Teen Depression

In the mind of a vaguely overweight and plus-sized teenager, there lies a hole. The smallest hole like the one in a punctured car, small, but big enough to gradually start consuming her. Her eyes spot skinny and slim girls walking down the corridor, their eyes slowly and mercilessly examining and inspecting her body. She squeezes her stomach in, hoping it makes a difference but realizes that her baggy t-shirt cannot allow that. She doesn’t know what to do. One Mississippi, like an intuition, she lowers her gaze. Two Mississippi, her head follows. Three Mississippi, her body posture changes. Four Mississippi, she looks down and immediately she registers the fact that her self - esteem tags along.

Teenage depression is often perceived as bad moods or the occasional blues. But it is much more serious than that. Its a major issue that impacts every single aspect and element of a teenager’s life. It is not the hormone mayhem causing depression but not only feelings such as worthlessness with their peers or insufficiency over their grades which may cause depression but social status and body image also plays a big part in the picture too. According to Mayo Clinic, which is a medical practice and research group in the States, teenage depression is a serious medical problem which causes a persistent feeling of sadness and loss of interest in activities. It can cause emotional, functional and physical problems. “It isn’t just a weakness which could be overcome by willpower - it can have serious consequences and requires long-term treatment.” an unconfirmed source adds.

According to Kidshealth.org, 1 in 8 teens all over the world are victims of this appalling and desolate condition. 1 in 8 teens all over the world have are to suffer symptoms such as sadness, hopelessness, anxiety, agitation and thoughts of death and suicide. 1 in 8 teens all over the world have to constantly be having doubts about themselves. Why should these symptoms possibly and most probably change the teen’s life? Statistically speaking, 1 in 5 teens get help from a counsellor or any sort of adult. But what about the other 4 teens who are constantly struggling, everyday of their life? Do they just dwell into the depths of the disorder? What kind of help should they be receiving? Although major depression can last only 4 to 8 months, in those 120 days, 2880 minutes and 172,800 seconds, a lot can pass through this depressed teen’s mind. Suicide topping the lists.

The adversity of a teen suiciding because of hopelessness or frustration is truly devastating to the victim’s family, friends and even his or her community. The reasons behind the teen’s suicide or attempted suicide can be highly complex and intricate, as explained earlier. Although suicide is very rare among children, the rate of suicide highly increases during adolescence. According to kidshealth.org, suicide is the 3rd highest cause of death for 15-24 year olds. Every year, approximately 2 million people attempt suicide in the States and the most popular place in the United States to attempt suicide is the Golden Gate Bridge.

Although the Golden Gate Bridge might look like any other appealing and attracting bridge to a tourist’s eye, it has a darker, more deeper, upsetting and painful side to it. This bridge has a higher suicide rate than any other bridge in the United States. 46 confirmed victims have plunged into their death only last year and a total of 1600 confirmed people have taken their lives since 1937, which is approximately 78 years ago, because of the problems and issues they face in their lives. An average of 120 people every year jump off the Golden Gate Bridge, which is just dreadful and tragic. And out of all those 120 people, 98% of the jumpers regret their decision in the second after their jump, the second when they look down and realize what they have done to themselves.

As they head down 70 km/h towards the frigid and freezing water below them, remorsefulness and self-condemnation once again overwhelms them. The fact that 99% of the time, a jumper will die just increases the tremendous impact. In a nanosecond, the icy water turns into cold, hard cement as the victim’s body smashes its spine and causes an abundance of internal bleeding. The Angel of Death soon lifting his spirits up with a visible and heavy load of regret riding on the casualty's shoulders.

Since the authorities of the Golden Gate Bridge cannot allow their suicide numbers increasing year after year, which it is, as a matter of fact, they have allocated special Highway Patrol Officers, also known as the ‘Guardians of the Golden Gate Bridge’, who are constantly on the lookout for people of all ages who are possibly going to attempt suicide. An exemplary such guardian, Sgt. Kevin Briggs, has helped convince more than 200 people on the precipice of death not to take their lives. When he talks to the person, he tries to figure out what their problem is and if he can get him to break down and knock some sense into them. When interviewed, a special comment which stood out was “In 20 years of experience I have learnt that people don’t necessarily want to die, they just don’t know what to do”. Sgt. Briggs is often used as inspiration and why shouldn’t he inspire us, to educate us to face an issue such as this, to possibly save a person’s life? But how can we help a suicdée and force them into understanding that suicide is not the way to go?

Helpguide.org states that most people who commit suicide don’t want to die. They just want to stop hurting and they feel like death is the way to go. If you want to help prevent suicide, it starts by recognizing the warning signs and actually taking them seriously. Some key warning signs include talking about suicide, preoccupation with death, withdrawing from others or saying goodbye. If you believe that a person is suicidal, you can play a huge role in suicide prevention by pointing out alternatives, showing that you care about them and getting a counsellor or doctor involved.

Tip # 2: to offer help and support. Now, this might not seem as much, but it is considered the best way to help a suicidée. By offering a sensitive and a concerned listening ear, you are letting him know that he or she is not alone in this battle of life or death. You can modify their mindset into believing that no issue that you face is greater or even equivalent to their precious and valuable life.

Tip # 3: Get professional help. You may not always know how to respond to the talks with a suicidée, so don’t be reluctant to get professional help involved. Involving a psychologist or a psychiatrist can also remodel their way of thinking as they have experience and have been studying about the topic for a fair amount of time.

Tip # 4: Be proactive. Suicidées often don’t believe they can be helped, so, being more proactive by dropping by, calling again and again and inviting the person out instead of saying “call me if you need anything” can really, once again make them feel wanted and loved by someone which could highly change their fatal decision of suicide.

Tip # 5: Encourage positive lifestyle changes. This may be very difficult as usually, the suicidée might just not care about what he/she does anymore. But encouraging them to do treatments such as exercising, eating healthy, getting plenty of sleep and being out in the nature might as well change the perspective of the world for the suicidée and really help their recovery process.

It takes a lot to muster up courage to talk to a suicidée, so don’t be afraid to talk to your own family member or counsellor as thought of ending life can stir up difficult emotions which you just have to let out. You could also read books on Teenage Depression such as When Nothing matters Anymore by Bev Cobain or Conquering the Beast Within by Cait Irwin. Also, rejoice in the little victories you claim. A road to a healthy recovery may be bumpy, but with patience and love, what not could be solved?

Be Yourself

The anxious, scrawny looking boy gazes intently and keenly as the buff, popular boys pose like big, oversized, intimidating gorillas. Skinny and slim girls can also be found twirling their hair as they challenge and flirt with the boys at UWC Tent Plaza during lunch time. But why is this popularity contest such an huge and important thing between teenagers?

According to G.M Williams, the image of being popular is a person who is considered and believed to be important, happy, liked and supported by school. To be popular is to be adored, adulated and loved. To be popular is to actually be somebody, like an entity.

But being popular doesn’t only give out positive vibes. It has its share of negative as well. Some of the popular kids are disliked by other students. But this may be because of envy and jealousy but also because the standout teens can be bullies or part of the mean girls clique.

Cristie is often called a malicious girl who often feels inferior to herself. When interviewed, on the behavior of Cristie, a shy introvert expressed that she often feels that Cristie judges her and the introvert claims to feel her self-esteem go down, almost like an instinct.

Another interview with a talkative and chatty bystander suggests that Hunter is a really funny and witty guy but he often makes fun of him while joking. He also adds that Hunter’s actions and behavior have a high contrast when he’s with the ‘cool kids’ and when he’s with the so called ‘un-cool kids’.

Still, the big question is, what does being popular in middle school tell us about the world outside the bubble of adolescence? Why does being popular matter to the students? Does it matter?

According to Professor Allen, who is using the criteria of likeability to define popularity, his studies indicate that the more the popular the teens were, the more likely that they get into trouble with wild deviant and quirky behavior, like shoplifting or vandalism and drinking and smoking. According to him, its the one way to signal to their peers that I’m not doing what adults want. To indicate that I don’t listen to anyone. I am independent and an antagonist.

But another story of 13 and 14 year olds found that teenagers who perceived themselves as well liked and comfortable with their peers were just as socially successful over time as those who were deemed popular by others. This internal sense of social acceptance, the study’s authors said, may be as or more important in the long run than the number of friends you have.

But one of the questions which races into my mind is, so why isn’t popularity of any significant value?

The idea that someone is better just because they own an ‘posh’ car, an expensive wardrobe and have an alluring or a pristine body is just absurd. Hear me out readers. No one is better than someone else. We all were born equal and because of those senseless and ludicrous rationales, treating others different is again, just absurd.

Most of the people are convinced by that fact that popularity leads the way to happiness and contentment all the time. And of course, and some of that might be true. Lots of popular kids are contemplated as more happier, just because they are admired and because they are surrounded by lots of friends with whom they have fun with. But on the other hand, there are the unpopular kids who aren’t very happy but they have a good, loyal set of friends which make each other happy.

So, popularity doesn’t control or determine your happiness but instead, what you do and what you make of your life does. Whether or not everyone in your class or grade is fond of you shouldn’t determine your middle school experience. You should be able to control your happiness by who hang out with the people you love and doing the activities in which you take pleasure in. Be yourself. Being popular isn’t important. It is as straightforward as that.

Sustainbility On Campus

Grade 8 Students just found out how their school, UWC East, does their part in helping the future generations by creating a sustainable environment for thousands of students to use and sustain at a unique grade 8 assembly.

In a dark hall, a bright and jolly man named Simon Thomas caused all the peacefully seated students to stare at the presentation in awe, with a look of surprise on their faces like when your parents give you the perfect birthday present, the one you always longed for. The same exact face, but instead learning about how the school is what it is today and what it does to do their part in protecting the precious resources of the dying planet that we live on today.

Who would have conceptualized the fact that a school could have a huge difference in Singapore’s sustainability in ways such as the orientation of the building, how the building is designed to do different things like ventilate itself and save water and electricity, how they infiltrate the water they get from rainfall into their plan of preserving the resources? Who would have thought that they spend an average of $160,000 dollars per month on electricity and each month they are doing their best to cut down on it and use the money to educate the students better?

The orientation of the building is set up in such a way that each classroom shaded each other from the hot and tropical sun of Singapore, that way, the school would have to buy blinds and curtains. Of course there is a quality amount of sunlight which enters the room, so to minimize the amount power used by the school for the lighting the school installed automatic dimmers in the lights so it uses only the proper amount of light which is required to light the room.

A classroom in the school ahs fans but why would it have fans when 40% of the $160,000 of the school’s is used to power the air conditioners? These fans are actually built to ventilate the hallways because they aren’t air conditioned. Soon, this cool air will enter the toilets, give out the fresh cool air to the plants in the toilet and is later let out from the open windows. And this process occurs a lot of times because the doors to enter the toilet is opened a lot.

UWC doesn’t just save electricity like that though. Whenever it rains, half of the enormous football field collects the rainwater, which is soon to be filtered and in no matter of time, it will be used to water the plants in the garden and the green grass on the premises of the school. So, instead of using the scarce amount of freshwater in Singapore, UWC uses reuses the rainwater so that they can save a lot of water for the people of Singapore.

How sustainable is this school? How many schools in the world do this? I don’t think the significance of the drastic measures this school takes has been emphasized before. Just imagine if a few schools in every country or state do this. There will be an colossal amount of resources that those schools will save. Imagine the number of resources the world will save for the safety of the future generations. Sure it’ll cost a lot of money, resources and time. But don’t you think it’ll be worth it. According to Mr. Raisdana, if many schools in the world will have a sustainable philosophy, it not only will impact the school but the students itself. The students will soon grow into adults and go into different businesses like law and banking and then soon, these adults will hopefully pass it on to the next generations and soon there will be another sustainable way to help the earth.