We were asked to pick out 4 'Ah-Ha'! moments from each one of the listed chapters...
Chapter 2: "Stress: The Constant Challenge"
- Your liver release extra sugar into the bloodstream to boost energy to help you get through stressful situations and aid in the "fight or flight" response.
- Your personality affects how you perceive and react to stressors in your life. This explains how some people handle stress better than others!
- The 'American Psychology Association' states that at least %43 of Adults suffer from stress-related issues.
- Altruism has many positive side effects on your health and stress. It can help build a better immune system, increase your self-worth & self-esteem, relaxation responses and mental health! It's good for your health to be happy and help others!
Chapter 3: "Psychological Health"
- Self-Actualization is when you have finally fulfilled most of your human potential: Being able to see things for what they really are, accept the things that you cannot change and move forward, be completely independent (socially, emotionally and intellectually), be genuine in who you are and what you do, have the capacity for all kinds of intimacy and be creative.
- "Never seeking help for personal problems does not prove that you are psychologically healthy, anymore than seeking help proves that you are mentally ill. Unhappy people may avoid seeking help for many reasons, and severely disturbed people may not even realize that they need help." (pg. 49, Health 100)
- You should learn to recognize your own defense mechanisms. Most people don't even know what they are anymore because they have turned into habits.
- College life offer the perfect opportunity to combat loneliness. You are surrounded by other students on a regular basis. Reach out, make a friend! Our class should be particularly easy because it's a "Learning Community" - the same students in BOTH classes.
- Chose a mental health professor carefully!
- When I was younger my parents had me seeing a counselor because they were getting a divorce and feared how I would handle it (being so young, yet very impressionable). Later, years after my parents' divorce, I still saw said counselor. She would take out my parents not paying her, on me and was very mentally and emotionally abusive. I find it very hard to trust most Psych professionals now.
Chapter 7: "The Use and Abuse of Psychoactive Drugs"
- In regards to sex addictions, the chemicals that your brain produce while having sex become the very thing that your body becomes addicted to.
- Young people are more at risk to do drugs and become addicts because of social pressures, home life, and well, just being teens.
- Makers of street drugs aren't held to any kind of safety regulations. Because of this the drugs they make are often contaminated or even poisonous.
- In regards to the "dose-response function" (the relationship between the drug taken, the type and the intensity of it's effect). I really always thought that one of the reasons why people continuously went back to a drug was because they more they took, they stronger the effect. This was an interesting revelation.
- Statistic: For every acre of forest used to grow marijuana, 10 acres are damaged by toxic chemicals and pesticides that are used to protect the plants and ward off/kill local deer and bears.
Chapter 8: "Alcohol & Tobacco"
- If an alcoholic beverage says that it's "100 proof" then it contains %50 alcohol by volume. That's it's "proof value."
- Carbonation and sugar increase the rate of alcohol absorption in the body.
- Smoking kills 440,000 people a year.
- More than 17 million Americans are heavy drinkers.
- Tobacco smoke is made up of hundreds of different chemicals. Some of which are KNOWN to cause cancer and death (poisonous).
Chapter 16: "Personal Safety"
- In 2008, 43,000+ Americans were killed and 2.5 million were injured in motor vehicle crashes.
- Most rape victims are attacked by someone that they personally know.
- Child abuse is often unreported. Surveys suggest that as many as %27 of women and %16 of men were sexually abused as children.
- An estimated 150,000-200,000 new cases of child sexual abuse occur each year.
- When helping to give emergency care make sure that the scene is safe for you and the injured person. Conduct a quick visual examination of the victim, call for help and provide emergency first aid.
