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All Stars

Ask Oprah's All Stars - Is This Normal?

All Stars
Oprah's experts on relationships, personal finances and health are back for another action-packed season of All Star advice!

On this episode, Is This Normal? Is the question being asked to Oprah's top three experts about money, sex, health, relationships and a whole lot more on Ask Oprah's All Stars.

Click on each of the links below for answers to your most burning questions. Then, make sure to tune in Sundays at 9/8c for all new episodes!




1. Dr. Oz, Can Lauren catch any disease from kissing her dogs?

2. Suze, How can I set up a trust fund for my bird?

3. Dr. Phil, is it normal to shop in your sleep?

4. Dr. Oz, is it normal for a 7 year old boy to start puberty?

5. Dr Phil, is it normal to give my children affection through baby talk?

6. Suze, I want to teach my 16 year-old daughter to become financially responsible and to start building good credit. Is it normal to give my teenager a credit card?

7. Suze, How do I say no to anyone who asks for money? Even if I don't have it, I will try to borrow it from someone just to give it to that person. Is this normal?

8. Is it normal for teenagers to want plastic surgery?

9. Dr. Oz, is it normal for there to be bumps on a man's penis?

10. Dr. Oz, is drinking vinegar damaging to my health?

11. Dr. Oz, is it normal to lose sense of taste?

12. Is it normal to have sex in public places?

13. Is it normal for my husband to want to have anal sex?

Suze, How can I set up a trust fund for my bird?
Suze Orman:The best way for you to do it, honestly, is to do a living revocable trust for yourself and or a will. A bird and animal is considered a tangible asset, something that you own. So within that document, you can put aside a specific sum of money, appoint somebody who will take care of that bird or your animal for you how you want them to do so, once that money is gone, it's gone. If they don't use it all up, it goes back to your estate. That is the best way to do so. But can you just do it for yourself as well? Okay, girlfriend?
Dr. Phil, is it normal to shop in your sleep?
Dr Phil: The first thing you gotta do is make it difficult for yourself to do that. It's called response stopping. What you can do is put your stuff away so you don't get up in your sleep in your pattern and go to your computer. Unplug it, put the power cord somewhere else that you can't get to it. Put your Blackberry or your iPhone away where they're not just at hand where you can just get up and go there in your sleep and do it.

On a more serious note, let me tell you this is often a sign of anxiety. Where you're stressing out and so you have this energy and it causes you to go into an altered state of consciousness. You're not awake, but you're not asleep and you're still functioning.

Gayle King: Is it a medical problem, Dr. Oz?

Dr. Oz: Yeah. One of the miracles of sleep is that we don't act out our dreams. In you, there's a disordered process where you're not paralyzed when you dream, but if you don't deal with the anxiety issues that Phil pointed out, it's not gonna make that much of a difference down the road cause you're still gonna be miserable about it.

Gayle King: We show this segment "Is this Normal?" Is this normal Dr. Oz?

Dr. Oz: It is not normal. Phil you agree?

Dr. Phil: I agree it is not normal but it is manageable. You're not crazy. You don't have some major mental illness here.
Dr. Oz, is it normal for a 7 year old boy to start puberty?
Dr. Oz: I don't think that he's going through premature puberty, but there are some issues for children who are. Let me put some definitions on this. For girls age eight and for boys age nine, that's the cut off.

If they're seeing signs of maturity or puberty before that age. That's the sign that they're maturing too early. That can lead to their bones fusing too early so they don't get full growth. It can be caused by tumors and hormones producing growths in the body, so you wanna know about these clues. Listen, so many of the things we talk about, we wanna know if they're normal? We don't ask because we're embarrassed, but they're clues to us that things aren't going the right way. So from what I can tell, I don't think he's having premature puberty, so I think he is normal. It's okay to think those thoughts. You don't want him to be ashamed of what he's feeling.

I'll tell you as a doctor, but also as a father what I think is the right thing to do. I think if you're not embarrassed by the discussion and you answer it at their level, and by that I mean if they're asking, "how does sex happen" and you literally just describe it at a very common way not embarrassed way, then they just move on because they're truly curious about it. They're not lascivious in their desire to learn about that.

"The mom and the dad get together and then the baby comes out" and if they ask more detailed questions, take it as much into detail as they ask but if you're embarrassed, you'll make them embarrassed and it's also is a clue to them that something's going on and it's taboo which can attract their interest.
Suze, I want to teach my 16 year-old daughter to become financially responsible and to start building good credit. Is it normal to give my teenager a credit card?
Suze Orman: Is it normal to give a kid a credit card? Maybe yes, Maybe no. Here's the real question, is it wise? And I don't think it is especially if they're fifteen or sixteen years of age. I understand that you wanna build credit for your child, so here is the best way for you to do it. If you yourself, girlfriend, have good FICO scores, meaning you have FICO scores that are 720 or above, all you have to do is put your child's name on all of your credit cards as an authorized user. Don't tell them that you've done that. Don't let them have your credit cards. They never need to know, but then your FICO score or credit score becomes theirs.

Then what happens is when they go away to college, get them a debit card, hopefully one with very little fees so that you can monitor. They understand they have money in the bank. They can use it on a card. No money gets denied without hurting their FICO score, otherwise.
Suze, How do I say no to anyone who asks for money? Even if I don't have it, I will try to borrow it from someone just to give it to that person. Is this normal?
Suze Orman: Again its not only not normal it is not wise especially if you have to borrow it. If you have to borrow it means you don't have money yourself. Listen there needs to be rules and regulations for when you lend money no matter who you are whether you have money or you don't and here they are very quickly.

Before you lend money to anybody you your self should not have any credit card debit. You yourself should have at least and eight month emergency fund after the amount of money that you are going to lend them; you know you have to be fully funding your retirement account not just for this year but for the years that you have been working. And any money that you lend is money that you have to substitute the word "I'm going to loan it" and say "I am going to give it" because if you think you're gonna get the money back I am here to tell you I don't think so.

So, it's got to be money that you can give away and you never care if you get it back or not.
Dr. Oz, is it normal for there to be bumps on a man's penis?
Dr. Oz: All right so Jared the rule the thumb on penile bumps: they are not all sexual transmitted diseases although some of them are. Some of these are small infections. You can get little nodules inside the penis from sebaceous cysts that's a collection of material.

If they are a lot of them they will look like they are little skin tags growing off of them that's often a sign of a viral infection that's sexually transmitted. You can get mad at them for that.

The kinds of ulcers that have, that are painful those are usually a clue that they're infections as well. So any sores of that nature ought to be addressed pretty aggressively, but what I worry much more about is a lump that's continuing to grow and getting larger and larger invading the tissue around it cause that's much more common for cancers.
Dr. Oz, is drinking vinegar damaging to my health?
Dr. Oz: Hey Kristin so let me ask you how much of this vinegar of this white vinegar you drink a day?

Kristen: Probably about two ounces.

Dr. Oz: That's just fine it's not a problem...You know what it's really cool actually. So, vinegar is acidic acids made with the bacteria and the alcohol and converse it. So its a natural product its does clean your windows but it does also things for your body. A lot of folks us it as a exfoliate on there face because it does force the skin to rejuvenate itself a lot of people have used it for gastrointestinal issues. But I tell you if you want to go on a diet it's not a bad aid to use because it slows down the way sugars get into your body. It also, cause of the taste, takes away your appetite.

For your daughter again the amount that we are talking about is probably at most an ounce a day there shouldn't be more then that so we are good, I think that's just fine. I want you to continue using it. And you know what it's inexpensive. Suze, it doesn't cost a penny.
Dr. Oz, is it normal to lose sense of taste?
Dr. Oz: Alright, so I got in front of you four plates and this is a tool that we can all use at home. There are a couple of things that cause loss of taste. One of them is zinc deficiency, and so I want you to start taking thirty milligrams zinc lozenges. I give this to all my patients who I operate on because after heart surgery a lot of people lose their sense of taste. And if you don't taste foods, you can't smell them, therefore you won't eat them cause they taste like wood.

So that is something that I see a lot of. I've got a different test for you there are four foods there. There should be a bar of soap...because taste and smell are closely related. There's a pineapple that should be in front of you. Then there is some cinnamon - smell that. Alright, cinnamon and then taste, see if you got the rose pedal there, and for folks at home these are four very important smells because if you don't have the sense of taste for those four or you lost one of them that you use to have I worry about Alzheimer's.

It is one of the first signs that we actually see when we have changes in our brain function as we began to lose parts of our taste complex which is intricately connected to our brain. So we'll put a list up on our web site of twelve different taste and smells. Don't panic if you miss one of them but it is one of the earlier signs especially if you use this.

Those two senses [taste and smell] are so intricately related that something has destroyed your taste buds very selectively just at the level at the tongue not the rest of your body because there's no way you can smell things, not taste them unless it's localized to the tongue. And you know we are born with a lot of taste buds and by the time we get to age fifty we began to lose a lot of them but fifty year old are suppose to be able to taste their food still.

If you don't have a neurodegenerative disorder or a problem like with Alzheimer's then you generally speaking will get better with time. It's cyclical you'll re-grow taste buds.

There's no treatment except for the zinc that I mentioned to you. Zinc deficiency - you need zinc to be able to turn on the taste buds so please try that and please give it six weeks it takes a while to restore those levels.
Is it normal to have sex in public places?
Dr. Oz: I mean there is no problem with that. We're going to be talking about some other sexual questions that have come up but a lot of it is about you know tasting the forbidden fruit. So if getting variety in your life and you know guys especially like exotic dangerous things.

Think back to our ancestors...What would excite guys you know they'd be out there pillaging and raving the country side. They'd find someone. Women don't want that they want the opposite they want calm quiet. That's why guys like the lights on and women want the lights off. It all makes sense when we understand it at that level.

Suze Orman: But if sex means sex...are you kidding me! I don't care if it's a penis and a vagina, vagina and a vagina it is not normal and it is not right.
Is it normal for my husband to want to have anal sex?
Dr. Oz: There is no question about it is normal. It's not only normal in our survey obviously common but if you know, lots of studies done on this topic make sure the same things forty percent of men and forty percent of women both have anal sex periodically. It's not common to have it every time. It should be something that again is part of that forbidden fruit desire lust that we have. It should be negotiated and discussed, it cannot be a power play.

A couple key things: There are different nerve endings in the anus stem in the vaginal area. So different types of stimulation, different types of orgasms. There's reasons why it could bring intimacy into a relationship if it's handled the right way. You got to use lubrication alright, for those who are thinking about it. And it's important to recognize you can still transmit sexually transmit...illnesses that way which is a big deal for me. But with that question it's normal.

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