Weekly Blog

Today in class Dreier talked about his life when he was obese. He talked about how times have changed at fast food restaurants and new dieting techniques. He said that he and his wife went on weight watchers which I believe is a good way to lose weight except it takes awhile to get in the habit of watching what you eat and counting all the "points". Is becoming obese and social issue or a hereditary disorder because if it is social, you do not think about what you eat because you are busy socializing. With hereditary, you eat what your parents feed you. I know that my parents made me eat everything on my plate before i could leave the table. My step mom makes my step sister do the same thing. With eating everything on your plate your going to want to do that at every meal even when you are full. It is not okay to eat EVERYTHING on your plate! A good way to lose weight is portion control, how can you control your portion size as a kid when you have too much on your plate. I believe that people eat with their eyes.

Disorder articles

The first article that i read was called "The Course of Bipolar Disorder Over Time" by Krisha McCoy. In her article, it states that if people with the Bipolar Disorder do not take their medications and do not follow their doctors orders, their disorder will get worse throughtout life. If people do not take their medications and they don't attend their therapy sessions, they are more likely to have an "episode" once a year. If you do take the prescribed medications and attend the therapy sessions, people are more likely to decrease the amount of "episodes" by half. It said in the article that there is no definate cure to this disorder but doctors believe that with proper medication, therapy sessions, and routine check ups, the disorder can be less noticeable by the patient and witnesses. http://www.everydayhealth.com/bipolar-disorder/bipolar-disorder-prognosis.aspx

The second article i read was called "What is Multiple Personality Disorder?" by Tricia Ellis-Christensen. This article is about multiple personality disorder or now known as dissociated identity disorder (DID). People who suffer from Multiple Personality Disorder usually get it by having a trauma in their life, whether it be childhood or adulthood. Most of the time it is during the childhood, starting with physical and sexual abuse. When the victim has been in a trauma during life, they make up characters to cope with their feelings. The alters can be female, male, strong, weak, young, or old. The biggest thing that doctors look for when diagnosing someone with this disorder is if the patient "loses" track of time. This is because they are acting out another alter. The article states some of the symptoms which include having phobias, confusion, depression, suicidal thoughts, anxiety, alcoholism, and drug abuse. One of the primary treatments for Multiple Personality Disorder would be therapy (play therapy, art therapy, talk therapy, and hypnosis). Doctors do not want to put people on medication because there is a liklyhood that the patient will overdose. Therapists say that the disorder can go away, not fully, but with years or therapy it is likely that it will go away unless placed in a previous traumatic place. http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-multiple-personality-disorder.htm

weekly blog

Today in class, we talked about depression and other disorders. Dreier went through the "desk/pocket book" and said that to be diagnosed the psychologists and psychiatrists must be thorough with their patients background and disorder that may or may not be diagnosed. What i dont understand is that i have recently been diagnosed with depression and my psychiatrist was not in depth with me at all. I saw him the first time for about 20-30 minutes and he prescribed me with depression medication. I have noticed a difference but still, every time i see him, its only for 20-30 minutes. How can he be so sure that i have depression, if he still hardly knows me? While reading the article "Prognosis Negative" and talking to Patrik on googlewave, i realized that my "disorder" might be a new one and might be in the upcoming DSM book. I just have a hard time believing that people can diagnose a person the first time meeting them for atleast half an hour. If you have anything to add that could help me have a better understanding of this, please do...

weekly blog

During class yesterday, we talked about our id, ego, and superego. I have had times where there is a devil on one shoulder and angel on the other. It is hard because you have to weigh the consequences. A lot of times i dont want my id to win because i know bad will come from it. Then again i dont want my superego to win because i dont want to be known as a goody to shoes. I have learned to trust my ego and make sure that neither id or superego wins/loses. I think choosing which way to go happens alot for teenagers because we have a lot of pressure on us and we want to be rebelious. Thats not always the right choice though and that is why we need to let our ego talk.