do i look fat in this?

1. woke up early for an appointment and a stop at the cupcake shop! it's this little cupcakery that i was told about and it has delicious cupcakes! they are a tad too cloyingly sweet for my taste (shockingly enough) but the actual cupcake is great--the icing needs to be eaten in small doses, though.
2. worked more on the suicide paper--it's turning out better than expected! and just lazied around the apartment. didn't want to (and couldn't) be outside sunning and couldn't gym today either. that is the plan for tomorrow, though. 
3. got wholly absorbed in a new book! i'm already on page 98 and i started only around 1.5 hours ago. the secret history is the title and i have my father to thank for the suggestion. i absolutely love being sucked into a new book. i mean, harry potter and narnia and a few other books suck me in every time but they are so familiar. new and exciting books are always welcome!

perhaps off a bit of inspiration i also found today, i think tonight is a good night to talk about weight, body perception, societal expectations, and wimmen (translation: women). it is so surprising to me, still, how much women are affected by their weight, body shape, and society's pressures. the average woman is a size 12 in america. however, 1/4 people in america are obese. i'm not saying that size 12 is obese or too fat or anything like that. i'm not here to pass judgment. just to start a conversation about women and their weight. there are some women out there who are unconcerned about weight and body shape. these women often appear on TV shows for the same reason that the baby sea turtles are shown fighting to make it into the rough surf on the beach--both are RARITIES. i am entirely unconvinced that any woman on this planet is satisfied with her weight or shape. i just refuse to believe that we would all give up one of our favorite bitching topics so easily. something can always be altered, corrected, improved. we are conditioned from birth to see ourselves in a critical way. some women, certainly, cling to this idea more than others. a lot of women are happy with their bodies, but whether it is expressed or not, i think that all women feel at least a tiny ounce of dissatisfaction with their bodies. my research on this topic (okay, "research") has supported my claims. there is just such pressure for females to look a certain way (which is different based on culture and race) and the pressure is felt all the time. all you have to do is look at the cover of a magazine in the grocery story to see headlines about bikini season and getting in shape for the new year and not overindulging during the holidays. it's endless! mix that with any inherent need a woman has to prove herself and to find a mate and to be at her best and you've got a stewing cauldron of self-esteem and body size issues to eat up for supper. what is considered average is by no means considered desirable, at least from the media bombardment i'm facing. but even the skinny women aren't satisfied! some want to be skinnier, or have more curves, or longer legs, or who the hell knows. it's crazy to me how it's impossible to be satisfied with body size/shape/appearance.

foodies unite!

1. my only participant of the day didn't show up! i had two slots and one was empty and the other participant bailed on me, leaving my day at work pretty useless. so i went to the pool and almost died after 1.5 hours and then went to the gym. 
2. started writing the paper on acute suicide risk factors and realized (once again) that i write WAY too much. i have two factors to cover and only 3 double spaced pages in which to do it! i'm through the second article of the first factor and finished with one page. problematic!
3. watched my hour of wedding dress shows and talked to some friends. pretty boring night but that's okay. i am saving up all of my energy for junior year! get ready for the craziness.

so i thought i would follow a semi-similar path for tonight's post and talk about local vs. organic food. these two sides are often at war in the health food debate! basically, proponents of local food would rather have food that has been grown locally. the reasoning often varies but can include wanting to support local business,  wanting to reduce CO2 in the atmosphere from trucking or flying food long distances, or wanting to reduce consumer costs. organic foodies are interested in how the food is grown; meaning that no pesticides/insecticides/hormones/fertilizers are used to grow/raise the product. each side has its pros and cons but the ideal place to land is on both sides. finding food that is local and organic is the jackpot. for instance, finding beef that has been raised on pesticide-free grain and without hormones and free-range, but is from argentina is preferable for an organic foodie. apples that were grown by a local farmer who sells at the farmers' market every weekend, but may have used insecticides for treating the trees are preferable for a local foodie. the best of both worlds? blueberries grown locally that are pesticide-free and harvested by a family and sold in the weekly market. finding local or semi-local growers/farmers who don't use pesticides/hormones/etc. for their products would be ideal, but it's often difficult to manage. a piece of advice or two. some fruits/vegetables retain a lot more of the pesticide chemicals that may have been used to grow them. some examples: celery, carrots, apples, avocados, and strawberries. poultry problems may arise with milk/eggs/meat because a lot of the growth hormones stay in the animals at time of butchering/milking and are transferred to the final product. a lot of these chemicals have links to several forms of cancer also. be aware of how the animals were raised. in some instances, like the ones mentioned above, the organic movement overtakes the local movement simply for reasons of safety. with most other produce or foods like bread, buying local can be preferable to buying organic. just make sure to thoroughly wash all produce before consumption. so i feel like this sounds like a little news article and i apologize--it's because i've been writing this review paper tonight. anyway, the local vs. organic war should not be so heated--let's instead encourage middle ground!

here's to a healthy lifestyle

1. started the job search today! i hope i can actually find one that i like and can keep for awhile--i'm definitely willing to work during the school year and during the summer. 
2. of course i did not paint my nails today. i'm the worst with manicures. they NEVER last and i ALWAYS chip the polish off. oh well...
3. one week until my birthday! a little under two weeks until my boyfriend comes and little over two weeks until i'm going home! cannot wait. 

i'm all out of post ideas! isn't that lame? yes, very lame. exercise! that's a new topic, right? this blogging for 365 days thing is harder than i expected. "exercise gives you endorphins. endorphins make you happy. happy people just don't shoot their husbands...they just don't!" thank you, elle woods (legally blonde). but really, she's right. exercise releases chemicals in the brain (endorphins among them) that help boost mood. all the more reason to exercise, right? then why are approximately 1/4 people in america classified as "obese?" isn't that a terrifying number?! "overweight" is usually ten or more pounds heavier than what is expected for one's height; "obese" is 30 or more pounds overweight. terms are thrown around all the time and nutrition and exercise and supplements all comprise a huge industry in this country. again, i ask, why are so many people overweight and obese? because people aren't properly educated about health and fitness. it's a depressing thing, really, and an issue that needs to be addressed immediately (along with all the other depressing and pressing issues). but solving the problems of health and fitness will address a lot of other issues too: mental health, lifetime expectancy, prevalence of heart disease/diabetes/some cancers/etc., health care costs, relationship satisfaction, and many more. the abundance of information out there is obviously not addressing the mass public in effective ways. so much of the dieting advice is crap, and what's good is hard to stick to so people give up. on top of poor dieting techniques, a lot of people don't workout regularly, don't work out enough, and don't work out properly. these problems combined with a general laziness that pervades the american consciousness results in a fatter public. i'm not guilt-free from all these problems i'm mentioning, by the way. but i was lucky enough to be raised by two parents who care about health and fitness and they passed good advice onto their children. but i'm just as guilty as the next person about some of these things (everyone is guilty to some extent--no one, NO ONE is perfect). i was channel surfing tonight and ran across kourtney and khloe take miami about two of the kardashian sisters. kourtney had recently had a baby and was trying to get back in shape for a cover bathing suit photo shoot. she was saying how she wanted to show moms everywhere that it was possible to be healthy and get the pre-baby body soon after delivery, but then she was working out three times a day trying to get that body. she forced her body into exhaustion and had to go to the hospital and was also neglecting her job, her baby, and her family. now, i don't know about you, but that schedule doesn't sound really practical or applicable to "real world" moms. my point with this tangent is that everyone has to work for their idea of the perfect body and everyone has to work to be healthy. so it's not easy but it's certainly worth it. there are so many aspects of psychology i'd love to study and to preach about, and this is definitely one of them--health psychology. but i do study health risk behaviors and eating/exercise patterns are included in that. to health!

"excuse me, waiter!"

1. my computer mouse has died : ( i'm sad and it'll cost to replace it, but i need to have a mouse--i hate having to rely on the built-in mousepad when i'm at home. 
2. i want to paint my fingernails sparkly pink tomorrow. it's not bright pink, more muted, but it's definitely sparkly! post-work and post-gym perhaps i'll give myself a manicure. 
3. i want to do something fun tomorrow night! my birthday is a week from tomorrow but i want to go out tomorrow night anyway. i'd go see SALT but it's not opening until friday. 

i need a job. it's really hard to work during the school year but i need to make the money that i lost this summer. i know it all went to a good cause but i need to make it up and hopefully make even more. it really sucked not being able to find a job this summer, despite how hard i looked. i started looking on craigslist today for jobs at college but it's hard to apply this early. i'd prefer a restaurant job, of course, but those are so easily taken up during school! i need to go the weekend i get back and start asking. it's also hard to give up nights/days/weekends for a job when you really just want to be relaxing/studying/partying. and, i feel like the fact that i'm going abroad in the spring would be a negative, although the employer doesn't need to know about that. babysitting would be fine too but i don't have a whole lot of experience in that area--just one consistent babysitting job. i also don't like kids a whole lot. we'll see what i can come up with. wish me luck!

"take it"

1. had a long, busy day. running experiments, two hour meeting, more participants, gym, dinner, chopped, now sleep! tuesdays are my busiest day though, according to my scheduled experiment times. 
2. i feel myself coming down with a bit of an illness. i need to sleep in a little tomorrow and catch up, then work late. have another gym workout tomorrow though...6 days a week!
3. been thinking a lot lately about this summer--i can't believe it's coming to a close! it's crazy to me how quickly summer flies by. i really have enjoyed my time so far and hope to live out these last few weeks with a positive attitude and an open mind.

been thinking lately about taking the easy way out versus taking the hard way. it should be clear by now that i don't shy away from hard things. i'm a major and double minor (might turn back into a double major--we'll see). i'm blogging for an entire year straight. i'm living in a place where i know no one for an entire summer for my career. i have picked the hardest (yes, harder than med school) graduate program in the country to apply to. i go to and have a 3.8 gpa at a competitive and highly ranked public school. i workout 6 days a week (that's a lot for me!). i could probably think of others but i've run out for now. so i like to push myself and i like to better myself and i like to challenge myself. why, then, am i contemplating taking the easy way out this fall? granted, no way is really an easy way based on what i'm going to feel regardless, but one way is certainly described as being easier than the other. it's a tough question and one that i'm not sure i know the answer to, but i will spend more time thinking, of course, and maybe come up with something soon. love black and white photography...

p-->p

1. woke up bright and early for my first official meeting with my trainer! it was hard but he gave me a workout for this entire week. tomorrow is running/interval training and abs. whoo hoo!
2. took a cat nap before going into work. had a few more participants today than normal and that was nice--good sample size is crucial to having enough power to make the experiment worth it. 
3. watched the bachelorette tonight! it's getting closer to the season finale! no wonder these people are falling in love; they traveled all over the world together and are now in tahiti for the final two shows--this is not real life people!

i don't have much to talk about today. i wish i could talk about the studies i'm running but that's not really allowed. but i am helping write a paper and i did a bit more research on that today. it's exciting all that is happening and it's so weird that the summer will be over in about a month. in one month from today i am moving into my new apartment and starting junior year! i'm very excited but very nervous at the same time. yet again i'm entering a new time for change in my life--it feels strange to be on the brink of something again. i was back from the edge for a long time! oh well, it's good that i have practice at change.

not a happy subject

1. lazied about in the sun for a few hours, did laundry (which i just remembered is still in the dryer) and started a new book. myths about suicide...uplifting! not. but very informative and interesting. 
2. had a great conversation with pookie and am very excited to be back at home!
3. started researching for the sections i'm going to write for the paper about acute suicide risk factors. i'm afraid of messing up but confident i can do well.

so i study a range of things but the primary concern of the lab i'm working in now is suicide/suicidal behavior/ideation/risk/assessment/prevention. it's not uplifting work but i feel that it's influential, so i'm going to briefly go over one of the major theories in this post. this is the work of dr. joiner and his students/colleagues. his theory of why people commit suicide is three parts. the first component is that the person must overcome the fear of enacting lethal self-injury. this can be accomplished in a variety of ways, the most notable being habituation to violence and pain and self-injury. this may come from working in a violent profession (police officers, doctors, etc.) or from engaging in violent behavior (binge drinking, self-injecting drug use, fighting, sports, etc.) or from suicidal behavior (cutting, burning, hitting, etc.). habituation is essentially just getting used to a stimulus. the most powerful of these would be the last--personal experience with inflicting self-injury is a powerful predictor of habituation to pain and fear of death, but the other factors i mentioned above are important too. once the fear of pain and death and self-injury is overcome (at least, up until that moment when it's staring the person in the face), the other two parts of the theory come into play for explaining why people act upon suicidal ideation: a low sense of belongingness and a perceived sense of burdensomness. when people feel socially isolated and no connection to the world in any way, it's clear to see how that would be a major red flag. feeling like one has no association to the outside world would make it seem that much easier to end one's life and cut off whatever remaining connections there were. a perceived sense of burdensomness is when a person feels like he/she is a burden on family, friends, employers, the world, whomever. it is often not the reality, but the person usually feels like those in his/her life would be better off if he/she were dead. the three components on their own are usually not enough to be lethal, but pose a risk for suicide. the combination of the three leaves one at high risk for suicide and requires immediate action. it's a really sad and taboo topic but the light that recent research is giving to the topic is crucial for understanding and prevention.
item: work for the suicide hotline.