According to researcher Edward Smith, a cognitive neuroscientist at Columbia University in New York, breaking up or being  unexpectedly dumped by your love interest really does cause physical pain. In a study of 40 people who had recently experienced a break up, Smith found through brain scans that breaking up causes actual physical pain.

Brain scans of the participants found that the same areas of the brain that light up during physical pain also light up during emotional pain. This means that everything you've heard about heartaches and broken hearts are true. Breaking up really does cause physical pain.

Have you experienced a painful break up? Share your experiences!

Has you doctor told you that you need a laparoscopy? Laparoscopy is a minimally invasive surgical technique used in procedures such as tubal ligation, gallbladder removal or hiatal hernia repair. It is normally performed in the outpatient surgery unit of a hospital. In most cases, patients can return home a few hours after a laparoscopic procedure. Learn more about the laparoscopy procedure.

Have you had a pelvic laparoscopy? Share your comments!

You've probably noticed that we've been asking you to share your women's health experiences with other readers. Is there a women's health issue that you've experienced and want to share with other readers? Or a women's health topic that you want other readers to share their stories?

Here are some of the topics we've been asking you to share:

Colposcopy Experiences

Hysterectomy Stories

Uterine Fibroid Tumors

Endometriosis Experiences

Some reader stories already published online:

First Period Stories

Embarrassing Menstrual Moments

What Did Your Mother Tell You About Menstruation

Getting Your First Bra

Gallbladder Stories

If your topic is not already included, send me your topic and I'll create a form so you and others can share your experiences.

The Associated Press reports that a study published in the New England Journal on a small European study can help you learn how to best keep off lost pounds.

If you've ever been on a weight loss diet, then you probably have experienced the difficulty of  keeping off lost pounds. Maintaining weight loss is often an incredible roller coaster ride with your scale going up and down.

So what does it take to keep off lost pounds?

The researchers, in this study,  looked at 773 overweight and obese adults who had families. The participants were from eight countries in Europe. Each of the 773 adults lost an average of 24 pounds after spending two months on a low fat diet prior to participating in the study. The families of the participants were included because researchers believed it would help the overweight and obese family members stick to their assigned weight loss maintenance diets.

One of five different weight loss maintenance diets was assigned to each study participant. Each of four different diets were a combination of high or low amounts of protein and carbs. A fifth diet was used as a control diet. This diet was a combination of moderate protein with no restriction on carbs.

Study participants received counseling, recipes, and cooking tips. There were no restrictions on the amount of food eaten on any of the five diets. Participants were instructed to keep food diaries, and gave periodic blood and urine samples for laboratory evaluation.

After six months on the weight loss maintenance diets, only one group was able to not only keep the lost weight off, but lose additional pounds. This group was the one that was assigned a high protein, low carb diet.

The weight loss maintenance group assigned a low protein, high carb diet regained a significant amount of weight at almost 4 pounds.

The high protein, low carb group also had far fewer dropouts than all of the other diet groups who had significant numbers of dropouts. The researchers believe the difficulty with dropouts was caused by problems keeping families motivated.

While this study is promising and offers more hope to yo-yo dieters who find it not so hard to lose the weight, but often impossible to maintain weight loss. However, more studies with larger groups is necessary before any firm conclusions can be reached.

Have you been able to maintain weight loss long term? How have you done it?

10 Steps For Healthy And Permanent Weight Loss