Travel Safe This Summer
Even if you watch what you eat and drink and get enough rest while you're traveling, you may still get sick. The good news is that you'll probably be able to find competent medical care. The key is knowing where to go. Most travel guides suggest you go to a hospital where English is spoken or U.S.-trained doctors can be found. For this reason, it's a good idea to always carry a written copy of your medical history with you.
Having such important information available in one place can help health care workers make appropriate decisions, and you won't have to worry about forgetting important information at a time when you're likely to be upset and not thinking clearly.
Before you leave your home sweet home, create a medical history form that includes the following information:
- your name, address, and home phone number as well as a parent's daytime phone number
- your blood type
- immunizations
- your doctor's name, address, and office and emergency phone numbers
the name, address, and phone number of your health insurance carrier, including your policy number
- a list of any ongoing health problems, such as heart disease, diabetes, or AIDS
- a list of current medications you are taking and pharmacy name and phone number
- a list of allergies to medications, food, insects, and animals
- a prescription for glasses or contact lenses
- the name, address, and phone number of a relative other than your parent
It also helps if you have some basic emergency medical knowledge, not only for yourself but for helping others you may be traveling with. A great way to prepare for your trip is to take a first-aid or basic life support course before you go; if you're traveling with a group, you should know where the first-aid kit is and what's in it.
Why Exercise is Wise
You've probably heard countless times how exercise is "good for you" but did you know that it can actually help you feel good, too? Getting the right amount of exercise can rev up your energy levels and even help you to feel better emotionally.
Experts recommend that adults get more than 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity each day. There are three components to a well-balanced exercise routine: aerobic exercise, strength training, and flexibility training.
Rewards and Benefits
Exercise benefits every part of the body, including the mind. Exercising causes the body to produce endorphins, chemicals that lead a person to feel peaceful and happy. Exercise can help some people sleep better. It can also help with mental health issues such as mild depression and self-esteem: If you feel strong and powerful, it can help you see yourself in a better light. Plus, exercise can give people a real sense of accomplishment and pride at having achieved a certain goal - like beating an old time in the 100-meter dash.
Exercising can help you look better, too. People who exercise burn calories and look more toned than those who don't. In fact, exercise is one of the most important parts of keeping your body at a healthy weight. When you exercise, you burn food calories as fuel. If a person eats more calories than he or she burns, the body stores them away as fat. Exercise can help burn these stored calories.
Exercising to maintain a healthy weight also decreases a person's risk of developing certain diseases, including type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure. These diseases, which used to be found mostly in adults, are becoming more common in teens.
Finally, it may not seem important now, but exercise can help a person age well. Women are especially prone to a condition called osteoporosis (a weakening of the bones) as they get older. Studies have found that weight-bearing exercise, like running or brisk walking, can help girls (and guys!) keep their bones strong.
What's Right for Me?
One of the biggest reasons people drop an exercise program is lack of interest: If what you're doing isn't fun, it's hard to keep it up. The good news is that there are tons of different sports and activities that you can try out to see which one inspires you.
When picking the right type of exercise for you it can help to consider your workout personality. For example, do you like to work out alone and on your own schedule (in which case solo sports like biking or snowboarding may be for you), or do you like the shared motivation and companionship that comes from being part of a team? You also need to factor in practical considerations, such as whether your chosen activity is affordable and accessible to you (activities like horse riding are harder for people who live in cities, for example) and how much time you can set aside for your sport.
What Can You Do About Test Anxiety?
Test anxiety can be a real problem when someone is so stressed out over a test that he or she can't get past the nervousness to focus on the test questions and do his or her best work. Feeling ready to meet the challenge, though, can keep test anxiety at a manageable level.
Use a little stress to your advantage. Stress is your body's warning mechanism - it's a signal that helps you prepare for something important that's about to happen. So use it to your advantage. Instead of reacting to the stress by dreading, complaining, or fretting about the test with friends, take an active approach. Let stress remind you to study well in advance of a test. Chances are, you'll keep your stress from spinning out of control. After all, nobody ever feels stressed out by thoughts that they might do well on a test.
Ask for help. Although a little test anxiety can be a good thing, an overdose of it is another story entirely. If sitting for a test gets you so stressed out that your mind goes blank and causes you to miss answers that you know, then your level of test anxiety probably needs some attention. Your teacher, your school guidance counselor, or a tutor can be useful resources to talk to if you always get extreme test anxiety.
Be prepared. Some students think that going to class is all it should take to learn and do well on tests. But there's much more to learning than just hoping to soak everything up in class. That's why good study habits and skills are so important - and why no amount of cramming or studying the night before a test can take the place of the deeper level of learning that happens over time with regular study.
Many students find that their test anxiety is reduced when they start to study better or more regularly. It makes sense - the more you know the material, the more confident you'll feel. Having confidence going into a test means you expect to do well. When you expect to do well, you'll be able to relax into a test after the normal first-moment jitters pass.
Watch what you're thinking. If expecting to do well on a test can help you relax, what about when people expect they won't do well? Watch out for any negative messages you might be sending yourself about the test. They can contribute to your anxiety.
If you find yourself thinking negative thoughts ("I'm never any good at taking tests," or "It's going to be terrible if I do badly on this test"), replace them with positive messages. Not unrealistic positive messages, of course, but ones that are practical and true, such as "I've studied hard and I know the material, so I'm ready to do the best I can." (Of course, if you haven't studied, this message won't help!)
Accept mistakes. Another thing you can do is to learn to keep mistakes in perspective - especially if you're a perfectionist or you tend to be hard on yourself. Everyone makes mistakes, and you may have even heard teachers or coaches refer to mistakes as "learning opportunities." Learning to tolerate small failures and mistakes - like that one problem you got wrong in the math pop quiz - is a valuable skill.
Take care of yourself. It can help to learn ways to calm yourself down and get centered when you're tense or anxious. For some people, this might mean learning a simple breathing exercise. Practicing breathing exercises regularly (when you're not stressed out) helps your body see these exercises as a signal to relax.
And, of course, taking care of your health - such as getting enough sleep, exercise, and healthy eats before a test - can help keep your mind working at its best.
Everything takes time and practice, and learning to beat test anxiety is no different. Although it won't go away overnight, facing and dealing with test anxiety will help you learn stress management, which can prove to be a valuable skill in many situations besides taking tests.
|
Wellness Center
Christy Parsons (Wellness Coordinator) will be leaving the bay area this school year. She started the program here at Lincoln and will be dearly missed by the staff at Lincoln High.
Ian Enriquez (Youth Outreach Coordinator) is available daily.
Sheening Lin (psychologist) is available daily.
Emi Koga and Rebecca Peng have completed their internships and will be moving on to new projects next year. Congratulations to both of you for great work this year.
Kory Okun (relationship counselor) is available Tuesdays.
Wayne Hayes (counselor) is available Tuesdays.
James Guay (therapist) is available Wednesdays.
Monica Murphy (nurse) is available on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays.
Derek So and Pauline Ong (Cantonese speaking counselors) are available on Wednesday and Thursday.
Aerobic Exercise
Like other muscles, the heart likes a good workout. You can provide it with one in the form of aerobic exercise. Aerobic exercise is any type of exercise that gets the heart pumping and the muscles using oxygen (you'll notice your body using oxygen as you breathe faster). When you give your heart this kind of workout on a regular basis, your heart will get stronger and more efficient in delivering oxygen (in the form of oxygen-carrying blood cells) to all parts of your body.
In addition to being active every day, experts recommend that teens get at least three 20-minute sessions a week of vigorous activity. If you play team sports, you're probably doing more than that recommendation, which is great! Some team sports that give you a great aerobic workout are swimming, basketball, soccer, lacrosse, hockey, and rowing.
But if you don't play team sports, don't worry; there are plenty of ways to get aerobic exercise on your own or with friends. These include biking, running, swimming, dancing, in-line skating, cross-country skiing, hiking, and walking quickly. In fact, the types of exercise that you do on your own are easier to continue when you leave high school and go on to work or college, making it easier to stay fit later in life as well.
|
