Week 8 Putting It To Use- Dave Polanski

Wow, what a class. It is hard to believe these 8 weeks are already up. I feel like this class helped me a lot with my understanding of development. We pretty much covered the entire human development from conception to death, the best part of this class was the reflection on our past experiences. Every week when I would sit down to blog, I felt like I was the kid in Slumdog Millionaire. Each chapter in the text brought up many memories; some bad and some good, all learning experiences. As we all depart on what is next in our lives, we will face many trials and tribulations but we must remember they all shape our development.  

"I believe that to meet the challenge of our times, human beings will have a greater sense of responsibility. Each of us must learn to work not just for his or her own self, family or nation, but for the benefit of mankind."- The 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet 

This quote is what all development is about in my opinion. We get so caught up in self-gain that we lose sight of the world around us. We are driven by time and money, we have succumbed to living by the almighty dollar and if it is not making us money it does not make any 'cents'. When you turn on the news, all you see is someone against someone else. Black lives matter, blue lives matters, it is all bullshit. It is societies way of pinning us against one another and taking our ability to think for ourselves. People get so caught up in the moment, they jump to whatever side they agree the slightest with. We get this idea in our minds that we just have to be right, even if we are wrong we just never want to admit it. Ego is a dangerous things because it prevents us from doing the right, right thing, not just the right thing as we see fit.  As we venture onto our next journey, we have to try to always remember 'the greater good' of things. Take an extra second to help someone, lend a hand even if you're short on time. Remember to be the change we want to see. 

I would like to share one more quote with you all that helped me ties everything together.  

'Despite everything, I still feel people are really good at heart."- Anne Frank 

It was a pleasure working with all you during our time together. I wish you all the best and hope we all can continue to develop to the best of our own abilities. 

Week 7: Death- David Polanski

The only guarantee in life is that we are going to someday die. Death can come at any second and no matter what we can never fully plan for death or the effect it has on us afterward. We all have lost somebody in our life and it sucks. I wish I had some more elaborate explanation of how death is but it really just sucks. We fill up with all types of emotion and have a thousand questions we know will not be answered in this life. Although death can happen at any time or at any age; typically we die when we grow old. Our bodies start to decline and we eventually will pass. This cycle has been occurring since the dawn of time and will continue to happen until Christ's second coming. We don't want to die nor do we want our loved ones to die; it's human nature. However, what happens when we are faced with our first loss of a loved one. This has change for me throughout the years because I cannot help feel children respond differently to the loss of a loved one. Children are resilient. The first death I remember happening was my great uncle Frank in 1997; he was my grandma's brother. He lived in California and I would see him once a year when he would fly in to visit my grandma. My grandma was close with him and I would say she was the closest with him out of her siblings. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and moved back to Chicago to be with his family. I was 8-9 at this time and remember always going with my grandparents to visit him but not grasping the magnitude of what was happening. The only thing I remember was how sad my grandma was; I hated seeing my grandma sad. My uncle passed away briefly after his diagnosis and this was my first time seeing the affects it has on others.  

"No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same relentless, the yawning....There is a sort of invisible blanket between the world and me. I find it hard to take in what anyone says. Or perhaps, hard to want to take it in."- C. S. Lewis 

Our book defines grief as, "the emotional response to the loss of another person, that includes feelings of anxiety, despair, sadness, and loneliness." This is the best way to put what grief truly is. After my uncles death, I saw a different side of my grandma. She lost all desire to live. Since my grandparents watched me after school I spent a lot of time at their house and for 2 years following his death my grandma spent most of her time in bed just existing. I referenced C.S. Lewis because his depiction of grief is uncanny. When someone we know loses a loved one we try our best to comfort them. We say things like, "I'm sorry", "is there anything I can do?", or "They're in a better place". I remember drawing pictures for my gram, cleaning the house, or making her a snack and nothing seem to work. I remember hearing my mom use the terms 'anxiety' and 'depression' to describe my gram and I never knew they were all related. My gram just did not want to take any of it in at the time because she simply was not ready. I always viewed my gram as the toughest lady ever and I would still argue that. As I mentioned before that we all respond differently to losing a loved one, this was my gram's way of coping. She needed a significant amount of time to grieve because this was the first sibling she lost and I feel it put her life in perspective of living.  

As I got older, I had 2 significant deaths that made me grasp the importance of losing a loved one; my grandfather and my aunt. I was 22 when I lost both of them and the impact it made in my family is still rippling today. To me losing a loved one is the 2nd hardest part of life; the first is watching your family grieve.  

Lastly, in 2013 my cousin was diagnosed with stage 4 liver cancer and was given 6 months to live. He kicked cancer ass for four long years and lost his battle earlier this January at the age of 45. He gave it his all but in the end just couldn't go on to fight anymore. However, during these four years I was able to be there for certain stages of his battle. Hearing you are going to die is one of the worst things you can hear because now you have time to reflect on it. A lot of emotions and thoughts must be running through your mind 24/7.  

Psychiatrist Elisabeth Kubler-Ross developed the following 5-stages of grief (288): 

1. Denial 

2. Anger 

3. Bargaining 

4. Depression 

5. Acceptance  

I saw the progression of these stages as he fought his battle and there is just nothing worse than it. We want to keep living, that is why we go through these stages; it's our fight or flight response. He dealt with the first four with trials and tribulations but honestly, this is natural. We don’t want to die, no use for talking about the negatives that come with death because he has passed on. Acceptance is the last and it is the hardest for family to cope with because we know what is expected to happen next. The last time I saw him was at a party we had for him one week before his death and he was in the same spirit we always knew him to be. He was ready. We can never be sure how to handle a death, knowing you're going to die, or what to say to someone who lost a loved one. However, as a Christian I know we can have faith. This life is temporary and we know someday it will all be over but as for the time being we must show love, compassion, sympathy for anyone dealing with grief.

Week 6: Adulthood- Dave Polanski

When I think about being a teenager; I think about all the energy I used to have. I could have a bag of pop-tarts and a Mountain Dew every for breakfast (which I did) and function just fine for the day. For lunch I would have a slice of pizza, pop, and a bag of chips and still feel energized for wrestling practice. I weighed 155 lbs in high school and was rather active. I felt I could whatever I wanted and still feel fit because how active I was. When senior year came, going out on the weekends and having some beers was completely expected. I remember drinking late into the night and waking up feeling absolutely fine. Nowadays I cannot have a 6 pack without waking up feeling like grim death. What occurred? Well, there can be several factors why we lose our 'drive' as we get older but a lot can play in affect to this. As a male, I did most of my growing in my teens and no matter what I always was hungry. When your body is growing it needs fuel to grow (even if the fuel is not the healthiest), the term fast metabolism explains this theory especially for teenagers. A lot of teens are exposed to drinking while in high school and this transitions smoothly right into college. The 'typical' American life is to graduate high school, graduate college, get married, and have kids. This sounds beautiful but it is far from how the American life truly goes. I did not go away to college but a lot of my friends have and I saw the same outcome for most of them; they failed out about sophomore year and all put on the infamous freshman 15 and for some the freshman 30. Sure, we can put the blame on personal responsibility but this is not a fair accusation to most. We expect kids to go from having a curfew, having their parents wake them up for class, home cooked meals, laundry done and no responsibility to living completely on their own just three months after high school graduation. This is set up failure for most because the change is too abrupt and overwhelming. The temptation to party every day and eat junk is readily available, even more so than living a healthy lifestyle.  

Pg. 213 in our text shows a chart that indicates obesity in our country. Since we live in Illinois I will use their numbers, 25-29% of residents in Illinois are obese. Living a lifestyle that includes drinking alcohol, eating junk, smoking and lack of exercise set-up Americans to be obese. We indulge in these things because they are cheap, easy to access, they make us feel 'good', and are considered the norm in our society. Entering the work force really cuts a person's time down and we start to eliminate things such as: diet and  exercise. We complain about never having energy as we get older but seem to neglect the energy we get comes from what we fuel ourselves with. Our society is designed for us to live like this unless we make the changes we need to. Our text states, "Nutrition plays an important role throughout human development. In early adulthood, increasing evidence demonstrates the influence of nutrition on two major health concerns, heart disease and cancer."  

We see all kinds of warnings regarding the detrimental effects of smoking everywhere. There are even pictures on packs of squares warning people about the dangers of smoking. Why don’t we do that for food? The World Health Organization has officially classified processed meat as a carcinogen that causes cancer. When you ask someone why they do not smoke and they say it causes cancer; 9/10 they would not say the same about eating meat; when in fact both are classified in the same group. The problem is that we are drowned with advertisement; $5 foot longs, 2 for $10 pizzas, $1 any size coke, and this list can go on for some time. Heart disease, cancer, diabetes are all diseases that can be prevented through diet and yet they are some of the top leading causes of health problems in adults. Is there a solution? Well, our medical field would like for you to go to your doctor to get on some medications that will regulate (NOT CURE) your condition. A major concern form men is erectile dysfunction, the 'cure' is Viagra. Most people don't know but Viagra started as a heart medication. When men cannot get aroused it is not because they lost their sex drive it's because their arteries are developing plaque. A male erection occurs when there is a strong blood flow to that area hence an erection. Erectile dysfunction is an early indicator for heart disease because your arteries are slowly clogging. Our modern medical system does not want to cure us but maintain us so we stay sick and we stay on medications.  

Take a moment to think about loved ones or people you know who face these health problems. Early adulthood can be the beginning to an early death due to the lifestyle that is common to many young adults that transition to middle adulthood to being a senior. Who wants to get older just to have to take X amount of prescription drugs every day to just function?  

I tend to talk a lot about diet and nutrition, especially in regards to adults because the information is out there but it does take research. I catch a lot of flak for being vegan and often get the same remark from everyone, "bacon'. I used to make the same jokes and would be lying if I said the taste of bacon was not good but what's good is not always what's best. Informing others about the dangers of food can maybe prevent illness. I hate to see anyone sick or even worse dying, so relaying information is important to me. Not to say my way is the right way or I am better than you but simply that you're going to live a much happier life eliminating these poisons.  

Autism is growing at an alarming rate and I would like to see the links between autism and the lifestyle of the parents. What a parent ingest their offspring will also ingest. 1-150 8-year olds are diagnosed with autism; this trumps the preceding study from the 1980's that claimed 1-2000 kids had autism. Nearly 70% of Americans are on at least one prescription medication, add this to the standard American diet and I would be willing to bet these two factors play into the rise of autism in children.  

https://www.cancer.org/latest-news/world-health-organization-says-processed-meat-causes-cancer.html 

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Chapter 10 touches on friendships in middle adulthood and claims, "Middle adulthood is typically a time when close friendships become fewer and more precious." I am currently experiencing this at my current point in life. I will be 29 in a few weeks and every year I feel like I have less friends but a stronger bond with the ones that are still in my life. This may sound depressing but it really is great. There just is not enough hours in the day to maintain all the friendships you used to have because the older we get the more we have on our plates. However, the friends that "make the cut" really have shown they are tried and true. The times I spend with my close friends now are better than any of the times that we shared in the past because they are more meaningful. I can count on one hand the friends I have now but still wish the absolute best to the ones I do not talk to anymore. I feel the feeling is mutual because as adults we understand there simply is just not enough time.

Week 5: Adolescense- David Polanski

"Who are you? Said the caterpillar. Alice replied, rather shyly, "I-I hardly know, sir, just at present- at least I know who I was when I got up this morning, but I must have changed several times since then." -Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland (1865) 

What a beautiful way to open the chapter regarding adolescence but also development as a whole. I am 28yrs old and cannot help but feel that adolescence is the most challenging stage we experience. Children will go through the most physical change they will ever experience, as well as be aware of these changes. Speaking from experience, puberty was absolutely terrible. Everything was happening and I had no control over it. Being raised by a single mom I was definitely not going to talk about changes that were happening nor want to discuss anything sex related. Awkward. Adolescence is the stage where we start to develop physical/emotional attraction to others. Ch. 8 speaks about sexual identity and goes onto state "Attractions to individuals of the same or opposite sex may be purely physical or emotional, and do not necessarily involve deeper intimacy or love." I feel this is the top contributor to problems in adolescence. The amount of pressure to fit in, be liked, be popular, have a boyfriend/girlfriend, peer pressure, have sex, and the list goes on, it is enough to drive anyone mad.  

Do you remember your first break up? The world literally felt like it was coming to an end. Mixing emotions and hormones together made it feel that way and that is ok. As I got older you realize they were not a big deal but at one point they were and that has shaped us into the person we become. I feel like adults brush those feelings off because they chalk it up to "just being a teen", however, why don’t we put more emphasis on personal issues that all teens face. According to The Jason Foundation; Each day in our nation, there are an average of over 5,240 attempts by young people grades 7-12. There have been significant changes made to aide in suicide prevention but it is a battle that can always use improvements. Suicide rate I believe is 5x more greater than females in the U.S. Our society does not address males and their emotions because for some reason it has not been deemed 'manly'. Our culture gives us an idea of how a man should act and to avoid being ridiculed we suppress our emotions. Emotions and feelings should be encouraged to be discussed because it can prevent suicide or other dangerous situations. "Men don't cry" is probably my favorite saying because it is just pure ignorance. We have all been sad in life and if you gotta cry you gotta cry, who cares? Why are so concerned what others are doing, we are more incline to ridicule then help and until that is solved we will continue to see the issues we see now.  

This stage can be a make or break stage for many adolescence. Our society has to improve our actions toward teens. I feel like the media and entertainment promote harmful things to the youth and they have the resources to access them. I felt I learned a lot about life in my teen years but only now when I reflect back on them. Mistakes were the best thing about being a teen because we made a ton of them and hopefully learned from them. The worst break up, the biggest fight, the ACT were all things that were enough to drive me crazy, but it was all worth it. I want to close with another quote from Lewis Carroll that I could not help but relate. 

“Mad Matter: "Have I gone mad?"  Alice: "I'm afraid so. You're entirely bonkers. But I'll tell you a secret. All the best people are."