All About G

Today, I decided to try something different.

I think the results are pretty good.

I’m not putting up pics until next Friday when I come home. So until you see them, or me, wallow in suspense. You’ll certainly be surprised. It’s a guarantee.

I didn’t do much at all the five days I had off. I mainly stayed at my house and rested, which was what I wanted to do. I went to Oneonta on Friday to get a plastic rod stuck into my arm. It’s called Implanon; the new implant birth control. It’s supposed to last three years, which is good, because I’m ridiculously inconsistent with taking my pill. The actual procedure was painless as well, if not a little humorous. They injected a numbing agent into my arm, which started working immediately. Then, they shoved a FAT ASS needle into my arm. the size of it… it’s about the size of a…. yea, whatever. I’ll just take a pic and post it somewhere for you to see. I got to watch it all take place with detached fascination. Other than my skin being “extra tough,” it was quick and easy and I was out of there in about half an hour.

I got to put my new credit card to use, going food shopping with Mom. I don’t plan on using it often, by the way. I’m not happy with actually having the thing in the first place, but if I’m going to get student loans, I’m gonna need a good credit score, and in order for me to have that, I’m gonna need a credit card. So, once the foods stuffs gets paid off, I only plan on using it a little here and there, like buying a pair of jeans, or maybe a notebook. Little things that are easy to pay off.

Let’s see, anything else… Trip back was really uneventful and SILENT, except for the music we were playing. It was kind of boring, but I guess when your dad doesn’t really have a life beyond his office, you don’t really have much to talk about.

I get to go home in a couple of weeks to help the DCDC with the Obama rally we’re sponsoring in Delhi… you should TOTALLY GO. And I’ll be kept there for a few extra days, because my mom and I figured it’d be much cheaper to keep me till election day and then drove me back instead of driving me back and then coming to get me two days later.

In other news… I think I did something to my back. It hurts in a specific spot when I extend my lower back, and its tender to touch. I think it’s about time i go see Dr. Bonnie. She’ll probably be able to help. Good thing I’m going back in like, what, two weeks?

(Dad should especially read this, and maybe take my advice, or I’ll smack him)

Today, in General Psychology, we were discussing a little bit of brain chemistry. We went over the anatomy of a neuron (old knowledge—booooooring), and we went over several neurotransmitters in the brain.

Now, it just so happens that we went over dopamine and serotonin, and I learned some interesting things about them.

One of the more obviously facts about both would be that a shortage in dopamine and/or serotonin results in various problems, one of them being depression. There are difference with each of them, of course; serotonin regulates sleep and mood (insomnia is a result of a shortage in serotonin). Dopamine regulates motivation, the reward system (‘If I do this, I get this for it’), movement, and cognition. Since a shortage in either results in depression, would it be possible to have a educated guess as to which neurotransmitter is being under-produced by looking at the symptoms that come along with depression? For example, for a depressed person who has extra trouble sleeping might have low levels of serotonin in their brain.

That’s not the only thing I’ve pondered. I also learned today that a decrease in serotonin leads to sadness, anxiety, food cravings, aggression and depresson.

You’re probably wondering why I emphasized the food cravings in that last paragraph. During discussion, my professor told us that the body will crave foods that contain nutrients which will increase the level of serotonin in the brain. I looked up those foods—both for serotonin and dopamine—and here’s what I found.

Foods that can increase serotonin levels: chicken, turkey, tuna, salmon, kidney beans, rolled oats, lentils, chicken peas, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, baked potatoes (with the skin), tahini (sesame butter), walnuts, avocados, almond butter, complex carbs (meaning fibers, not starches) a variety of fresh fruits and vegetables, and a ton of water.

Foods that can increase dopamine levels: almonds, avocados, bananas, dairy products, lima beans, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, and ESPECIALLY fruits and vegetables (because it turns out that dopamine is very easily oxidized, and fruits and veggies, which are high in antioxidants, protect the dopamine from those nasty free radicals that roam the body and try to mess with your system).

I also read that eating simple sugars, like candies, processed foods, etc, saturated fats (animal fats), cholesterol, and refined foods interfere with brain function. Another thing to avoid would be caffeine. In a sense, it’s kind of not surprising, because all of those things mess with the rest of our bodies, so why not the brain too?

Can anyone raise their hand and tell me what those foods have in common?

Vitamins, antioxidants, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, along with a smaller “dosage” of saturated fats (because it’s a fact that poultry, such as chicken and turkey, are in fact healthier than beef and pig). Good job to those of you that actually tried to guess without looking at the answers.

This brings me to a theory… a hypothesis (because I’ve yet to hear if this has been tested). If clinical depression, or even depression, is caused by a low level of serotonin and/or dopamine, would it be entirely possibly to reverse the effects, and possibly even cure it, by doing something as simple as changing one’s diet, instead of prescribing to them drugs that enhance the brain’s chemistry?

Let’s use my dad as an example, because he is conveniently at the forefront of my mind, and the only person I can think of who is clinically depressed. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone in as bad a funk as my dad. He’ll deny it to you, he’ll say “Oh I’m doing fine.” In reality he’s not. For a while, he was taking Zoloft, and all was good and well.

But, for a while, he’s been off Zoloft, because we haven’t been able to afford the prescriptions (there were like, $80 per refill or something ridiculous like that). And he’s back down in that horrific funk (and then, don’t let him fool you—he may act like everything’s fine and dandy, but before he got this bad, he wasn’t living in his office save for the few moments he’d emerged to go to the bathroom or get food, and the few hours he’d go to his room to go sleep).

There are reasons why his serotonin levels are low; for the sake of his privacy, I won’t go into specifics. But his lifestyle habits contributed very nicely.

Now, let’s look at my dad’s habits;

– he smokes, which in itself is horrible (and he has yet to do ANYTHING about quitting, ahem ahem). – He drinks a TON of caffeine. I’ve honestly never seen him drink an actual glass of water. When he’s not drinking coffee, he’s drinking Coca Cola, and when he’s not drinking Coca Cola, he’s drinking coffee. In between this is the occasional (more like rare) glass of milk, and every now and then a shot or two of liquor. – He eats like crap. When he actually eats, he eats more meat than plants, and he eats a lot of pasta (which is actually a simple carb, which means it’s a starch instead of a fiber). I don’t really see him eat a lot of fruits, and he does eat veggies, but again, the majority of what you see on his plate is meat. He has an affinity for beef, too, I might add, and when he’s giving a choice of meat, will usually pick that. He’s tried to get me off of his back about his eating habits by buying these boxes turnovers, but upon looking at the ingredients, I found that they were more processed than anything, and had more trans fats (trans fats = cholesterol) than anything I’ve yet to see (5g to be exact). – He has a bad habit of bottling up his emotions and problems (though I’m not too much better), and is usually always tense with stress. I’ve never ever seen him do anything to try and relax, and no, Dad, watching anime and reading manga does NOT calm the mind. I’m talking about meditation, exercise, things related to that. – He isn’t anywhere as social as he needs to be, and believe or not, but social relationships can impact a person’s health, physical mental or emotional. He’s barely social; he doesn’t even really interact with us, his family. As I said before, he’s hiding in his world, his office.

While I have no idea if he’d be willing to actually do this, because he’s said that he’d try something, tried it for about a week and then went back to his old ways, but if he changed his lifestyle around—changed his little, went out a little more, engaged his mind more, and talked to people—chances are, his condition would get better.

But here’s the thing, and this is the problem with EVERYBODY. They will usually only keep these lifestyle changes until they feel that “everything’s better” and then revert back to their old habits.

Unfortunately, folks, this isn’t that case. These changes are PERMANENT. If you ate more serotonin-rich foods and got rid of your depression by increasing you serotonin levels, chances are that when you stop eating those foods, your serotonin levels won’t be sustained and therefore will decline.

So, Dad, this is how it goes. You want to stop being depressed, no? If you don’t, you have a LOT of things to change. Start off by ceasing with the waste of your money to buy soda that really isn’t necessary. Honestly, I don’t care if it’s a “treat”. It isn’t even a treat. You always have Coca Cola. Treats are occasionally, not every day. Drink more water. Go on more walks. STOP READING SO MUCH MANGA AND WATCHING SO MUCH ANIME. Come out of your office every once in a while, and talk to us, and I mean talk as in having intelligent conversations (like talking seriously about hyper-extending knees instead of talking about aliens). Stimulating your brain will help too. Stop eating such crappy food, and eat more healthy, organic foods. For example, replace those shit apple turnovers with real apples. And if you’re worried about the kids eating them, then keep the apples in your office. Simple as that.

If you need to go someplace not all that far away, then walk, or bike, instead of using the car. QUIT SMOKING. And you absolutely have to continue drinking water, eating more greens, walking instead of driving, and etc. Even after you feel better (if you feel better… this is still only an experiment). Going back to your old habits will only pull you back down in to depression, because your serotonin transmitters are so fucked up, they can’t continue to maintain those levels of serotonin without help.

So, questions, comments, thought? Leave a comment. Let’s start a second intelligent discussion. And for the record, that one before it, about the knees, is still open fr discussion of anyone has a thought to add.

And I want EVERYONE’S opinion on this. You can be reading this blog and hate my guts for all I care, but I want EVERYONE’S opinion, no questions asked, because this is one of those things where once I’ve made up my mind, I can’t go back to change it.

So, backstory: I definitely want my name (not my full name, Regina, but my more commonly used nickname, Gina) as a tattoo. I’m getting it in Japanese katakana writing. So, here’s my question;

Vertical? Or…

Horizontal?

I want anyone who reads this to leave a comment, giving me their opinion on which way I should get it. So far, the score is Vertical – 2; Horizontal – 0. Maybe I’ll go with majority rules in the end or maybe I won’t, but I wanted to see what you all think. I’m leaning towards vertical, because it is the traditional writing style in Japan, after all.

Oh, before I forget; this tattoo (my name in katakana) will be on my lower back, the right side. So keep that in mind when making your choice.

If you all want, I can post up the image of the other tattoo I want to get. It’s the kanji for strength (methinks it’s known as ‘ryoku’ in Japan, but I’m not sure, because there are several different ways to write strength, not mention several different meanings, in Japan). [EDIT] the length of it will be approximately the length of my point finger, and it’s width will be approximately the length of my thumb’s proximal phalanx.

Thanks!

FINALLY I DON’T HAVE TO SIT IN THE LAB ANYMORE!

This actually happened, like, the other day, but I was so lame I didn’t update and tell you all about it until now.

So what’s my excuse, you ask? Well, I’ve been running around all over the place, mainly job hunting, because… well… I need a job, obviously. So far, Target’s turned me down because I won’t be in Ithaca over the holidays… stupid Target, and I have other people I need to get in touch with, which I will do tonight and tomorrow. I just need a steady source of income and I’ll feel much better.

That’s about it for now. I’m going to go mess with my Twitter and eat ice cream. Byes~!

Okay, I have about 15 minutes before I have to run for my class—psych—(only one of the day YAY!), so I’ll tell you all how I’ve been doing.

Things are okay I suppose. There are ups and downs. Like, for example, I’m using the computer in the computer lab, and it’s not because it just so happens to be close to the classroom (though it is). As a matter of fact, I don’t have any internet. In my single, I have a phone jack and two computer jacks. I tried all three in my quest to activate my internet account, but none of them worked. Dad thinks I messed up my cable, but I didn’t do anything to it, and it’s perfectly fine. I think Apogee’s screwing with something (Apogee, btw, is the internet provider here on campus). Dad called them a couple of days ago, and they said they would get in touch with me.

Well, they have YET TO DO THAT!

So Dad’s going to give them a call sometime today and find out what the hell’s going on.

Anyway, other news. I’m still job hunting, but today I’m going to go fill out an application for office assistant. I’m still looking, and hoping, so I can only keep doing that until I actually get a job, because there’s a lot of crap that I need, like, really bad.

Let’s see… this Saturday is club soccer tryouts. Guess what I’m doing this weekend :grin:? And track has a meeting tomorrow. I decided I’m only going to run outdoor, because I hate running indoor (it probably would have been different if I had ran indoor track throughout my high school career instead of just starting to run it my freshman year in college).

Hopefully I make the club team; that would make me really, really happy. I tried giving up soccer last year, and I just couldn’t do it, so I’m not going to

So, I won’t be online as much as I want to, and you won’t be able to find me online playing games, YET. Hopefully, this crap with Apogee with right itself so I can actually use my OWN computer instead of using the ones in the freezer known as a computer lab. Till next time, folks.

Ever have one of those days where you’re in a good mood but depressed at the same time?

Yea, I’m having one of those days. Today was a really good day, aside from the couple of arguments I got in to. But on the other hand I’m also depressed because I’m leaving home again. I really don’t want my summer to end, because it feels like I still have a million things to do before I headed back to IC. Not to mention the fact that I just don’t want to go.

Not much I can do about that, unfortunately, except deal with it. It’s either that, or forget about my education, and that’s the last thing I want to do.

Anyway, I have to go finish packing my things. So to everyone here in Sidney, I’ll be seeing you around.