Prior to reading the chapter readings and completing the assignments about accessibility, it was never something that crossed my mind very often. I mean with a mom with Multiple Sclerosis who will end up in a wheel chair some day, I told myself it’s probably something I should educate myself in. This biggest takeaway I have from these readings and also the further research I did is that accessibility is never a problem until it’s happening to you. Sure I can say that as an individual who can walk without assistance, not have to worry about money, and am not held back in society in any way that I believe we need to change. But as many of you reading this probably think, oh she’s just saying that to fit 300 words in for this blog post but the point is that, that isn’t the truth.

This topic is something has began to become a pretty sensitive topic for me. It took me a good while to try and understand the severity of accessibility and its limitations, but I found a way and it’s opened my eyes to a whole new way of thinking.

Growing up my mom and I always were shopping. It could be the middle of a blizzard and we were up and out early on Saturdays to go shop our whole entire day away. My moms absolute favorite place to shop is a strip of boutiques in a little town in North Carolina. I know this might seem like I am getting off track, which I very likely may be because finals are coming and I am stressed, but this story comes full circle. This little boutique strip is on the top of a huge hill and looking back now, it has no other way of getting to the top other than walking up a huge set of stairs.

The idea that one day when my moms MS gets to later stages she may not be able to go shop at her favorite shopping place because she will be in a wheelchair, breaks my heart. I know this is something that may seem so small compared to other accessibility issues, but this is what opens my eyes and makes me realize how many individuals lives are affected because of accessibility issues.

Throughout this class I have learned and been exposed to so many new topics and problems in society that it is crazy. I originally took this class for credits and honestly did not believe I was going to enjoy it in any way shape or form. I am very glad I was wrong because accessibility is just a small sliver of what we covered and I could type for hours about the countless information I have retained from this class.

I can safely say I feel a lot less ignorant to our society after taking this course and have been completely convinced to start doing everything I can, even though it may be very small, to make changes because for me some of these topics become very personal.

Over the course of the semester I’ve gained several new viewpoints. This class has really given me valuable information, that as 21 years old it’s sad I didn’t know about. Why don’t we learn about invisible disabilities in high school? Why didn’t we learn about Crip Camp in history? To me that seems like a major historical event…. The history of women regarding their bodies, labor, reproduction, was never talked about.

There are so many topics touched on in this class that should have been taught in middle/high school. When I tell people (who have never been in one) that I am in a gender studies class they assume it’s easy. Or that it’s just a filler elective and they don’t really understand what we cover. This class and these topics are things everyone should know about. The fact that some of these topics are brand new is depressing.

I feel like this class has given me a better idea of what people go through. It only reiterates the idea that you never know what it’s like to be in someone else’s shoes. Also, the importance of awareness, open-mindedness, and kindness. We’re all from different backgrounds and taught different things and that’s ok. We just have to be willing to listen to each other and learn so we can do better.

My early years of elementary school were filled with many happy childhood memories with family and friends, but they also reflect a pretty dark and challenging period of my life. When I was seven years old, I got some of the most shocking news of my life at the time. My parents sat me down and had to explain to their little girl that they were no longer going to live with each other… they were going to be seeking a separation. At such a young age, I felt helpless as I did not understand why this was happening. After that conversation I had to observe over a period of time my dad slowly move his things out of our house and into his new apartment. During this period, I especially felt lonely considering my two older brothers were moved out by this point and therefore I was the main one that felt the brunt of the impact. My new normal was staying primarily with my mom during the week and going to my dad’s every other weekend. Although my parents were always respectful of each other during this difficult time and always stressed their love and support for me in which I still continued a happy and healthy childhood, the impact of their separation took a negative toll on my physical health.

I started suffering extreme separation anxiety in a way I never experienced before, however, I never knew how to really cope with the separation so my emotions would bottle up and instead impact my body. The biggest symptom I experienced were two types of stomach problems, the most dangerous being purging. I went through a phase in which my anxiety got to the point that I was unable to swallow, like it literally scared me to swallow food, I physically could not do it. It was like I had fears of choking or something. Instead I would find myself chewing my food but instead of swallowing it, I would either spit it into a napkin or into the toilet. I went what seems like a long time without being caught however, I still remember vividly the day my mom caught me. We had gone out to Applebees after she picked me up from daycare as a special treat and I ordered my favorite, chicken tenders and fries. Not long into our meal she noticed me using multiple napkins and balling them up as if I was hiding something. When she noticed what I was doing, we immediately headed home and she called my dad. What a stressful night. Soon after, I was visiting doctors left and right to see what was wrong until I finally received a diagnosis… acid reflux. It sounded good at the time but between you and me as I reflect now, I think my issue was a cry for help or seeking attention during such a difficult time. I was placed on medicine and eventually (although it took some time) I was comfortable eating again. However, although purging was no longer a problem for me, the anxieties from it still lingered in that I still have anxiety eating in front of people because sometimes for sake of comfortability I have to eat slower. So, when I eat with people and they finish first it is extremely uncomfortable as I feel like now, I’m being judged and stared at.

Luckily by the time I was nine my parents reunited and have been happily married since, however I found myself still suffering from the trauma of their separation. Although I was no longer purging, a new stomach problem emerged which stemmed from separation anxiety. No longer was I just experiencing separation anxiety of when I was with one parent and not the other, but it extended to other family and friends closest to me. I never wanted to leave my parents as I always had the constant fear of them separating again or even worse while I was gone. My best friend who I had literally gone to Puerto with for two weeks the summer prior to their separation and had no issues, I was no longer able to even sleepover one night at her house. There were multiple times that my mom had to pick me up from her house or somewhere we were hanging out because anxiety would consume me until the point that I had terrible stomachaches. My symptoms were still being blamed on my acid reflux diagnosis however, as I sit here at almost 22 years old, I have a better understanding of my body and recognize the true toll stress and anxiety have on me.

Social Media has impacted us in many profound ways, it allows us to reach large otherwise inaccessible audiences, it allows us to keep in touch with our loved ones thousands of miles away, and creates opportunities that would be glossed over.

Although in my opinion there is a massive downside, and that is the prolonged effects of it on your body and on your mental health.

Take this for example, 2.7 million people are opted in to follow Walmart. Walmart doesn’t care about you, Walmart pays its employees the bare minimum. All this corporation is concerned about is making more money, and the 2.7 million people who follow them just to receive advertisements willingly… well If the world ever needed a support group, I know 2.7 million people who could use one.

I myself used to have a Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, & TikTok, I was addicted. Mindless scrolling through feeds taking up hours of my day, months off my life. All for what? Can you recall what posts you saw yesterday? Has anything stuck with you? The truth is all of these companies are more concerned with selling your attention and data to their advertisers, and they have invented clever ways to keep you addicted and keep you stimulated, I will go through each of these platforms and list the negatives- although I am not listing any positives there are definitely a lot of positives but you must decide for yourself if they are worth it.

I want to start with the most damaging ones in my opinion, TikTok & Instagram. These platforms are comparison central, and the most damaging to our youth- especially women. You have to realize nearly every picture posted on Instagram has been cherry picked and & edited, pictures of models with slim thin waists and huge curvy hips, no stretch marks or skin defects of any kind. If you want to see countless examples just visit Reddit. When developing minds see these women on Instagram and then look at their own bodies, stretch marks & acne, loose skin, they start to feel ashamed and embarrassed about their own bodies- even though what they are looking at is fake. This mindset in the women of today is unprecedented and a big problem, so many girls now go to extreme lengths to hide their “flaws” and become super self-conscious and unhappy as a result of this comparison. It saddens me to see that people who are otherwise attractive think of themselves as uglier than a dog shit stain on their shoe. TikTok is another great example of this, countless people comparing themselves against each other and feeling worse about it after. This isn’t an attack on people who have these sorts of bodies, rather it’s an attack on these platforms that make it seem so these bodies are the ideal standard of perfection and desire, when that is far from the truth. Your body is your own and you should be happy and content with it.

Snapchat was another aspect of comparison, hundreds of my high school acquaintances, most of them I haven’t had a 10 minute conversation with in years, all living their lives and posting on Snapchat to see. What I realized is… I don’t give a fuck… I don’t care that you ate at some fancy restaurant or that you’re out having fun with your friends or at some concert, so I deleted it all.

Twitter is an echo chamber full of toxicity and politics, which is one of the reasons I deleted it. Everyone seems to have an opinion on everything & those who oppose you will be met with visceral hatred, such divisiveness, all for what? Twitter had to go.

Facebook? Well Facebook is just awful, let’s leave it at that. You can justify the previous social media platforms, but not Facebook. Facebook is a shell of what it once was, hounded by a glob of useless and often blatantly false information. Just stay away.

For those that have made it this far I have a challenge for you, quit social media for one month- delete the apps from your phone and log out of it on your browser and clear your history. Create friction so you can’t just immediately hop back on. You might hate it and call me an idiot, and that’s okay- but it’s worth a try, just to see. No longer did I feel the obsessive urge to take a picture of my food or picture of the mall I visited with my friends. You will experience the most clarity, the most peace, you will be far less anxious and still than you’ve felt in a long time and at the end, you will realize that you’ve missed absolutely nothing.

As the semester comes to an end, and a much needed break is nearly within our grasp, there is still one more dreadful week we as students need to get through. Finals. This week is dreaded by students as the seasons begin to change and we realize that winter is here, which means so the hardest weeks of our lives. Personally, this semester, I only have one in person final, and 4 other final papers to write as well. Not only do two of my papers land on the same day, my in person final isn’t until the very last day of the semester, giving me plenty of time to stress out over it everyday!

The thought of taking a final itself is mentally draining. We as a society put so much pressure on ourselves to do the best possible on these tests that determine our final grades in classes we spent months trying to accomplish. This causes an extreme amount of stress on a person. I’m not a good test taker to begin with, add the fact that this test can determine whether or not I pass a class? That’s a recipe for disaster. I also watch it happen to all of my friends. We go from these joyful moods of school nearly being over for Christmas, to falling into finals week depression. We sit and we stress over trick questions and open answered questions and for what? To find out how good we did in a class that may have no relevance to my degree.

Not only is finals week mentally draining, it is physically draining too. I look back on my freshman year, I had one final left and then I was good to go home. It just so happened that it was going to be my hardest final. I was cramming months worth of work into a couple weeks of trying to remember every formula and rule I have ever learned for this class. My eyes are barely open from staring at screen and my hands can’t bare to do another math problem. I stay up all night studying trying to prep myself. When I finally do get to go to sleep, I wake up throughout the night in fear that I am going to sleep through my 8am final the next morning. So I go to the final, I take the test and I walk out feeling very not confident. Next I have to go home and face my parents who constantly ask me what my final grades are and why I can’t do well on these tests. The only answers I have is that the stress physically causes my body anxiety and I can’t function during these tests. This is something that happens to so many students at the end of the semester and our already drained and fatigued bodies can only take so much from the stress these taxing tests give us.

Thanks for coming to my little end of the semester rant, I’m gonna get to work stressing about all my papers now.

I had a couple ideas for a blog post but couldn’t decide on one so I’m doing both! Getting it all out there for the last post of the semester. 

            ‘Never give up’ is a common phrase that is thrown around in hopes to encourage its listeners to continuously push through, no matter the hardship. When I was little, he would read me stories for bed and my favorite was the Care bears, and particularly a story about a bear that never gave up. From there, this phrase was something my dad continuously instills in me, even to this day.

It’s just a dream. It’s not real.

Last week I was plagued by nightmares that woke me up every hour of the night and left me disoriented and foggy for the rest of the day, less from the lack of sleep and more from the lingering sense that I was somehow still stuck between sleep and waking, in a liminal space where I couldn’t trust my own mind.

Poems

Rage like Banner

In my mind I have rage like Hulk.

I have the rage everyday

I want to roar, smash, and destroy.

But the reality is I am just merely Bruce Banner.

I appear to keep calm to keep peace.

I deny myself love to not reveal the monster inside.

Can I allow myself to be the Hulk? 

Do I need to release the Hulk?

Do I have to keep being Bruce Banner?

These days I feel like everybody is moving so fast paced that it is hard to even catch a breath. We work, go to school, and are involved in extra curriculars, sometimes I think that I’m going to miss an assignment or something important if it take time away from my schoolwork. I’m sure I’m not alone in this mentality, and that many other people feel the same way as I do. With this in mind, I don’t always feel like I can take a break. And aside from that, I don’t really want to take a break. I feel like the only time I will allow myself to take a break will be when the semester is over, and all of my schoolwork is completed.

I am also a student athlete here at UMBC, and our athletics are finally winding down for the winter break. However, I play a spring sport and it is essential that I come back in the spring ready for our season. I think sports have also played a role in this struggle to take a. break. Coaches have always told us that if you take a break, somebody out there is practicing and getting better than you. Some athletes are even taught to play through minor injuries and illnesses because their coaches do not want their players to “lose their edge.” This mentality has caused athletes to push themselves to the limits and devalue relaxation.

The moral of the story is that we all need a break, especially during this time of year. Finals are starting and we are experiencing extreme levels of stress in school. I think in some cases it’s hard to take a break from everything you have to do, but our bodies need it. Our bodies physically and mentally cannot sustain a life where we don’t take breaks. I think during college it is hard to take time off because it feels like you have so many responsibilities piled on to each other, but it is so important for our health to be able to take a step back. Now from the other perspective, I think that too many breaks can also be an issue. However, there is definitely a happy medium that might be different from person to person. I think finding this medium can help to ensure that you will not burn yourself out later in life.