FInal Response of Wasted

This book went way beyond the death of my Market Place of Ideas project. I spoke a lot about the issue of control and how that may cause eating disorders. I also talked about how it can be caused by social pressures. I also discussed how common eating disorders are in athletes who feel that the dimensions of their body, their weight, and appearance are main factors in their performance or will give them their competitive edge. In this book I learned that it could be anything in the world. It is a mystery what sets it off exactly. It could be any of those things, but those aren't the only reasons for it. Of course, environment and family background play a large roll as well. Sometimes it is just a part of someone that could have been set off by default. Eating disorders are not only a prominent issue, but they are truly an addiction. Many people today are suffering from them and even dying from them. Many times they are accompanied by other disorders or drug usages which make them even more dangerous. Eating disorders may not be brushed off as insecurities or immaturity. It is an issue much deeper that requires extensive therapy in order to heal.

Wasted- Blog 5

At the end of the book Marya is 23. She is still is fascinated by the idea of death. She still feels an emptiness that can't seem to be filled. She still puts on a plastic smile. She still is very intense. AT the end of the book, she was eating and surviving. She had learned to understand herself and the emptiness inside her instead of fear that emptiness. It still is with her everywhere she goes. There are times where it is better than others. She is now able to look into the mirror with confidence at times without critiquing herself and seeing only her flaws. She fights the voice in her head on a daily basis that shouts her imperfections. Everywhere she goes and everything she eats is a battle inside her. She knew in time it would become easier for her to live.

Wasted- Blog 4

While back in a unit she faced many challenges. She thought everyone there was crazy. It didn't take her long to see that she is one of them and they are not lunatics. Her roommate, Joan, tired to connect with her but at first she was very closed off. Joan said, "They are going to make you eat eventually you know?" (191). Other people tried to comfort Marya and told Joan to mind her own business. Marya would stare at things and immediately think about the exact amount of calories in them. She had a panic attack and wanted to return to the hospital because she would prefer the food there. She was complaining the food at the rehab was "dripping with fat." She was refusing to eat anything and truly feared it. She felt as long as she had her eating disorder, she still had herself. She secretly had her laxatives so she felt some comfort. Those sadly, were her security blanket.

Wasted- Blog 3

Her intention during some of her relapses was not to lose weight. One time it was all internal. It was an exploration of the extent of hunger. Other times she would eat all that she could and be very unhealthy, but then throw it up. She would act completely normal and hide her throwing up. She had used to be closely monitored by everyone, but now she had freedom. She played it off like she had made a full recovery and did not have to seek help every two weeks. This scares me. She is clearly a good actor if she can make everyone believe she has recovered. No one even suspected her she was acting so well. She is very sneaky. She would throw up after school when no one was home. She would binge eat, then purge. People were fooled into thinking she was comfortable enough to eat unhealthy at times. All the warning signs I learned about while doing my project were there though. Eating disorders are addictions and do not go away over night.

Wasted- blog 2

Eating disorders are addictions. This book was written to show that many people's notions about eating disorders aren't exactly the truth. It is brushed off as much less than it is. Many times  as immaturity, madness, or a normal adolescent issue. It may in some cases be partly due to these things, but it is never just that. These are life and death situations. Little therapy and a pill will not just take it away. It is much deeper than that. Hornbacher writes about her experience hoping to prevent others to choose the same route that she did. She says that she would do anything to keep them from it. People need to learn to love their bodies and be comfortable with who they are. Eating disorders haunt people and they must be treated with extreme care. "You would rather be a human than a human's thin shell" (Hornbacher). Eating disorders affect every day life. It can change your beliefs and what you do and how you do it every day. She said the "mirror phase" of her adolescent days dominated her life. Body and image was all that crossed her mind. Everyone worries about what they look like at one point or another, but for her it became an addiction and obsession.

Wasted blog 1

"Eating disorders linger so long undetected, eroding the body in silence, and then they strike. The secret is out. You're dying" (2). Marya Hornbacher has been battling eating disorders since the age of nine. She was bulimic at this age and became anorexic at age fifteen. In the past thirteen years her weight ranged from 52-135 pounds. It was a continuous cycle of improving and plummeting. She had countless hours of therapies and spent years going in and out of rehabs. She was also institutionalized. She has so many different disorders now that her eating disorder does not even fit a category. While reading through her files she saw that she was called a "chronic and hopeless case." She believes they are wrong and she has slightly improved. Yet, she does not deny that she has an eating disorder and some major issues. She does not blame her eating disorder on anything. She feels people should not being wondering whether it is neurotic, but what exactly was it that flipped the switch and why are so many people struggling with eating disorders.

Pressures

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfBCkG27O0I

Mary-Kate Olsen struggled with an eating disorder three years ago. As a celebrity many feel that she has the perfect life. She was loved as a child and just as much as a teen. She is rich and has it all. That is not always the case. Fame and wealth does not mean happiness. It is not everything to most celebrities. Poeple don't know what they are talking about especially when they are not celebrities. It cannot be easy being followed and trying to be perfect all the time.  Obviously, she was not happy with herself if she had a mental disease. The press is constantly following her when she has an issue. It just doesn't seem fair. This video upset me because it kept asking questions like "is this beauty?" They were saying she was so beautiful and how she looks is not beauty. Yes, they said she's not on her own and others are going through it, but they should be encouraging and trying to help. I even feel they should be leaving her alone because they are only making her problems worse by publicizing them. I'm sure media to begin with was part of what caused her problem in the first place. Many people feel that being skinny is what makes someone beautiful, but that is not true. Beauty comes in all different shapes and sizes. I am so glad Mary-Kate Olson is good and healthy now.

Eating Disorders in Athletes

Eating disorders tend to affect athletes under the age of 30 years old. Male and female participants are both prone to this issue. "Eating disorders may arise through the self-perceptions of the athlete as to the appearance of his or her body, or through the direction of a coach, the stresses of the competition, or similar pressures." Athletes are more vulnerable than most to eating disorders because many athletics require a certain body type. The commitments elite athletes must live up to, the physical demands and the prospect of achievement tends to attract perfectionists. They also endure pressure from trainers and coaches to record personal data of their weight, dimensions of the body, physique, and percent body fat. Athletes can become obsessed with their bodies and pick them apart. Many feel having the perfect body will help them win the competitions or gain support. Many athletes are even concerned about parts of their physical appearance that will have no impact on their particular performance. The athletics in which appearance is part of the score or is present by implication tends to have the most athletes with eating disorders. In dance girls wear very fitted clothes and in many times short clothes and feel judged. In gymnastics they must wear leotards. Man of these athletes have eating disorders.
Athletics with weight limits also tend to cause problems. Sports like wrestling and boxing where one competes against their weight must not fluctuate. Also, there are some sports that require the athlete to be very lean. Anorexia is the disorder many of them turn to. This is ironic because it destroys the physical systems. Anorexia can lead to malnutrition, an interruption in the women's periods, risk of osteoporosis, or even death. Bulimia also does not help the athlete to succeed because the athlete will have injuries in their mouth and esophagus. They will also many times be depressed and dehydrated. Many athletes also go on crash diets where they disrupt their normal eating in order to have rapid weight loss. This denies the body of essential fuels, vitamins, and minerals. This will also not contribute to any success of the athlete.

Osama bin Laden

Justice has been done to Osama. He was fired down in Pakistan. Obama was given a lead about where he could possibly be back in August and has been following up with it since then. They found him last week and killed him yesterday and brought his body back to the United States. There was a lot of celebration at ground zero because justice was done for those who lost loved ones to the tragedy of September 11, 2001. The fire fighters of New York City were on their fire trucks watching this celebration. This really warmed my heart. No American soldiers were harmed during the killing of Osama and they did their best to avoid any civilian injuries.
I like that Obama made it clear that Osama was not the leader of the Muslims (or Islam). He was a mass murderer and the leader of Al Qaeda. He declared war against and killed mass amounts of Pakistan's people. I think that is very important because many Muslims are discriminated against. It is ridiculous that many of them cannot walk through airports without being suspected and checked significantly more than the white Americans.

Dramatic changes

Eating disorders have become increasingly common among adolescense. In these years they tend to be more self-conscious about how they look and our uncomfortable in their skin. "This can be especially true when they are going through puberty, and undergo dramatic physical changes and face new social pressures" (kidshealth.org). Adolescence are becoming more and more obsessed with their appearance. Young woman are the most prone to having an eating disorder. There are ways parents can help prevent these disorders from occuring. They can help by "nurturing their self-esteem, and encouraging healthy attitudes, about nutrition and appearance. Help must be solicited immediately. One of the main problems is that these kids are normally good at hiding these disorders for months or even years from their families and friends. They are very common in the US. 1 or 2 out of every 100 kids will struggle with one, most commonly annorexia or bulimia. Also, excessive excercise is an eating disorder as well as self-induced vomiting or laxative use. People with annorexia tend to be underweight while people with bulimia tend to maintain a normal weight. "Binge eating disorders, food phobia, and body image disorders are also becoming increasingly common in adolescense."

Dancers with Eating Disorders

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlnKW2zlxSg

This video really got to me. I remember seeing the movie Center Stage which is part of the clip in this video. I remember that was the first time I figured out what exactly an eating disorder was. The star dancer of the company (not the star of the film) was throwing up everything she ate. She tried pizza for the first time and loved it, but of course threw it up. There was a lot of pressure from her mom to be skinny and be the best. In truth, she did not love dance anymore. She was fulfilling her mom's dream. She was hurting herself for something she was good at and didn't have the heart for. Other girls were told they were too fat to stay in the school or to make it as a professional. The pressure all the girls went through to be a dancer caused many of them to have issues and harm themselves. Annorexia is extrememly common among ballerinas. The ballerina image more than any other type of dancer is to be long and skinny. This is so they can be lifted by men and because it is pretty. This image isn't meant for all people, some people are big boned and will never look like that. This movie, as a dancer, made me think. I never want to end up like that. I have been very fortunate with my family history and environment, which has caused me to have very few issues. As a dancer, I eat very healthy but I also know that it is okay to treat myself. I am not a ballerina but I do ballet. It is good to be muscular, healthy, and strong.

Further Exploring

Today, I took the time to further explore the general information about eating disorders. I read about three general and common eating disorders; Anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder. Anorexia is self-starvation. People have an  irrational fear that if they eat, the will get fat. People who suffer from bulimia try to prevent weight gain by following a cycle of dieting, binge eating, and then purging. These are also behavioral disorders. These people's eating is not the only thing affected. They suffer in many other ways such as the body system being disturbed, their minds are affected, also their everyday social lives are altered. They act in certain ways that they would never have before. These are behavioral disorders because these people feel compelled to do this to themselves and continuously do these behaviors. These disorders are lethal. Anorexia has the highest death rate of any psychiatric condition. The anorexics that purge as well are at the most risk because they are starved and throw up. Some of the complications that come with starving are slow heart rate, low blood pressure, faintness, dizziness, intolerance to cold, thinning hair, constipation, weakness and fatigue, and loss of monthly period. Many times these people do not only have eating disorders, but it is also accompanied by depression or anxiety. In other words, many of these people also have mood disorders. Eating disorders are dangerous and most of the time require extensive help to overcome.

Eating Disorders- Topic

I feel eating disorders is a huge issue in the world today. Especially, as a dancer it is an issue I see almost on a daily basis. People become obsessed with what they look like. On a surface level people are obsessed with their appearance. Today, I learned that people with eating disorders are not just worried about this. They most of the time have a much larger reason. It goes deeper and beyond insecurity. It is more times than not an issue of control. People with eating disorders feel that their eating is the one thing in their life they can control. No one can take that away from them. Many times these disorders stem from a rough childhood or a tense family life. Sometimes they are caused by living in an overly critical environment. Also it could be caused by being abused or having someone close to you be abused. Eating disorders are ways of coping. I learned that 8-10 million people today suffer from eating disorders. They are most common among women. This will be the topic I will be exploring this quarter.

Race

After taking several tests to discover any hidden race biases, I recieved results that I feel truly represent who I am. My results classified me who is neutral and does not prefer one race over the other. When I was young I went to Tamarak Day Camp. I came home after camp and told my parents I met a new friend. They asked me to describe what she looked like because they wanted to know If I met Jasmine Jordan. They were being nice and had no intention of being racist, but were trying to ask me questions like "Did she have darker skin" to see if that's who I met. My response to them was, "She has a lot of braids." My parents to this day pride themselves on how they raised me to see how everyone is equal and I never judge or think less of anyone due to race or religion. I think this shows that from a young age I never felt that the color of ones skin defined them.

After closely examining some of the Black and White perspectives I see a lot of similarities to the packets we just read. Something that was mentioned in the packet but really expanded on in the articles I just looked at, was that there is a major difference in the amount of married black women to the amount of married white women. This was shocking to me. I would never have made that connection. In one of the articles a black lady was describing how black people tend to have many single moms.  She was explaining how she feels they are not raised and expected to be successful. This was very sad to me because everyone deserves a happy ending and an equal opportunity for success. There is also a much greater population of HIV and AIDS among black people which I thought was shocking. How does one's color affect the amount of people with a certain sexually transmitted disease? It just doesn't make sense to me.

In the white perspective there are many differences than I read today in the article. Today I read about a white boy hanging a noose outside a library and constant attacks of race. In the packet I read about how white people are aware of the past, yet they are trying to move forward past it. They did not want the guilt of their ancestors, but still did have sympathy for the black people. In these articles it seemed as if times really have not changed and improved much, which is really disheartening.

Susan Williams

In class my debate team discussed how the alleged rape of Susan Williams was one lovers word against anothers. It is hard to fight for one side when you want to protect Susan and other woman, but if this is not the truth you do not want to put an innocent man in jail or worse. We were chosen to defend Susan Williams against David Jones. Right before we were given this assignment we discussed how we thought that Susan could have made this into  way more than it was because she found a note to David that made her jealous the night she claimed she was raped. There is very little evidence to prove she was raped. On the contrary, there is also very  little evidence that proves his innocence. There are no witnesses. In defending Susan, and also acting as Susan in the case I became passionate in her case and putting Jones in jail where he could hurt no one else. While being examined I was surprised that I actually felt slightly emotional. We tried to take and emphasize every piece of evidence We don't know the results yet but hopefully after all our hardwork the jury will vote Jones guilty and we will win.

Revolution in Egypt

After 30 years too long, the government was turned over in January of 2011. Many were very happy about this and were given hope. Many felt they were freed. In hard economic times this gave them a bright future to look forward to. The government was put in control of the armed forces. Protests broke out. Much of the protests were peaceful and hopeful. Without a stable government there was a lot of unrest. Some of the protests became violent. In the slideshow there were pictures of the military relaxing because the protests were peaceful. I think that was interesting because normally in a situation this large I feel it is unlikely that the protests would be peaceful. The military was able to keep the protests under control for the most part. Also, in the slideshow I thought it was interesting that the day after the prtests there were many pictures of people working together and volunteering to clean up the area where the protests took place. I think that shows a sense of unity among the people. I also saw young people protesting and taking a stand.  In the video I watched people were raising there hands to speak and people were standing around during the protests. Once again that was surprising to me considering the government was just destroyed. I am scared that this unrest may negatively affect the US.

State of the Union

I think President Obama's State of the Union Address was most admirable. I thought the environment was very interesting and I appreciated the integration of the parties. The environment made the country as a whole seem unified and strong. Obama put much focus on education. He thinks education will put us back on top and help us out of economic troubles. He feels as a superpower we must be top five in education once again. He also felt health care is dominating much of our deficit and the health reform must remain passed. He spent a lot of time talking about the future and his bright plans. This gave the nation hope. I think freezing federal spending will help us out of the recession as well but may end up hurting many. I wish there was a way to help everyone and hurt nobody. He needed to focus more on how to help in the present but overall I felt his speech was very nice and reassuring to the US as a whole.

Tweak Conclusion

Nic battles his intense relapse all throughout the book. He had times at his ultimate low hurting everyone he loved and addicted out of his mind as well as times of subtle improvements. It wasn't until the end of the book when I saw a true dramatic change in Nic's life. He was finally in the right recovery program for him. He loved the people there because they supported were him and could relate because many were in the same boat as him. At the end, his parents and family come for the weekend. At first, his dad says he loves his son but he doesn't know if he could ever change. It wasn't until they did drawings as a family to express themselves that his dad saw the his son had made a change. Nic's drawing repeatedly had written all over it how sorry he was. They hugged and a ton of mixed emotions filled Nic's head. His dad apologizes too and truly believes in his son again. Nic feels like he can finally live and be an independent person. He was making a very solid start and was definitely comitted to recovery this time around. The book closes with him feeling normally, laughing, and living.
This book was a rollercoaster to read. It started out really slow and all about him doing drugs. Finally, he went through ups and downs. I felt attached to his character and wanted to help him. The ending warmed my heart. I felt so proud of Nic and happy that his family had given him forgiveness and everyone loved each other once again.

Tweak #5

Finally, Nic gets help. He is prescribed on medications to help some of his illnesses going on mentally after talking to a doctor for only fifty minutes. He ended up taking medicine for depression and being bipolar to help treat it. His family is away together and Nic was on his road to recovery. It warmed his heart how his siblings looked out for each other. It also warmed his heart when his brother explained how he was scared Nic was going to change but he was the same old Nic. It gave Nic a sense of normalcy that he enjoyed. He was still not completely back to normal but his siblings helped a lot. He still felt he had to distance himself because he got really annoyed with little things and he did not want to ruin any relationships. While on the beach with his family Nic describes the improvements in himself he is starting to feel from this getaway even knowing that the reality of LA will set in the next day. He  described, "Watching Karen, Daisy, and Jasper making pattens out of shells in the shore break, my dad reading farther back underneah a tree, I feel a certain calmness...In the past there's no way I would have been able to pull myself out of that spiral of negativity, anger, and hopelessness...Something has changed" (Sheff 204). He felt comfort again and not stuck living his life as a drug addict who is constantly battling to find his place and be happy. He was playing with his siblings on the beach and was telling them how happy he was to be back with them again. He tells them with tears pouring down his face how he is so happy to have escaped the depression he was stuck in. This part made me so happy and thankful that he was able to recover. When he started crying as he was playing it warmed my heart and was by far my favorite part of the book. My brother is my best friend, and I can't imagine being absent from my family for as long as he was. This part of the book is full of love and really appreciating the good and life itself.

Tweak #4

"I stole from my grandparents. I stole from my aunts, uncle, and friends. I stole and justified it and stole more. I feel sick being on the other side of it. I feel unsafe, violated, and out of control." This quote struck me. This shows just how strong an addiction can be. He was now stealing from the people he loved the most in order to get money to support his drug usage. This is truly really sad. The fact that he was convincing himself it wasn't bad of him to do makes it even worse. Stealing is not okay not matter what and there is no justification for it. He was well aware of all he was losing yet, his addiction to meth was too strong to stop. When he was younger he always thought him doing drugs was harmless. He could stop when he wanted and control his usage without getting addicted. This book tells about his violent relapse in which he was no longer able to stop. Everyone sober around him wanted him to stop but he was incapable. He was in too deep with his addiction and even involved in selling. These drugs got him involved with the wrong people  and doing regrettable things that he would not do sober. His friends were ripping people off when selling drugs and coating them with things to make them more addicted. To them it became all about the money and there was no trusting anybody. Nic was losing all his morals. He was not only stealing, but he was having promiscuous sex and bringing others around him down with him. His father knew his life had been changed and harmed when his parents got divorced, but he hoped and prayed that he could help his son. His son's reality was a nightmare. Nic thought he was invincible before his relapse. He would never become one of the addicts and he would never get caught doing drugs. He again was wrong about himself. 

Nic is very similar to young drug users around here. Around here in the north shore, people think they are invincible. There are people who do a ton of drugs and think that they will just be able to quit when they want and they are not ones to become addicts. Many think they will never be caught yet, most of them do get caught. Drugs are dangerous and it truly feels like that is down played by teens. Once one gets addicted it is extremely hard to break it just as Nic is experiencing. 

Tweak #4

"I stole from my grandparents. I stole from my aunts, uncle, and friends. I stole and justified it and stole more. I feel sick being on the other side of it. I feel unsafe, violated, and out of control." This quote struck me. This shows just how strong an addiction can be. He was now stealing from the people he loved the most in order to get money to support his drug usage. This is truly really sad. The fact that he was convincing himself it wasn't bad of him to do makes it even worse. Stealing is not okay not matter what and there is no justification for it. He was well aware of all he was losing yet, his addiction to meth was too strong to stop. When he was younger he always thought him doing drugs was harmless. He could stop when he wanted and control his usage without getting addicted. This book tells about his violent relapse in which he was no longer able to stop. Everyone sober around him wanted him to stop but he was incapable. He was in too deep with his addiction and even involved in selling. These drugs got him involved with the wrong people  and doing regrettable things that he would not do sober. His friends were ripping people off when selling drugs and coating them with things to make them more addicted. To them it became all about the money and there was no trusting anybody. Nic was losing all his morals. He was not only stealing, but he was having promiscuous sex and bringing others around him down with him. His father knew his life had been changed and harmed when his parents got divorced, but he hoped and prayed that he could help his son. His son's reality was a nightmare. Nic thought he was invincible before his relapse. He would never become one of the addicts and he would never get caught doing drugs. He again was wrong about himself. 

Nic is very similar to young drug users around here. Around here in the north shore, people think they are invincible. There are people who do a ton of drugs and think that they will just be able to quit when they want and they are not ones to become addicts. Many think they will never be caught yet, most of them do get caught. Drugs are dangerous and it truly feels like that is down played by teens. Once one gets addicted it is extremely hard to break it just as Nic is experiencing. 

Tweak #3

So far this book has been page after page about Nic doing drugs and getting involved with the wrong people. It is alot of the same thing over and over. He is injecting himself with horrible drugs and it is truly disgusting me. Nic is now trying to sell nasty drugs in order to make a lot of money with his friend. He is going to people who are fresh out of jail as his drug hookups. He said," It is my decision what to do with my life." This struck me because he knows he has control over his life but won't change his ways. He admitted that he has thrown his life away. At this point he feels he is incapable of change but knows he has serious problems. Now everyone has realized that he has relapsed so it became reality. It was out that he was no longer clean. The part that struck me in my reading today was his reflection on his past with his family, specifically his step mom. He described such a normal loving family and memories that he had. He talked about genuinely looking forward to time with his family friends and gently getting the little kids off of them as he'd play with them. He also recalled the first time him and his step mom hung out just them two. They spent quality time and got a long really well. This is not typically what you read in books the kids tend to not like their step moms. I thought that showed that he was an accepting and real nice kid. They would crack jokes all the time and he mentioned that he respects her so much. Then, when he was hallucinating from drugs he thought he saw her and was upset by the disappointment she had in him. Because he cares this shows that he has not completely crossed over and lost himself.

This reminded me of the death penalty debates. Many people argued that the things the person being prosecuted did were horrible but that does not make them horrible people. They argued that there is still a little kid inside these people who is innocent and a good person at heart. This is how I feel about Nic. He may do horrible things but I know that he still cares about his family and wishes he wasn't addicted to drugs. By the memories he describes he seems to have been a really good kid. I think it is so sad that he is on drugs and I hope to see a recovery as the book continues.

Extra Blog: Hurricane Katrina

In class we have been watching a movie about Hurricane Katrina. The video is interesting because the people speaking in the video end up talking about each other and their reactions to the storm. I thought it was good that they ordered a mandatory evacuation. I just didn't think it was okay that the government was not able to properly execute their order. They should have found a way to get those who could not afford to leave, were too sick, or too old out of there. Many died or became ill. People lost everything in this storm. I thought it was harsh of the police not to take any calls even though their was a warning that no one will help those who choose to stay. The fact was that no one wanted to stay and die people just could not leave for one reason or another and should not be punished for that reason.

It struck me how many fingers were pointed in this movie and the lack of unity showed in America. I thought Bush putting international affairs before ones at home in the US was a slap in the face to American cities. He made people feel he didn't care. It took him too long to send help and really get people recovered and to safety. It was embarrassing to me that Canadian troops were there and wanting to help before American troops. The citizens of New Orleans were made feel that this issue was minor compared to other issues in America due to the lack of help they were getting from the federal government. People were angry and upset because they were suffering and no one truly knew how bad it was. People were breaking into stores everywhere in order to get supplies for survival. Many citizens became violent and it became scary out there. About 80% of the city was covered in water. People lost their lives. People went days without water. People got separated from their families. 50,000 people were in a center at one point and had no where to change, no where to bathe, no food or supplies and the government claimed they didn't know that many people were there. The airport when people finally were starting to get out and sent to civilization, was packed with people wall to wall. The upstairs was full of sick people being recovered by doctors. There was no air in their because of the amount of people. People were miserable from their conditions and the heat as well as the unbearable humidity. One lady who spoke on the video said she was angry because one official in uniform had an attitude. All she wanted was a little compassion after all these citizens had been going through.  This made me sad. This was very different than the 911 video where Americans came together and unified. This showed a bad side of America which made me very sad.

Tweak Post #2

Underage drug use is common in the north shore. It's not very often you come across a teenager who has not experimented with anything that is not age appropriate or appropriate at all. It is sad how popular some drugs have become. People don't realize that is this is a very serious issue. Teens are at an age where it is very easy to get addicted to things and many are not mature enough to get the help necessary to overcome these problems. Many adults have trouble overcoming these problems and many children are to naive to stop them before they get too bad. Tweak shows Sheff's struggle with this problem. He cannot control his drug problem because he had become addicted to hard drugs. He even got into selling drugs. Doing and selling drugs becomes his way of life. It is his first priority. They turn him into a different person who cares about nothing other than getting high. He constantly talks about how he chases the feeling he got from the first time he was high. This scared me because I have learned from this book that the more often people do the drugs, the more drugs required in order to provide that same feeling. Sheff talks about how he went through many twelve step rehab programs in order to stop his drug use as a child, but he never truly committed to them because he knew he needed drugs to survive, they had become his way of life. This drug addiction probably cost so much money. He used all his money saved up on drugs. Also, any money his parents gave him went to drugs. Also, his parents spent thousands on rehab programs that Sheff was not whole- heartedly working at. This drug problem was not only affecting him, but his whole family. Not only did it strip them of a lot of money, but it was detrimental to their normal lives. At a very young age they were seeing their brother get arrested and throw away his life. Sheff was a horrible role model for his younger siblings.

Tweak post #1

The beginning of the book Tweak by Nic Sheff starts off bold and strong. The book is about Sheff himself. He starts out by saying he has his life together and can control his drug usage. Then, his drug problem gets so bad that he loses everything. At this time he is only a teenager and has become brutally addicted to drugs. He says, "It was like, I don't know, like everything else faded out. All my dreams, my hopes, ambitions, relationships- they all fell away as I took more crystal up my nose...my life unraveled" (Sheff 5).  This shows that addictions really take over people's lives. Addiction makes people lose control because they will do anything to make sure they get whatever they are addicted to. Sheff described that at first he was hiding the bad things he was doing so he would not be a negative influence over his siblings and the next thing he knew he was arrested in front of them, watching them sob as he was cuffed by the police.

This book has altered my opinion about drug testing. In class we discussed several situations and argued whether it was okay or not to drug test students. Unless it was an extreme case, I pretty much disagreed with drug testing students. In Sheff's case though it would only be safe to drug test him. He was clean for a while but as he said he just could not stop. After his rehab, I think he should have been constantly drug tested so his parents could make sure he would not relapse. This would deter him from doing more drugs and keep him in the right state of mind. Addiction is powerful and was taking over Sheff's life. I am not against random drug testing or drug testing in schools if that is the measures that must be taken in order to ensure other kids and people don't have this same problem. It is too serious.