affects work or relationships,” she said. Diagnosis is based on long-standing patterns of behaviour that interfere with daily life.

In addition, “a trained mental health professional can help you understand where long-standing beliefs about inadequacy and rejection may have developed and how they continue to shape your interactions,” Le Goy said. She said that the goals of treatment may include building self-compassion, challenging distorted self-perceptions, strengthening social confidence, and gradually reducing avoidance patterns.

Keep in mind that it’s common to feel embarrassed about seeking support when a fear of judgment or rejection is among your symptoms. “However, working with a therapist who understands personality disorders can provide a safe, structured space to practice new ways of relating, improve connection, and reduce the intensity of symptoms over time,” Le Goy said.

Wilson added that cognitive behavioural therapy can be helpful for challenging negative thought patterns and modifying behaviour. “Especially with AVPD, more emphasis is placed on enhancing self-esteem and creating a healthier self-perception,” she said. “Psychodynamic therapy is another option and aims to uncover the underlying causes of the disorder, such as unconscious conflicts, negative childhood experiences, and maladaptive defence mechanisms that are used to reduce fears of inadequacy.”

Wilson noted that there are no drugs specifically approved for treating AVPD. However, a psychiatrist may prescribe medications to treat anxiety and depression, which can help reduce distress among people with AVPD.

Alone or in combination with medication, you can work with a therapist on taking gradual steps to participate in social activities.

“Building self-esteem through small successes is very helpful,” Kocher said. A good place to start is acknowledging your wins and not letting rejection derail your mood or your relationships.

Emma Willis has now been a staple on British TV for more than 20 years.

The presenter is best known for hosting shows like Big Brother, The Voice and The Circle, and was recently introduced to a more international audience when she and her husband Matt Willis began presenting Netflix’s British iteration of the dating series Love Is Blind.

It’s now been announced that she’s landed the biggest gig of her career, as she’s just been unveiled as one of the new hosts of Strictly Come Dancing, taking over from Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman.

But while you’ve probably watched Emma on some of the UK’s biggest reality shows over the years, there are plenty of other presenting gigs throughout her extensive resume you might have completely forgotten about.

Here are the ones we dug through the archives to find…

Emma got her start on music TV in the early 2000s, presenting segments for MTV as well as the UK version of the iconic TRL.

In 2008, Emma joined another British music show called The Hot Desk, whose other hosts included the likes of All Saints’ Nicole Appleton and Melanie Blatt, Laura Whitmore, Sarah Jane Crawford and Alice Levine.

At the end of each interview, the host would ask their celebrity guest to sign the “Hot Desk” with a pen (isn’t that just oh-so 2010s?).

One of Emma’s biggest interviews from that era was with a young and bright-eyed One Direction on The Hot Desk in 2011, a year after they came third on The X Factor.

In the peak of 2000s gossip mags and celebrity interview panels, there were plenty of shows out there like Live From Studio Five.

Emma joined a line-up of co-presenters – including Brian Dowling and Ian Wright – who would conduct interviews and discuss topical issues, celebrity gossip and big news stories.

However it didn’t do too well with ratings, and ultimately came off the air after around a year and a half.

Even as far back as 2012, Emma was clearly discovering that she had a bit of a knack when it came to reality TV.

She presented two seasons of this British show about single women looking for love, which saw three pals searching for their ideal guy out of 100 auditioning men.

Emma co-presented this sunny series alongside Alexander Armstrong back in 2013.

Prize Island placed four pairs on an Island (obv) off the coast of Mozambique, with each team participating in rounds of games to uncover prizes, ranging from a TV to a luxury holiday.

At the time, there were reports that it might not air at all, after it looked set to rival (ironically) The Voice. The show ultimately only last six episodes across one season.

Another oft-overlooked game show from Emma’s TV past was the ambitious Prized Apart.

Prized Apart saw two groups of adventurous hopefuls trying out assorted physical tasks in Morocco (overseen by Emma’s former The Voice co-host Reggie Yates), putting their teamwork to the test in the hope of landing a hefty cash prize of £100K.

After facing criticism due to its convoluted gameplay (not to mention its carbon footprint, as contestants were repeatedly flown backwards and forwards depending on how they’d performed in tasks) it was axed after one season.

Do you remember that time Emma hosted a whole Brit Awards? Honestly, we’d forgotten too.

Back in 2017 she took to the stage for the UK’s biggest night in music alongside co-host Dermot O’Leary.

Dermot and Emma were brought in as somewhat last-minute replacements when the night’s original host, Michael Bublé, was forced to back out due to his son’s illness.

That year’s Brits saw One Direction, Little Mix, The 1975 and more take home awards.

This one marked a huge change for the presenter as she swapped reality TV and game shows for a hospital maternity unit.

Across the course of four seasons, she worked on a labour ward working NHS hours while training to be a maternity care assistant.

Whether she was making beds, cleaning floors or offering support during births, it made for pretty emotional viewing.

Strictly Come Dancing returns to our screens in the autumn.

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I’m probably not your typical games console reviewer being a mum of two under-fives who barely has time to go to the loo (and if I do, it’s usually in the company of a smol person).

That said, I grew up learning the ropes on a Nintendo 64 (Golden Eye 4eva), and later, an Xbox.

My partner’s now got a Playstation 5, but our kids – who are two and four – are a bit young to fully grasp how the controls work (there’s a lot of aggressive button-bashing without the desired outcome), so it’s not really something we can play on together.

That’s why I was especially excited to learn of Nex Playground’s launch in the UK and Ireland. I’d heard about the motion-based games console a while back, when it was only available in North America.

After reading a whole host of positive reviews on Reddit, I was curious about how it would fare for families with younger kids. Little did I know its next stop on the road to world domination would be good old Blighty (it’s currently available to pre-order ahead of an estimated late-June release).

For those who’ve not yet heard of the Nex Playground, it’s a small (3-inch) cube-shaped games console with a built-in camera. There are no controllers because you, as the user, are the controller.

The camera picks up your movement and up to four of you can become part of the game. There’s no sitting still – it’s all dancing, jumping, hitting and swinging. And it’s ideal for all ages.

Inspired by his own family’s needs (his daughters were two and seven when he first started building it), Nex’s CEO David Lee wanted to create a product that kids, parents and even grandparents can use – and he’s certainly delivered.

Rather than smartphones which suck up our attention and seem to ironically isolate us from one another, this is a device that has the power to bring families together. I know, because I watched it happen.

The games console costs £269 and comes with five games. You can also pay for an annual Play Pass subscription (£90 per year) which gives you access to 60+ games.

There’s a real mixture to choose from, helping cement the console as a family staple – I love Starri (which takes me back to the days of stomping on dance mats, but with Sabrina Carpenter’s Espresso blasting out instead), my partner loves Basketball Knockout, my toddler loves the Bluey mini games and my four-year-old is utterly obsessed with Mirrorama.

My parents even came to visit and I’ve never heard my mum and daughter giggle as much as they did while running around with emoji faces hovering over them on the screen – it’s one of the features in Mirrorama, which is pure silliness and kids are guaranteed to love it. Mine loves to try and steal the smiley face from whoever has it (hence all the giggling)!

I have the attention span of a goldfish and I’m constantly being pulled in many directions, so setting things up isn’t usually my strong point. However, this was super simple and I did it in minutes.

The Nex Playground comes in a small(ish) box with a petite remote, power cable, HDMI cable and small instruction booklet.

All you need to do is plug it in to the mains, hook it up to the TV (via the HDMI) and then turn your telly on and commence set up, which involves typing in your WiFi and adding the code for your play pass, if you’ve bought one.

I asked Lee about privacy and security, because it’s always at the front of mind with two young kids – and, ya know, there’s a camera now in our living room.

He explained motion-tracking data and processing stay local to the device (“nothing’s sent to the cloud”), and every system includes a built-in camera cover, which is magnetic so it snaps onto the front of the console easily.

There’s no third-party software involved. Nex is directly accountable for the trust, safety, and certification of the entire experience. They also have kidSAFE+ certification.

It’s a really clever piece of kit. I absolutely love that it gets both kids moving and it’s also really helping my four-year-old come to terms with the idea of winning and losing (which can be hard to swallow at that age, but she’s getting there!).

Many of the games are easy to understand and play – even for a two-year-old. And I don’t think the kids have ever slept as well as they did that first day we played on it. They were absolutely exhausted from all the jumping, dancing and pretending to be animals (thanks to reenacting Bluey’s Magic Asparagus).

There have been a couple of times where it’s glitched (ie. getting confused with tracking who’s who), or has been a bit slow to load, and some of the games like the driving ones can be a bit tricky for younger kids to navigate using their bodies (my four-year-old seems to just spin in circles whenever she’s trying to ‘drive’ something), but on the whole, it’s been brilliant.

The wide range of games on offer is a huge draw (the Play Pass is well worth it) and the company adds about 15-20 new ones per year, so I’m excited to see what arrives next.

Realistically, I – like many parents – sometimes have to rely on screen time to be able to get things done: work, dinner, etc., and there is so much less guilt knowing the kids are playing together, learning new skills (like working as a team or problem-solving) and keeping active instead of sitting on the sofa passively watching a show.

And when they’re tucked up in bed, my partner and I will grab a glass of wine and play a quick game of baseball, or bowling, from the comfort of our living room. There are also fitness games on there, so if you struggle to find time to exercise, you can easily grab 20 minutes here and there.

With British weather being as changeable as it is, I can see this is going to be an absolute godsend for parents over the summer holidays on those inevitable rainy days when you need to entertain the kids and work.

If you’re in need of a console that suits a range of ages, but 3- to 12-year-olds in particular, I couldn’t recommend enough.

Families in the UK and Ireland can pre-order the Nex Playground at Amazon, Smyths Toys, and Argos.

President Donald Trump mocked a heckler who interrupted his rant about transgender athletes at his Friday night rally.

“Go home to mom. Take him home to mommy! He’s going to be in trouble,” Trump told the heckler as the crowd began to chant “USA.”

The president appeared in Suffern, New York, to support Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, who is up for reelection in November’s midterm elections. His tangents hit on a few of his usual talking points, including voter identification and transgender people in sports.

Trump asked the crowd, “Do you want to hear the swimming story or not?” joking that his wife, first lady Melania Trump, did not want him to tell it.

“She says, ‘Darling, please, you speak so beautifully, would you do me a favour. Don’t do the swimming story, don’t do the weightlifting story, it’s so damn unpresidential,’” he continued.

Trump went on to tell the story anyway to an enthusiastic crowd until someone from the audience interrupted him. The footage captured by CSPAN shows a crowd circling the heckler, pointing and chanting.

“You know what he doesn’t say is, his mom’s watching on television now and she’s loving it,” Trump said, before continuing his story.

The heckler’s dissent from the president’s supportive crowd comes amid multiple polls indicating backlash over Trump’s leadership.

A new poll published Thursday by the American Research Group found that only 31% of American voters approve of Trump. A recent poll released by Fox News also Trump’s overall approval rating has dropped 10 points since the start of his second term.

Subscribe to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.

If you took part in No Mow May, chances are your garden’s looking pretty busy right now – and the British wildlife will be absolutely loving it.

You might be taking Monty Don’s advice and continuing the no-mow vibes throughout June, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t other gardening jobs to get done while you lay off the lawnmower.

Longer days and warmer temperatures mean plants will be growing quickly, flowers are blooming, and vegetable gardens are starting to produce crops. So, watering, feeding and general maintenance are essential.

If you’re not really sure what exactly to prioritise in the coming month, Amber Tunney, plant buyer at Cherry Lane Garden Centres, has shared her top gardening jobs for June.

The gardening expert said by June, temperatures are usually warm enough for hanging baskets to be moved outdoors permanently: “Position baskets in a sunny, sheltered spot and water regularly, especially during hotter weather, as containers can dry out quickly.”

Ideally you should be doing this every few weeks to encourage growth and good flowering.

“Plants in containers and hanging baskets use up nutrients quickly during the warmer months, so regular feeding is important to encourage healthy growth and continuous flowering,” said Tunney.

A liquid fertiliser applied every couple of weeks can help plants stay vibrant and full throughout summer.

Whether you’re growing strawberries, currants or something else entirely, cover them with lightweight netting so the birds don’t get at them.

If you’re growing tomatoes (or any other fruiting vegetables) and they’re beginning to produce flowers and fruit, Tunney recommends switching to a tomato feed to help support healthy development.

“This is because tomato feed is high in potassium, which is essential for encouraging strong growth and supporting crop development throughout the season,” she explained.

While we’re on the topic of tommies, removing the small side shoots that grow between the main stem and branches helps the plants direct more energy into producing fruit rather than excess leafy growth.

“This is particularly important for cordon tomato varieties, especially those grown in greenhouses or trained against supports,” said Tunney.

You can begin harvesting early potatoes in June, which the gardening pro said “provides the best, freshest flavour while also helping gardeners avoid peak blight season later in the summer, when warmer and more humid conditions allow the disease to spread more easily”.

She advises carefully lifting potatoes with a fork to avoid damaging the crop – enjoy them while they’re fresh for the best taste and texture.

As we enter the hotter months, greenhouses can become particularly toasty, which can stress or damage plants.

“Using greenhouse shading, blinds or even temporary netting can help regulate temperatures and protect plants from scorching,” said the gardening pro.

If you’re growing a gorgeous wisteria, a summer prune will help keep growth under control and encourage better flowering next year.

Tunney suggested that “long, whippy side shoots” can be cut back to around 20cm, helping maintain the plant’s shape and prevent it becoming overcrowded.

A few months ago, I started burping. Not in a funny, show-off-for-the-kids way, but in a constant, uncomfortable, what-is-happening-to-my-body kind of way.

I started counting: 30, 40 times a day. And like any adult in 2026, I immediately turned to Google to ask whether that was a normal amount of belching.

From the obvious offenders (sparkling water and speed-eating) to more serious underlying conditions like ulcers, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) or, in rare cases, cancer, I spoke with gastroenterologists to break down when burping is harmless, and when it’s a signal that something else is going on.

“Burping is normal,” Dr. Samantha Nazareth, a board-certified gastroenterologist and chief medical officer at metaME in New York, reassured me. “It’s air moving up from the food pipe (oesophagus) or the stomach.”

That said, “normal” isn’t exactly a fixed number. What feels like a lot to one person might barely register for someone else, and the range is wider than you’d think.

“It is difficult to give a ‘normal’ cutoff,” shared Dr. Rabia de Latour, a double board-certified gastroenterologist and therapeutic endoscopist in New York. “Some people burp infrequently, some burp 10-20 times a day, some only burp a few times after eating or drinking and some people can voluntarily produce a burp.”

Still, there are some benchmarks that can help put things in perspective. One 2020 study published in the Journal of Clinical Medicine found that patients who burped more than 13 times a day were more likely to have an underlying gastrointestinal issue than healthy individuals, who averaged closer to two daily episodes.

“In general, we consider abnormal burping when it disrupts your daily activities or quality of life or occurs with any other symptoms like trouble swallowing or nausea or bloating,” explained Dr. Elena Ivanina, a triple board-certified integrative gastroenterologist and functional medicine doctor.

Just because you’re burping more than 13 times a day doesn’t automatically mean something is wrong. In many cases, it comes down to simple, everyday habits – especially how you eat.

One of the biggest culprits is swallowing excess air. That can happen when you eat too quickly, talk while eating, chew gum, smoke, suck on hard candies or drink through a straw.

“It can be purely behavioural,” de Latour said, noting that these habits can lead to more air entering the digestive tract, and eventually, more belching.

What you’re eating and drinking plays a role, too. If you’re a sparkling water person, for example, all that carbonation has to go somewhere. “Dietary factors often include increased carbonated beverages, chewing gum, sucking on candies, drinking through straws, high-fat or fried foods or food high in fermentable carbohydrates like lactose (dairy),” Ivanina explained.

A few lifestyle factors can quietly add to the mix. Stress and anxiety can increase how much air you swallow throughout the day, while slouching or lying down right after eating can make it harder for gas to move through your system. “Stress/anxiety can contribute to this,” Nazareth noted. “Slouching or lying down after eating can trap gas.”

Taken together, it means that a sudden uptick in burping isn’t always a red flag. Sometimes, it’s just your daily habits catching up with you.

But let’s say you’ve cut back on the LaCroix, slowed down your eating, and you’re still belching like a six-year-old at a birthday party… It might be time to pay attention.

De Latour flags these symptoms as ones to watch: bloating, abdominal pain, acid reflux, unintentional weight loss, heartburn, diarrhoea, blood in your stool or vomit, vomiting, loss of appetite, chest pain, new anaemia (especially iron deficiency), and early satiety – that’s feeling full faster than usual.

Beyond the physical symptoms, there’s a simpler gut-check (so to speak): if it’s disrupting your life, that’s the real red flag.

“It becomes problematic when it is bothering the patient; either because it is too frequent, uncontrollable or causing feelings of embarrassment due to any of the above or odour,” de Latour said.

As for when to pick up the phone, you don’t need to be checking every box. Even one or two symptoms from that list, especially if they’re new or persistent, is reason enough to loop in your doctor. Trust your gut. (Sorry, had to.)

The good news: most belching is fixable. A few things worth trying before you spiral into a gastroenterology rabbit hole:

It sounds obvious, but Nazareth’s first recommendation to patients is simple – slow down, chew thoroughly, and stop talking with your mouth full.

Carbonated drinks, chewing gum, hard candy and straws all sneak in extra air.

Stress and nervous swallowing are surprisingly common triggers.

Certain foods – onions, garlic, beans, cruciferous vegetables – are notorious for producing gas in the lower part of the digestive tract.

A Ukrainian MP has called out the UK for its “moment of weakness” after the government decided to continue allowing the import of Russian oil products.

Labour triggered intense backlash this week after it declared it was pushing back plans to close a loophole in its sanctions against Moscow.

The government unveiled a set of temporary licences which will allow diesel and jet fuel – refined in third countries but made from Russian oil – into the country.

Ministers insist the ban will come in eventually, but chief secretary to the prime minister Darren Jones refused to give any indication of a timeline when speaking to Sky News.

Ukrainian MP Kira Rudik said the announcement came as a “surprise” to her, and described it as a “point of weakness”.

“At first it was a surprise because the United Kingdom is one of the countries that first has been our strongest partner, but also a country where all the parties are supportive of Ukraine, on different levels,” she told Sky News.

“So to hear that there was this like moment of weakness, a point of weakness was surprising. And I believe this is what was discussed between the [Ukrainian] president and the prime minister.”

Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Keir Starmer spoke on the phone on Wednesday evening.

She continued: “But let me tell you this, no matter what happens, Russia is always laughing that Europe is paying for the war from both pockets, from one supporting Ukraine and from another one paying for Russian gas and oil.

“Is it worthy of continuing doing that? Because it is definitely worthy of supporting Ukraine. And we really hope that all our partners, all European countries, will every day go away from purchasing Russian gas and oil rather than trying to move back a little bit.”

Jones tried to clear up some of the confusion around the controversial decision on Sunday, saying it was “totally wrong” to say the decision stemmed from concerns around jet fuel shortages linked to the war in Iran.

He said: “No, that’s totally wrong. Totally wrong.

“One of my jobs in the Cabinet Office is to chair contingency planning, and I’ve been spending many hours doing that in relation to the impact of the Middle East on the UK.”

Jones said the UK has other sources from around the world to rely on.

However, the decision still stunned shadow foreign secretary Priti Patel.

She said: “When the government says they’re introducing new sanctions, they might be introducing them – but there’s no framework for that. There’s no date coming forward. And in the meantime, they’re now allowing and enabling Russian imported oil to come into the United Kingdom.

“So they’ve contradicted themselves. And clearly that is not helpful when it comes to the Ukraine conflict at all.”

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In 2012, Pew Research found that while the typical Facebook user had 245 Facebook friends, the average *friend* someone has on Facebook had 359.

That sounds completely illogical at first. But it’s explained by the “friendship paradox,” a term resulting from sociologist Professor Scott Feld’s 1991 paper.

The phenomenon has since been translated into mathematical theories.

But what exactly is this “friendship paradox”, and what does it actually mean for our social lives?

In a Purdue University video, Prof Feld said he was “surprised” to find “that it’s always true in social networks that friends in general have more friends on average than people do”.

If that sounds a bit like a head-scratcher, well, it is (hence the “paradox” part).

“People assume that if there’s a pair of friends, one must have more friends and the other must have [fewer] friends, so you would expect that half the people would have fewer friends than their friends,” he continued.

But instead, he said, some people have loads of friends, and naturally, those people are likelier to be friends with lots of people who have fewer friends than them.

And the other people who have fewer friends are less likely to be our mates.

In other words, it’s not so much that most people hover around an average amount of friends, with some having slightly more than others. Instead, very extroverted people throw the balance off a lot (a bit like counting billionaires when calculating people’s net worth).

“Each of us seems to be thinking that our friends have more friends than we do, which they, in fact, do, because our friends are the people who are friends with everybody,” said Prof Feld.

Later analysis found that the mathematical premise of the “friendship paradox” seems to bear out in real life.

Well, Professor Feld said, one takeaway could be to remember that comparing yourself to your mates isn’t really a great indicator of your true standing: we should try to remember that this sample is “biased”.

Secondly, on a broader level, it means some people could spread more of anything – from ideas to disease and misinformation – than the average person might, meaning more of us are influenced than influencing.

“So if you want to stop the spread of a pandemic,” Prof Feld continued, “you really would like to vaccinate people’s friends more than you’d want to vaccinate random people.”

The same goes for switching people onto a certain product. Basically, whatever spread you want to create, track, or predict, you’re better off looking at other people’s mates’ habits than their own.