Blog 12

The stigma and shame surrounding mental illness is due to the ignorance of mental illness. People don't know much about mental illness nor how to deal with it. My grandmother had a mental illness and when I was a child she would tell me that men would break into her apartment through her pipes to steal her stun gun, toilet paper, jewelry and other odd things. I was old enough to know something was wrong with her but it intimidated me to be around her because I didn't know what to expect. My mother would tell me grandma is just a little crazy and not to listen to her. Her mental illness created tension and stress among family members because of the shared responsibility to care for her and the drama she created when grandma would tell her neighbors crazy stories about the family. The stigma and shame comes from not knowing what to do and wondering if you could inherit the disease. Also, the lack of support system for families that deal with a family member that has a mental illness. My mother is an only child so she relied on grandma's siblings and nieces for support. The health care system was not helpful at all and many attempts were made to get professional help but all failed.
Awareness programs, educational resources and financial resources would make a tremendous impact on the stigma and shame regarding mental illness.

Blog 11

If everyone lived with our future in mind I think we would only live a little different. It is my opinion that different people have a different perspective of how to make a better future. This goes back to the beginning of creating the foundation for our country. Some thought it would be better to let the states have more control in the decision making and legislation for their own people and others thought the federal government should have more control.
I am not naive to think there are not selfish people out there that ultimately just want to earn another dollar but their ambition does affect others by creating opportunities and challenges.
I think to a degree many people do think about our future. It's the path we all choose for our future that makes a big difference. The path is what holds or lacks knowledge, opportunities, right and wrong decisions, challenges, and many hard lessons learned.
Ultimately, if "everyone" lived with our future in mind there would be a little less selfishness but we would still have the diversity on what our future should contain.

Blog 10

Academic institutions can take a more active role in disease prevention for women by creating more awareness programs. The different departments within the school, especially health sciences and nursing, can create opportunities for students by getting them involved in implementing the programs. Gaining awareness to the female students is essential in preventing diseases. Creating activities specifically for females on campus can create an opportunity to gain insight to perceived needs and actual needs among females within the academic institution. College women may not view themselves as potentially getting a disease unless they are educated with facts about specific diseases and their risk factor for contracting the disease.
Finally, academic institutions should include these programs on their websites in order to reach more students, specifically distance education students.

Blog 9

The biggest challenges I face to regular exercise and a healthy diet is time and a good support system. Including exercise and a healthy diet on a daily basis also requires prioritizing and organizing. I am taking a Health & Fitness class and we are implementing a 7 week program for a target behavior. My target behavior is to increase my exercise activity from 30 minutes 2 days a week to 40 minutes 5 days a week. It has been a challenge. As a mom-and pregnant, wife, full-time employee and a student priorities are constantly shifting. I have learned that it is important to have support from your family and to include them in your exercise routine and healthy eating. Otherwise you are constantly working around them or missing out on time with them. I am fortunate enough to have a supportive family. However, we've had a few obstacles because my husband was not as "gun ho" about it as I was. Many times he would say, "let's just sit on the couch, eat munchies and watch a movie." As tempting as it was it took plenty of will power to tell him no and let's stick to the game plan to go for a jog. We always felt better after making the right decision but it is so easy to falter.
These challenges will definitely change as our kids get older we will have to readjust our priorities. I should definitely be finished with school within the next 5 years so that will provide more time to other areas in our life. My goal is to make exercise and eating healthy a priority for my entire family so we can support each other when the temptations are great.