Death Anxiety

Death Anxiety

            Different age groups see death differently. When young adult talks about natural death, most of times they think that they still have plenty of time to live. They don’t very close to natural death stage. But they think differently about sudden deaths. For example- accidents, murders etc. can happen at any stage of life. That’s why they don’t worry about it. On the other hand people who are old, and are about to die take everything about death very seriously.

            According to many researchers death anxiety is complex multidimensional construct. It’s very painful when people think about death, they feel very uncomfortable. I like the way the textbook explains that old people present threat for younger and middle-aged people by reminding that everyone has to die one day. Death anxiety is a reflection of one’s concern over dying, an outcome that would violate the prime motive (Textbook edition 4 page 630). In other words death anxiety is how a person thinks or feels about death.

            Death anxiety is different than fear because it is non-specific, and it has many components. The components of death anxiety are pain, body malfunction, humiliation, rejection, nonbeing, punishment, interruption of goals, and negative impact on survivors. These components can be divided into three levels, for example- public, private, and nonconscious. Older adults don’t stress less compare to younger adults, it’s because of their religious thoughts, and their experiences in life so far. Men are more scared of death than women because of their fear of unknown things that are going to happen to them.

Health issues in Old Age

Health issues in Old Age

As a person gets old his/her health goes down. They don’t have enough power or strength to perform many tasks in their lives. So, they end up getting help from their family members and health care professionals. Main factors which affect health in old age are: sleep, nutrition, cancer, and immigrant status.

Sleep: Often old people sleep less compared to the young adults. Sleep can be interrupted due to many reasons such as mental health problems and physical diseases.

Nutrition: Old people need to eat balanced diet. Due to their reduced physical activity level, their appetite goes down. So, they only eat small amount of food and don’t get enough nutrition required for good health.

Cancer: Many old people take cancer screening tests because the risk of getting cancer increases as person gets old. So, the family doctors often recommend cancer screening just to be safe, so they can handle the disease before it gets worse. Old people recover much slower compared to younger adults due to their poor health and immune system.

Immigrant Status: Immigrants have difficulty in communicating due to their language problems. So, they can’t explain their symptoms and signs of disease to the doctors and nurses which results in inappropriate treatment and prescription. Sometimes old immigrants don’t feel comfortable with their care and treatment due to their different belief system.

 The above mentioned factors have huge impact on elderly health status. Family support can improve the poor health of elders effectively which can be achieved by providing them proper care and by respecting their feelings.

Burnout due to the jobs

Burnout due to the jobs

            It is very hard to find a job that is satisfying. In order to find good paying jobs, people have to go through a lot of education and experience. In other words, most of the good paying jobs are competitive, only few people pass interviews and other work requirements.  People who get jobs are exposed to a lot of stresses and they go through a lot of pressures which reduces their working capacity.
           Sometimes the pace and pressure of occupation becomes more than a person can bear, resulting in burnout (Text book Edition 4 Page 460). It is common in healthcare fields due to the amount of work, responsibilities, and pressure. I have seen many nurses in the hospitals, who are stressed out and tired for the most of the time. Sometimes they have to do double shift which elevates the stress level greatly. Many times nurses don't take short breaks due to the large amount of work. If employees are stressed out, then it will also impact the company. The total profit of the company is likely to go down because the employees would work under pressure. In the health care field if nurses stop enjoying the work that they do, then they would not be able to provide a good service to the patients who need  good care to make them feel better, and to deal with their diseases. Overall, the stress and burnout at the working place impacts everybody involved in the occupation negatively.

Parental Role

Parental Role

The most interesting topic for me this week is parental role. If we look in the history, mostly people would become parents in their young ages and there was not any family planning back then. But Today, almost everything is planned in our lives, even though plans work out only for few things and we are still exposed to many unexpected things. Now days people are having kids in their older age in compare to the people in the past time. Men who become fathers in their 30s are more likely to spend more time with their kids because most of the time they finish their education and they already have good jobs. And exactly the same experience is faced by moms; they spend more time with their kids when they have kids in old age. (Text book Chapter 11).

Becoming a parent brings many responsibilities in every one’s life. In order to become good parents people fulfill most of the responsibilities. Parenting is the toughest job for people but it can be easier and less stressful when mom and dad have good relationship and they believe in cooperation to raise their kids. When one partner expects all the work for raising a kid from other person, then this job becomes stressful and overwhelming. Due to this kids get closer to one parent who takes care of them and the other parent never gets respect and love from the family. So, in order to keep family happy parents should have the ability to work together.

Nutrition

Nutrition

During teenage years body needs special nutrition. According to the textbook a teenage girl should consume about 2,200 calories per day and a teenage boy should consume 2,700 calories in a day. These calories depend on many factors such as body consumption, growth rate, and activity level. Today kids hate vegetables and salads but they love French fries and burgers. Due to these unhealthy habits mostly kids get way too much fat than needed and very little calcium and iron. Calcium is the most important part of the food that teenagers should be taking because their bone growth requires proper amount of calcium in the body, which can be taken by drinking milk regularly.

Fast food is the main reason for obesity, which can be seen quite often in our country. Parents don’t have time to cook food at home, so they like to stop by a fast food place and grab a burger for their kids. Today’s busy life is alternating the way we live our lives. People are busy in their careers and jobs; they don’t care what their kids are eating. Eventually, obesity is becoming the serious problem worldwide.

Friendship

       The most interesting topic to me this week is friendship. Friendship is a voluntary relationship between two people involving mutual liking (definition from the textbook). According to the text book children get understanding of having "best friend" by the age of 4 or 5. Two young children become friends when they like each other's company and like playing together. As time goes by, a friendship becomes deeper. Most of the children feel that they can get help from their friends whenever they need anything. They think their friends will keep their secrets, will help them when they need something and will do what was expected out of them as a friend. Children want their friends to be there whenever they need somebody.

         As children grow older more personal thoughts and feelings are shared with friends. Teenagers are likely to express their happiness over getting A grade and sadness for not getting good grades. Girls are more likely to have "best friend" than boys. Because girls are more likely to be worried about faithfulness of their friends and they don't ever want to be rejected by their friends. This is why most of the time they get dressed up like their other friends so they can all look alike.

         A friendship also provides emotional support. When kids are small, they usually depend on family members, when they are worried about something.  When kids grow up they also share their problems with their friends.

 

Creative Children

This is the most interesting topic for me in this week. The definition of giftedness is being good at music, dance and creative writing etc. It is necessary to provide supports from parents and teacher to the talented kids to make their talent even better. They need inspiration from elders constantly. According to Luther, Ziegler and Goldstein talented kids become much more mature than other kids and they also have less emotional problems.

In order to be even better at their talent, kids need encouragement from their parents. For example: A kid, who is good at drawing, spends a lot of his time at doing that and doesn’t like doing his homework. If his parents help him to take out some time for homework without scolding him, then he will develop a skill to do two things (homework and time) in his childhood. On the other hand, if the same kid gets pressure from his parents to be good only at getting good grades, then he will probably lose his talent as he will get older.