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Sharing is Caring: 4 Ways How Helping Others Can Improve Your Own Life
To this day many people prefer taking, rather than giving. They are always asking life for more, wondering what more they can achieve, get and experience.
But turns out that giving is not just more important than taking, not just what we – as humans – should naturally be inclined to, but also the thing that gives us true satisfaction and can improve own life.
Without having tried it, however, there's no chance you can know what the real benefits are.
There are many ways in which helping others, sharing, caring, giving what you can, doing good deeds, etc. can make you a better person and help other people too, while making the world more peaceful.
In case you want to live better and also contribute beyond yourself, here's how helping others can turn your whole life around:
1. A sense of purpose
Let's admit it. We're all looking for meaning in life.
Often, focused only on ourselves and living the daily life, we forget there's more behind all this.
There's purpose beyond materialistic possessions, reaching our goals in life, getting a new job, finding the right partner, or else.
When you start doing more for others, and less for yourself, you receive more than you can imagine.
You find meaning in your life if you decide to volunteer, or to just be a better person and always help when you can.
So if you still haven't found true meaning in your life, ask yourself what you can do today to help someone in need, or to show somebody that you care.
2. Volunteer, and you'll be happy and healthy
According to a report by Harvard Health Publications, volunteering and the level of happiness and health in people's lives are closely related. Let's break this down.
For a start, when you join a volunteering organization, you're part of a community, you feel like you belong. You're taking part in something bigger than you, and it makes you smile and be truly grateful.
You start feeling good about yourself, and often can't even describe it to others in your life. There's nothing selfish about it, and you don't even need to talk about it. It's this feeling of contentment, where you don't need to change anything, or to ask life for more, you just help others and feel happier day after day. What's more, it's great for the mind, body and soul too.
It's one of the most natural stress, depression, loneliness and anxiety relievers. No need for medicine, spiritual practices, special programs, or else. You just need to go out there and start helping people.
It's a therapy for the soul to see those in need smiling because of what you're doing. And that makes you sleep better at night, feel good about yourself, and your other problems you thought you had in life don't seem like a big deal now.
3. Doing good can help your professional life
You won't be helping others with the goal of exceeding in your career, of course, but it will increase your chances of landing a job a lot, as a government study suggests.
Well, turns out the skills you build while volunteering make you a better candidate for employers. It lets you explore new fields too, and you acquire knowledge at the same time. Then, you can easily put these into practice in whatever career you pursue.
What's more, if you're determined to excel at this, there are plenty of volunteering programs that offer further training. Things like that look good on your CV too, show that you care about the community, are open to side projects, and know how to work with other people.
Once you give it a try, you'll end up becoming a better communicator, understand the real meaning of teamwork, will somehow start brainstorming ideas and solve problems more creatively, will be managing your time better and thus become more organized.
When all these are first experienced at an unpaid position, where no one expects you to do your best and there's no pressure from superiors, you learn the skills necessary to move to the top of your career in the future, even before you've started a job in the field.
4. You build relationships
You know networking is crucial for your success in life and in business. Well, helping others can help you with that too. First of all, you're connecting with people in a more meaningful way than usual when you're doing good for the sake of making their life better. That's the social aspect and it also gives you fulfillment and makes you feel great.
But you also meet other people doing the same, potential employers, influencers, and more. This expands your network and you can never know what opportunity will come out of this.
At the same time, you're feeling more confident and comfortable around new people and let go of social anxiety. That lets you make friends too, which will stay in your life even when you're not doing this anymore.
Once you land a new job, or open a new chapter in your life, socializing and putting yourself out there won't scare you. You'll be free to approach new people, and will effortlessly communicate without fear of rejection or wondering what to say.
In a nutshell, helping others is one of the most profitable, practical and satisfying things you can do with your life. And it doesn't need to be big. You can complete smalls tasks or join a community that cares for a cause you're passionate about.
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Sharing is Caring: 4 Ways How Helping Others Can Improve Your Own Life was last modified: April 7th, 2019 by Sarah Williams
Sarah Williams is a 29-year old freelance writer whose passion is observing people and taking a lesson from every experience. You can connect with Sarah on Wingman Magazine, where she regularly shares her thoughts about personal growth.
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How To Win America's Fight Against The Opioid Epidemic
Peggy Compton
Every day, an astonishing 115 Americans die from opioid overdoses, according to a 2017 report from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Approximately half of these deaths are due to the misuse or abuse of prescription opioid painkillers (such as Vicodin, Oxycontin, and morphine). Beyond that, increasingly, deaths come from overdoses of the illicit drugs heroin and fentanyl, which are often used after people become addicted to or misuse prescription opioids.
Each day, more than 1000 people are sent to the emergency room for prescription opioid misuse. In many of these cases, opioids were used along with alcohol or medications meant to treat anxiety or seizures (such as Xanax, Ativan, and Valium). When people ingest such mixtures, they face a heightened risk of injury or death as their breathing slows or stops.
Effective treatments exist. But as treatment for over-dosing is increasingly available, treatment for addiction is still not accessible to many of those who need it. Access to effective treatments for opioid addiction is the missing piece in America's unsteady fight against the opioid epidemic.
Success in Fighting the Opioid Epidemic
Gains in the fight against the opioid epidemic have been made on several fronts. The physicians and nurse practitioners who prescribe America's medications are being trained to be more judicious in their use of opioids to treat pain. They are also learning to consider, whenever possible, non-opioid medications and other treatments that don't come from a pharmacy at all. National guidelines have been established for methods of relieving surgical, cancer-related, and chronic pain without opioids. Taken together, all these efforts are saving lives and reducing the volume of prescription opioids that can be diverted to illicit uses.
Similarly, emergency first responders and trained laypeople now have tools to help prevent deaths from opioid overdoses. Lives have been saved in many communities by the administration of naloxone – a medication which blocks the effects of opioids on breathing centers and reverses overdoses.
But what happens after emergencies – or to prevent them? Treatments for addiction can reduce the likelihood that people addicted to opioids will overdose and die. And such treatments are vital because, like any other chronic illness such as diabetes or heart disease, untreated addiction becomes more severe and resistant to treatment over time.
The Missing Piece – Access
What most of America is sorely missing, however, is sufficient access to the addiction treatments that are the most effective – and not enough efforts are currently underway to increase such access. Currently, the best estimates suggest that only one out of every ten patients seeking drug abuse treatment can actually get into a program. To sharply reduce U.S. opioid deaths, proven forms of treatment should be readily available, on demand, to all who need them. Policymakers, civic leaders, patient advocates, and journalists, should consider the following steps:
Treatment and reimbursements should be evidence-based. Research shows that the most effective approach is medication-assisted therapy (MAT), where patients are given methadone, buprenorphine, or naltrexone, alongside therapy to combat addiction. Too many private payers pay for treatments based on mistaken ideas. For example, detoxification is known to be highly ineffective against opioid addiction, yet it is widely practiced and reimbursed.
Insurance and other reimbursement systems need to acknowledge that addiction is a chronic disease that almost never goes into remission after a one-time treatment. Treatment for addiction needs to be ongoing and long-term, just like treatments for diabetes or heart disease. But currently most health insurance companies will only cover one treatment episode or a fixed number of treatment days per year.
Early, intensive treatment is the most effective and less costly over time. Currently, most insurance companies will only cover outpatient treatment for opioid addiction, and will only reimburse intensive inpatient treatment if the first effort fails. Evidence shows that in many cases, the opposite approach would work better: start with intensive treatment rather than with minor steps that allow time for the disease to progress.
Many opioid addicts could be treated within America's current primary care systems. Two effective medications, buprenorphine and naltrexone, can be prescribed by primary care providers. With appropriate waivers, for instance, a physician can treat up to 100 patients with buprenorphine.
Medications need to be supplemented with therapy. Because most primary care clinicians do not have the resources or practice partners to provide the therapies patients need in addition to medications, they often limit the number of addicts they treat or avoid treating them altogether. The answer lies in making behavioral health providers more readily available to work with primary care providers, who could then prescribe effective medications more readily.
Patients brought to hospitals for opioid addiction and overdose should be enrolled in therapy and other treatment on the spot. Many patients with opioid addiction end up in hospitals and emergency rooms. The current approach is to stabilize them medically and then tell them, as they are discharged, to seek further treatments. But many do not follow up or have adequate access to the help they need. A better approach would be to start treatment while addicts in crisis are at the hospital – and directly transfer them to an addiction treatment facility upon discharge.
Jails and prisons are other places where opioid addicts need treatment. Efforts to bring medication-assisted therapy to the incarcerated could mitigate the larger opioid crisis – and also reduce the rate at which ex-inmates commit new offenses and cycle back to prison.
The bottom line is clear: Increasing access to proven treatments for all addicts who need them would save and improve countless lives, and effectively counter America's current opioid crisis.
Read more in Peggy Compton and Andrew B. Kanouse, "The Epidemic of Prescription Opioid Abuse, the Subsequent Rising Prevalence of Heroin Use, and the Federal Response" Journal of Pain and Palliative Care Pharmacotherapy 29, no. 2 (2015): 102-114.
How To Win America's Fight Against The Opioid Epidemic was last modified: June 11th, 2019 by Peggy Compton
Cheryl Aguilar
Some of my clients have called their immigration journey, the immigration nightmare. One noted, "everyone talks about the American dream but nobody talks about the American nightmare." This nightmare has become a real every day experience for many of them.
Children crying and terrified after a stranger, an immigration agent, separates them from their parents when they arrive at the US border. Young adults living in limbo in a life that feels uncertain to them, not knowing whether in a few years they will continue working where they are or studying their university programs because of the nature of their temporary Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).
Parents worrying that if they get deported to their countries of origin their children will become foster kids because they will have to make a hard choice to leave them behind in the United States rather than to bring them back to countries plagued by violence, poverty, and hunger. Scholar and social worker Dr. Luis H. Zayas refers to these children, impacted by immigration policies of family separations, as the forgotten citizens.
These are just of the few stories that represent the plight that immigrants who are undocumented or have temporary status face in the United States. In the last year, we have seen increased political efforts to seize migration and punish immigrants who chose to migrate in the only way they could, creating feelings of insecurity, trauma, depression among community members affected by these policies.
As social workers, it's crucial we become well-versed on the challenges that existing immigrants and a new generation of newcomers face and that we follow our National Association of Social Workers (NASW) code of ethics to support them and treat them with dignity and worth of a person regardless of how they arrived to this country, nor our political views.
Going Beyond the Headlines, Facts about Immigration
Over the last year, we have been inundated with countless stories of immigrants arriving in record numbers through the Mexican border. Some of the media stories have focused on the illegality of migrating through the border; other outlets have reported on the reasons why immigrants are knocking on our doors but with little emphasis on why immigrants "choose" to come through the border. Reasons for coming include fleeing violence, political unrest, and persecution among others.
From testimonials of lawyers, service providers, and human and immigrant's rights organizations who are working profusely on the ground at border towns, we know that most of the immigrants who are arriving can qualify as refugees. Noting this difference is important because refugees seeking asylum have a right to seek asylum in the United States and have certain protections. The UN Refugee Agency defines refugee as "someone who has been forced to flee his or her country because of persecution, war or violence. A refugee has a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group. Most likely, they cannot return home or are afraid to do so. War and ethnic, tribal and religious violence are leading causes of refugees fleeing their countries," (UN Refugee Agency, 2019).
We often hear questions like "Why can't they come the right away?" or "They need to get in line?" The reality is that our immigration system is broken. To come to the United States legally, individuals have to either have a family member who is a Citizen or US Resident petition for them, or be sponsored by an employer through a work visa, most employment visas are usually for high skilled workers, or apply to a lottery system, for the "lucky" opportunity to obtain a visa. It sounds simple, right? Just apply and you should be fine. Not so much!
There is a restriction of the numbers of visas granted each year. According to the Migration Policy Institute, there are about 140,000 work visas per year and family sponsored preferences are limited to 226,000 visas per year. There are currently two types of backlogs impacting the issuance of US Resident cards, which allows people to come to the United States and stay permanently.
"The first is due to visa availability, not enough to go around and meet the demand. The second is due to processing delays of applicants' documents. A brief illustration of that is that in February 2019, the U.S. government was still processing some family-sponsored visa applications dating to August 1995, and some employment-related visa applications from August 2007," (Migration Policy Institute, 2019).
This means that a mother who is concerned that gang members have infiltrated her neighborhood, and are looking to extort her each month for a sum of money that she does not have or she and her family will be killed, who may not have a US Resident or Citizen family member or an employer to sponsor her, has no other way to enter the United States as a refugee seeking asylum. She and scores of others do not have another choice.
When working with immigrants is important to remember that while there are some similarities in the immigration journey for some, not two stories are alike. This is our opportunity to allow the client to be the expert of their story and have them guide us in their experience.
Community members who are in the United States without an immigration status or a temporary status or are seeking status may face many challenges as they adjust to a new environment or simply work towards surviving it. But their distress or trauma may not be new or their first trauma. Clinical psychologist Dr. Cecilia J. Falicov reminds us of the pre-trauma, during trauma and post-trauma immigrants can experience during their journey. Trauma sometimes begins before people leave their countries of origin. Understanding what their experience was prior to coming to the United States is critical during clinical or initial assessment or throughout work with clients.
Immigrants may experience trouble with acculturation, getting used to new norms, traditions, food, and language. Most importantly and often overlooked is the grief and loss they may experience for having left (or lost) a place they knew, friends, family members and things they are familiar to.
Aside from the trauma, kids who are separated from their parents may experience, attachment to their parent or caregiver may suffer, making it harder for them to have a healthy reunification at a later time.
Furthermore, immigrants may face discrimination, racial profiling or bullying in their community, at work or school, which can lead to stigma about immigration status or passing to hide their immigration status. They can experience abuse at work or exploration, such as earning low wages while working long hours. Perpetrators of abuse can threaten victims who are undocumented to call immigration authorities on them. Often times victims do not call for help out of fear of being deported and what they may not know is that there are actually certain protections for victims of violence or crime who are undocumented.
Immigrants may realize the limitations of their immigration status such as not being able to obtain driving licenses (some states do grant licenses to immigrants who are undocumented), not being able to obtain in-state tuition (some states have passed in-state tuition laws for students who are undocumented), not being able to travel and little or no access to services, resources or benefits.
These and other challenges can lead to depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which are the three main diagnoses that impact immigrants. And media news about immigration policies that may impact their life may exuberate symptoms.
While someone's immigration status can represent a social determinant of health, not all immigrants want to address challenges regarding their status in their work with social workers right away or sometimes ever. Teenage immigrants sometimes just want to talk about dating; parents want to talk about parenting, DACA recipients want to talk about their dreams and aspirations. We must be mindful and respect the client's self-determination and not impose our own agenda to address what we think the client "should" address and meet the client where they are at in their journey.
The Social Work Response
I propose a comprehensive approach to meeting the needs of our immigrant clients composed of clinical, psychoeducation or supportive services, mezzo (support groups) and advocacy. In my work with immigrant clients whose goal is to address their distress connected to their immigration status, I use a psychoeducational, skills building and processing approach where I incorporate:
Psychoeducation on the impact of politics in everyday life such as anxiety, depression, and PTSD; identifying feelings, emotions, behaviors, thoughts, and overall mental health symptoms.
Processing emotions, verbalization of feelings, normalization and validation through empathy, reflective listening, etc.
Skills building including stress and anxiety management, behavioral activation to combat depression, self-care, cognitive behavioral therapy, mindfulness (focusing on present moment and grounding). Strengths assessment and positive qualities. This activity entails helping clients re-discover or discover their strengths by reviewing all they have accomplished so far, including getting here. For many, the journey of getting here is a demonstration of determination, risk-taking, and survivorship.
Fostering a sense of safety, building safety plan (to address fears like "what if I get deported," etc.)
Empowerment: gaining control over what we can control.
Building Awareness: providing know your rights information, connecting clients to local resources, and providing information analysis.
In addition to the work we can do through our own agencies or places of work, effective interventions include providing services for community members at their schools, churches, and community based organizations.
This requires us to partner with entities and cross collaborate. Not too long ago, several colleagues and I were going to schools to talk to immigrant parents about stress management. The local school system and the organization I worked at then formed a partnership to bring awareness during "drop off kids and coffee time."
The clinical response and mezzo responses are just some ways of helping clients address their distress. But we know that our client's distress is connected to environmental issues and as long as there isn't a solution to that can aid the millions of lives impacted by the broken immigration system, our immigrant community currently in limbo will continue to suffer. This is when micro becomes macro. We have plenty of opportunities to engage right now on important fights including the passage of the DREAM and PROMISE ACT and decrying the family separations that are impacting children and are a form of children neglect and abuse. This is when we join together to fight for social justice as our NASW code of ethics calls us to do.
Falicov, C. J. (2014). Latino families in therapy (2nd ed.). New York, NY: The Gilford Press.
Zayas, L. H. (2015). Forgotten citizens: deportation, children and the making of american exiles and orphans. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Zong, J., Zong, J. B., Batalova, J., & Burrows, M. (2019, March 14). Frequently Requested Statistics on Immigrants and Immigration in the United States. Retrieved from https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/frequently-requested-statistics-immigrants-and-immigration-united-states
What is a Refugee? Definition and Meaning. Retrieved March 15, 2019, from https://www.unrefugees.org/refugee-facts/what-is-a-refugee/
Emotions and Politics: A Social Work Response to the Mental Health of Immigrants was last modified: June 12th, 2019 by Cheryl Aguilar
Decades of research into anxiety and depression have resulted in the development of models that help explain the causes and dimensions of the two disorders.
For all of their well-established utility however, these models measure differences between individuals and are derived from studies designed using few assessments that can be months or even years apart.
In other words, the models are highly informative, but not optimal for examining what's happening emotionally in a particular person from moment to moment.
Now, a University at Buffalo psychologist is extending that valuable research to repeatedly and frequently measure symptoms of specific individuals, in real time, to learn how immediate feelings relate to later symptoms.
The research casts anxiety and depression in a manner not previously studied and the results suggest that some emotions linger in a way that predicts feelings beyond what's happening at specific times. This information could provide treatment benefits for patients struggling with the disorders, according to Kristin Gainey, an assistant professor in UB's psychology department and the study's author.
"Clinicians aren't primarily interested in how one person's symptoms compare to someone else, which is what most studies focus on. Rather, they're most interested in how to shift the feelings of someone with anxiety or depression. In other words, they want to understand how to change the emotional experiences of a given individual over time and across different situations," says Gainey, an expert on emotion and affect in mood and anxiety disorders and a recent recipient of one of the American Psychological Association's Early Career Distinguished Scientific awards. "The only way to get at that directly is to measure these processes repeatedly within a person as they're happening."
To do that, Gainey conducted baseline assessments on 135 participants, each of whom were already seeking some kind of psychological treatment.
Three times a day for 10 weeks, the participants received surveys on their smartphones about their feelings and symptoms. They completed the survey within 20 minutes of its arrival.
"That generated enough reports to provide a good sense for each person's fluctuations and trajectories of symptoms and affect (defined as the objective feeling state that's part of an emotion)," says Gainey.
A smartphone provides a portrait of immediacy that questionnaires distributed in a lab that summarize feelings over extended periods are unable to achieve.
"We can't always remember accurately how we felt days and weeks ago, especially if there were some days you felt really bad and other days you felt great," she says. "That's not easy to summarize in a single index."
Anxiety and depression are each unique disorders, but they often appear together in a single patient. Both disorders share high levels of negative emotions, such as fear, sadness, and anger, while low levels of positive emotions, like excitement and interest, are unique to depression.
Gainey says it's not surprising that particular affective states, like feeling happy or feeling sad, might be responsible for symptoms experienced soon afterward. What researchers don't know much about is how long those effects tend to persist, and which specific symptoms they lead to hours or days later.
"This study let us see that some effects were short-lived, but for depression, if you were feeling high levels of negative affect, even if we control for how depressed a participant was at that time, it was still predictive of increased depression 24 hours later," says Gainey.
That might suggest that clinicians could track peoples' positive and negative affect in real time and plot trajectories that are indicative of increased risk.
"If we can identify specific risk factors for increased symptoms in real time, we could even use smartphones to send suggestions about helpful strategies or alert the person's mental health care provider," she says.
Smartphones Help UB Researcher Better Understand the Nature of Depression and Anxiety was last modified: February 22nd, 2019 by SWHELPER
Climate Change Increases Potential for Conflict and Violence
Images of extensive flooding or fire-ravaged communities help us see how climate change is accelerating the severity of natural disasters. The devastation is obvious, but what is not as clear is the indirect effect of these disasters, or more generally of rapid climate change, on violence and aggression.
That is what Craig Anderson sees. The Iowa State University Distinguished Professor of psychology and Andreas Miles-Novelo, an ISU graduate student and lead author, identified three ways climate change will increase the likelihood of violence, based on established models of aggression and violence. Their research is published in the journal Current Climate Change Reports.
Anderson says the first route is the most direct: higher temperatures increase irritability and hostility, which can lead to violence. The other two are more indirect and stem from the effects of climate change on natural disasters, failing crops and economic instability. A natural disaster, such as a hurricane or wildfire, does not directly increase violence, but the economic disruption, displacement of families and strain on natural resources that result are what Anderson finds problematic.
One indirect way natural disasters increase violence is through the development of babies, children and adolescents into violence-prone adults, he said. For example, poor living conditions, disrupted families and inadequate prenatal and child nutrition are risk factors for creating violence-prone adults. Anderson and Miles-Novelo noted these risk factors will become more prevalent as a result of climate change-induced disasters, such as hurricanes, droughts, floods, water shortages and changing agricultural practices for efficient production of food.
Another indirect effect: Some natural disasters are so extensive and long term that large groups of people are forced to migrate from their homeland. Anderson says this "eco-migration" creates intergroup conflicts over resources, which may result in political violence, civil wars or wars between nations.
"This is a global issue with very serious consequences. We need to plan for ways to reduce the negative impacts," Anderson said. "An inadequate food supply and economic disparity make it difficult to raise healthy and productive citizens, which is one way to reduce long-term violence. We also need to plan for and devote resources to aid eco-migrants in their relocation to new lands and countries."
Which is worse?
There are no data and there is no method to estimate which of the three factors will be most damaging, Anderson said. The link between heat and aggression has the potential to affect the greatest number of people, and existing research, including Anderson's, shows hotter regions have more violent crime, poverty, and unemployment.
However, Anderson fears the third effect he and Miles-Novelo identified – eco-migration and conflict – could be the most destructive. He says we are already seeing the migration of large groups in response to physical, economic or political instability resulting from ecological disasters. The conflict in Syria is one example.
Differences between migrants and the people living in areas where migrants are relocating can be a source of tension and violence, Anderson said. As the level of such conflicts escalates, combined with the availability of weapons of mass destruction, the results could be devastating.
"Although the most extreme events, such as all-out war, are relatively unlikely, the consequences are so severe that we cannot afford to ignore them," Anderson said. "That is why the U.S. and other countries must make sure these regional conflicts and eco-migration problems don't get out of hand. One way to do that is to provide appropriate aid to refugees and make it easier for them to migrate to regions where they can be productive, healthy and happy."
Taking action now
Anderson and Miles-Novelo say the purpose of their research is to raise awareness among the scientific community to work on prevention efforts or ways to limit harmful consequences. The long-term goal is to educate the public on the potential for increased violence.
"From past experience with natural disasters, we should be able to prepare for future problems by setting aside emergency resources and funds," Miles-Novelo said. "We should tear down negative stereotypes and prejudices about those who will need help and humanely assist refugees and others who are displaced. By doing all these things we can reduce conflict and hostility."
Changing attitudes and policies about immigration also will lessen the potential for conflict, Anderson said. He points to the backlash against refugees in many European countries.
"The view that citizens of wealthy countries often have about refugees needs to change – from seeing them as a threat to a view that emphasizes humanitarian values and the benefits refugees bring when they are welcomed into the community," Anderson said.
Climate Change Increases Potential for Conflict and Violence was last modified: April 7th, 2019 by SWHELPER
Navigating life with an addiction to alcohol or drugs can be especially difficult and exhausting. It always feels like the substance is taking over. If it's not in the foreground dominating life, then it's in the background, always in the back of your mind. Through treatment at an inpatient alcohol rehab or an inpatient drug rehab, life can finally be different, changing for the better.
Of course, not all rehab facilities are the same. Some offer only outpatient care. With this form of rehab, the enrollee is attending the facility but still going home to their daily life. While outpatient rehab may help some enrollees work through their alcohol or drug addiction, recovery doesn't always stick.
Inpatient rehab, on the other hand, offers more comprehensive care. That's because enrollees are at the facility around the clock for a set amount of days (although not in all instances).
Finding a facility with inpatient rehabilitation for alcohol and drug addiction may have seemed impossible until now. However, there are more options now than before. The care administered at the new breed of treatment centers is holistic, meaning there's more to recovery than simple withdrawal, therapy, and then out the door. Instead, there's work done to improve the lives of enrollees by nourishing and restoring their spirit, body, and mind.
Those who want to are ready to make a change in their lives may be interested in these inpatient rehabilitation facilities. Here are several reasons inpatient care can be so significant for enrollees looking to become sober.
Inpatient Treatment May Be More Successful Than Outpatient Programs
According to data cited from the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse on Alcoholism, inpatient alcohol rehab may have better sobriety rates than outpatient care. To back up that claim, 303 alcohol rehab enrollees were tracked over five years. Of those 303 enrollees, 120 of them participated in outpatient rehab while the other 183 did an inpatient program.
In the study, enrollees with intact social support systems and in better psychiatric health were proven to do equally well in an outpatient versus inpatient rehab setting. Those with weaker social support and a higher rate of mental illness did better exclusively in inpatient settings.
Regardless of the social support and mental health of enrollees, the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse on Alcoholism discovered that those who were in outpatient rehab programs had a four times higher chance of relapsing into alcohol use over those in an inpatient program.
This could because those in an outpatient rehab program can keep going back to their same old haunts or toxic relationships that provide alcohol, drugs, or other addictive substances. Even though they show up for rehab, if they're still using when they're home, a vicious cycle repeats itself. True recovery becomes practically impossible.
Whether it's for inpatient alcohol rehab or inpatient drug rehab, then, a facility with comprehensive inpatient care is best.
Alcohol and Drug Addiction Are Not Alike
Those who are addicted to alcohol will not necessarily need to go through the same treatment modalities as those with a drug addiction, and vice-versa. When a rehab facility only offers treatment for one type of addiction over another, it gets easy for an enrollee to be pigeonholed.
For example, perhaps an enrollee with an alcohol addiction enters a drug rehab center because it's conveniently close to them or it's more affordable. They figure that an addiction is an addiction and they'll come out on the other side sober.
Without special attention and focus on what factors created the addiction in the first place as well as individualized care, it's unlikely the rehab will work. It's much better for someone who's addicted to alcohol to receive inpatient alcohol rehab and someone who is addicted to drugs to get their own care at an inpatient facility.
Looking for Inpatient Rehabilitation Facilities for Alcohol or Drug Addiction?
Whether addicted to alcohol, drugs, or even both, getting the right help at inpatient rehabilitation facilities is crucial. QUality programs will provide both inpatient and outpatient care to treat addiction. Through this comprehensive, holistic approach, which combines medically-supervised withdrawals, therapy modalities, physical exercise, improved diet, meditation, and more can renew an enrollee's entire being.
We don't put a limit on the length of our inpatient care, either. While some patients will stay at an inpatient program for 30 days, others will need more time. A quality inpatient addiction center is willing to work with those enrollees for as long as it takes to make a return to a healthy, addiction-free life.
The Importance of Finding a Facility That Offers Both Inpatient Drug Rehab and Inpatient Alcohol Rehab was last modified: February 20th, 2019 by Mike Hussey
The More the Merrier? Children with Multiple Siblings More Susceptible to Bullying
A child with more than one brother or sister is more likely to be the victim of sibling bullying than those with only one sibling, and firstborn children and older brothers tend to be the perpetrators, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.
"Sibling bullying is the most frequent form of family violence and it is often seen as a normal part of growing up by parents and health professionals, but there is increasing evidence that it can have long-term consequences, like increased loneliness, delinquency and mental health problems," said Dieter Wolke, PhD, of the University of Warwick and lead author of the study. It was published in the journal Developmental Psychology.
Wolke and his co-author, Slava Dantchev, B.Sc., also of the University of Warwick, wanted to understand the underlying causes of sibling bullying and examined the possible impact of family structure, parenting behaviors, early social experiences and a child's temperament.
The researchers analyzed data from a longitudinal study of 6,838 British children born in either 1991 or 1992 and their mothers. They defined sibling bullying as psychological abuse (e.g., saying nasty or hurtful things), physical abuse (e.g., hitting, kicking or pushing) or emotional abuse (e.g., ignoring one's sibling, telling lies or spreading false rumors). The kids were put into four categories: victims, bully victims (defined as being both a perpetrator and victim of bullying), bullies or uninvolved.
When the children were 5 years old, their mothers reported how often the children were victims or perpetrators of bullying in the household. Sibling relations were analyzed two years later when the mothers were asked how much time the children spent engaging with their siblings on various activities, such as crafts or drawing. Several years later, at age 12, the children reported if they had been bullied by a sibling or if they had bullied a sibling within the previous six months. The boys and girls were also asked their ages when they first experienced sibling bullying and when they first bullied a sibling.
Researchers also collected family statistics from the mothers, including the number of children living in the household, the mother's marital status, the family's socioeconomic background, maternal mental health during and after pregnancy, parental conflicts, domestic violence and child abuse and the mother-child relations. They also assessed each child's temperament, mental health, IQ and social/emotional intelligence at various points during their early years.
Approximately 28 percent of the children in the study were involved in sibling bullying and psychological abuse was the most common form. The majority of those children were found to be bully victims, meaning they bullied and were bullied, according to the study.
"Bullying occurs in situations where we cannot choose our peers, like in families," said Wolke. "Siblings live in close quarters and the familiarity allows them to know what buttons to press to upset their brothers or sisters. This can go both ways and allows a child to be both a victim and a perpetrator of bullying."
Family structure and gender were the strongest predictors of sibling bullying by middle childhood, according to the authors.
"Bullying was more likely to occur in families with three or more children and the eldest child or older brothers were more often the bullies," said Dantchev. "Female children and younger children were more often targeted."
Wolke and Dantchev believe bullying can happen in larger families because resources such as parental affection or attention and material goods are more limited.
"Despite our cultural differences, humans are still very biologically driven. A firstborn child will have their resources halved with the birth of a sibling, and even more so as more siblings are added to the family," said Wolke. "This causes siblings to fight for those limited resources through dominance."
Although the researchers investigated whether marital and socioeconomic status would be associated with more or less bullying, they did not find any evidence.
"Sibling bullying does not discriminate. It occurs in wealthy families just as much as lower-income families and it occurs in single-parent households just as much as two-parent households," said Wolke.
These findings may be helpful to parents as they welcome new additions to their families, Wolke said.
"It will be important for parents to realize and understand that resource loss can affect an older child," he said. "It is a good idea for parents to manage this from the beginning by spending quality time with their firstborn or older children and by involving them in caring for younger siblings."
Article: "Trouble in the Nest: Antecedents of Sibling Bullying Victimization and Perpetration" by Slava Dantchev, B.Sc., and Dieter Wolke, PhD, University of Warwick. Developmental Psychology. Published online Feb. 14, 2019.
The More the Merrier? Children with Multiple Siblings More Susceptible to Bullying was last modified: February 20th, 2019 by SWHELPER
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There are plenty of iPad cases to choose from, but none were designed specifically for aviation. Most are too bulky and cumbersome in tight cockpits. Add a beefy mounting system to the already-oversized case and you're left with a system that takes up over half your flight bag.
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NASCAR: NTS Motorsports set with Hemric, Buescher and more in Trucks
By DizbizroundupFeb 9, 2015, 4:04 PM EST
NTS Motorsports has announced its full season NASCAR program, primarily in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series but also with entries in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East, Spears SRL Southwest Tour and ARCA.
NTS will have Daniel Hemric in its No. 14 Chevrolet Silverado for the full season, with Ryan McKinney as crew chief. Hemric, who will run for NCWTS rookie of the year, will also run three ARCA races.
James Buescher has also been confirmed to run selected races in the No. 31 Silverado. The 2012 series champion will have NTS competition director Chris Rice on board as crew chief.
A third truck, the No. 20 Chevrolet, will have 16-year-old Gray Gaulding on for eight races and Scott Lagasse Jr. for two (Daytona and Homestead) to bookend the season. Doug Howe will serve as crew chief.
Gaulding and Howe will partner for a full season in K&N; meanwhile in the West Coast-based SRL series, Blaine Rocha (No. 21) and 17-year-old Parker Stevens (No. 28) are the team's two drivers.
NTS Motorsports has also added veteran team manager and West Coast Stock Car Hall of Fame inductee Rick Carelli to serve as the team's general manager.
Follow @TonyDiZinno

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


It took seven games and 16 at-bats, but David Dahl could finally breathe a sigh of relief. At the same time, Mike Tauchman may have had the air sucked out of his chest just a little.
With a swing on a 84-mph changeup over the heart of the plate, Dahl smoked Ryan Atkinson's offering over the center field fence at Salt River Fields at Talking Stick for his first hit of the 2018 Cactus League.
The hit was a long time coming for the left-handed-hitting outfielder who owns one significant Major League Baseball record for batting, yet did not record a big-league hit in 2017 and was looking like his first hit in Spring Training might never come.
Dahl burst onto the MLB scene in July 2016, tying Cincinnati's Chuck Aleno (1941) for the most consecutive games with a hit to start a major-league career with 17. He finished his rookie season with an impressive .315 average over 222 at-bats, compiling 23 extra-base hits and 24 RBI. The next great Colorado Rockies outfielder was ready to knock down the door to Coors Field, it seemed.
But in Spring Training 2017 an all-too familiar situation surfaced for Dahl, who had not yet turned 23. A rib injury, which turned into a back injury, derailed nearly all of his follow-up campaign to his outstanding rookie season. Dahl made just 77 at-bats last year — none at the major-league level — as he attempted to overcome a third major injury in five years. In 2013 it was a hamstring. In 2015 it was a lacerated spleen. In 2017, the stress fracture in his rib and the resulting back spasms.
Based on his even/odd injury schedule, 2018 was supposed to be a good year for Dahl. He returned to Scottsdale healthy and ready to pick up where he left off with the big club at the end of 2016 and chomping at the bit to re-join a roster that had reached the playoffs in 2017. But an 0-for-15 slump to start Cactus League play wasn't how things were supposed to go.
Meanwhile, Tauchman, another left-handed-hitting outfielder, had been going about his business with good success this spring. Tauchman was 5-for-15 entering Friday's game against the Arizona Diamondbacks, including a home run and a triple. He added another hit and took a base on balls in the Rockies' 15-6 victory, scoring twice. It has been a solid start to the spring for the 27-year-old who is still looking to catch on with the big-league club full-time despite a career .301 average in the minors.
Tauchman finally broke through to the majors last year, appearing in 31 games for the Rockies. He compiled six hits, including a triple, and two RBI in his 27 at bats — a .222 average. He struck out 10 times in 32 trips to the plate. Not the meteoric start Dahl experienced, but nothing to be ashamed of.
Through that many at-bats in 2016, Dahl was hitting .370 with a pair of home runs and a double, though. He was just 10 games into that MLB-record 17-game hitting streak. And he was just 22 years old at the time.
Through the first week of Cactus League play in 2018, it appeared that Dahl might not yet be ready to return to the big club. The home run Friday, and a sharp RBI single in his next at-bat, assuaged some of those concerns. They also make life that much harder for Tauchman.
Tauchman and Dahl, together, create a bit of a quandary for the Colorado Rockies.
With so much in common (power-hitting lefties who can play any outfield position), both have been fighting a logjam in the outfield at the big league level, while fighting personal battles to boot. Dahl with his injuries. Tauchman the long, slow grind through the minors.
Each one has shown breakout potential.
Dahl became a Rockies darling with that superb start to his major league career. His .307 combined average in the minors, plus his 802 total bases in 386 games, suggest he could be the long-term replacement for Charlie Blackmon should the Rockies be forced to part ways with their All-Star centerfielder, either by trade or free agency at the end of the 2018 season, because they simply cannot afford to pay both Blackmon and franchise cornerstone Nolan Arenado in the years to come.
But Tauchman, too, has the potential to take over that (or any) outfield spot should Blackmon depart. He doesn't have the career power numbers in the minors as Dahl (fewer bases in 108 more games, less than half as many home runs in nearly 300 more at-bats). Yet, 2017 was a big year in Triple-A Albuquerque where he hit .331 and more than doubled his minor-league home run total with 16 for the Isotopes.
Both are fighting Raimel Tapia for Bud Black's fourth outfielder roster spot in 2018.
Tapia brings his own intriguing flair to the competition. A speedy, rangy left-hander that looks the part of a prototypical leadoff hitter. Tapia has nearly 200 MLB at-bats to his name from 2016 and '17, and won't be easily giving up his claim to that final spot on the big-league club. He's hitting .286 with three extra-base hits through the early part of Spring Training this year.
Fans flock to Tapia because of his curly, bright blond hair, wild running style, and electric smile. But despite his big personality and blazing speed, Tapia still lacks the base-stealing ability and defensive consistency that would earn him the job.
Dahl inured himself to the Rockies' faithful with that monster start of his pro career. His health has proved to be his biggest enemy in his journey to a full-time major league roster spot.
Tauchman, meanwhile, has flown mostly under the radar compared to those two. Yet, he has done more than enough to be in the mix for the Opening Day roster in 2018.
Black is expected to keep just four position players on his bench to start 2018. A utility infielder (Pat Valaika), a backup catcher (Tony Wolters), a backup outfielder (Dahl, Tauchman or Tapia), and one more utility position for a versatile infield/outfield type.
Dahl, if healthy, entered Spring Training as the presumed leader in the chase for that outfield spot. That's what a MLB-record hitting streak and .315 average in your rookie season will do for you. But his rocky start to 2018 began raising serious doubts about that. The home run and RBI single on Friday might be just what he needs to kickstart things.
Tauchman, meanwhile, now has to shine all the brighter to overshadow Dahl.
That's the nature of life on the fringe of a MLB roster, where one game and two at-bats can swing the conversation.


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RECAP: 'Outlander' Season 2, Episode 7 "Faith"
May 21, 2016 By Funmbi Leave a Comment
Claire suffers a big loss, but must turn her efforts to save Jamie by any means necessary… Full recap of "Faith", including new images and clips (first aired Saturday, May 21 at 9:00pm ET|PT on STARZ).
Courtesy of STARZ/Sony Pictures Television Inc.
"Faith" opened with a flash-forward to Claire and a young girl (Bree!!!) in 1954 Boston. The little girl had fiery red hair and was sitting at a table in a library looking at picture books of birds. She called out for her Mama (Claire) and asked what type of bird was pictured. Claire identified the bird as a heron. The little girl then asked her Mama if she'd ever seen a heron in real life, and Claire said yes, in Scotland.
Bree: "When were you in Scotland, Mama?"
Claire: "A long time ago."
Here we transitioned back to Claire in L'hopital des Anges, lying on a cot with Mother Hildegardet trying to comfort her as Monsieur Forez worked to save her life and her baby. Claire was so pale… she called out for her baby and Jamie. In the background other nuns chanted a constant stream of prayers. Eventually Claire zoned out, imagining a heron flying in the sky.
Later, we saw Claire had been moved to a bed in another part of the hospital. When she awoke, Claire was confused, especially when she felt that she was no longer pregnant. Claire became panicked and shouted for her baby. Mother Hildegarde came immediately and asked Claire to remain calm and save her strength.
Claire: "Where's my baby?… I want my baby."
Mother Hildegarde: "I am sorry Madame. She has joined the angels. She was born dead."
Claire was devastated and seemed to be in denial. When Sister Angelique tried to assure Claire that Virgin Mary (pointing to the statue next to the bed) would comfort her, that made Claire even more frantic. She demanded (in English and French) that someone bring her baby. Claire even stood up and tried to walk away. In the struggle, the Mary statue fell to the floor and shattered.
Sometime later, Claire sat in bed, shivering from fever. She asked where her baby was now, and Mother Hildegarde said she baptized the baby and gave her a name, Faith. This was forbidden since Faith had been born dead, but necessary for the baby could be buried in hallowed ground. "This, ma chere, will stay between you, me, and God."
Mother Hildegarde had also called for a priest to come to Claire to sit for her last confession and perform an unction. (They seemed to believe Claire would die of complications from the miscarriage and should prepare her soul for the afterlife.) Claire asked again for Jamie, but according to Mother Hildegarde, there still wasn't any word. When the priest asked Claire if she would like to make a confession, she responded: "My sins are all I have left."
That night, as Claire shivered in bed, a mysterious figure came to her. At first she thought it was Jamie, but it was actually Master Raymond. He implored that she be silent because if anyone saw him there, he could get into serious trouble. Master Raymond laid hands on Claire and asked what she saw: "blue wings". He told her to focus on those wings, which would bring healing and carry away her pain. Claire was actually able to diagnose herself with puerperal fever. In the course of the miscarriage, part of the placenta was left behind and festered inside her. Master Raymond continued to rub Claire with his hands, and as he did so, she felt white hotness in her bones, healing her:
"As Raymond's hands moved over the meridians of my body, I could feel the tiny deaths of the bacteria that inhabited my blood, small explosions as each scintilla of infection disappeared. The fever drained from my bones and my tortured body relaxed gratefully into the frame of his hands, melting and reforming like molded wax."
Then Master Raymond reached inside of her and helped her push out the remaining placenta. Sister Angelique heard Claire screaming out and came, but Master Raymond hid in time. Claire knew she had been healed and told the Sister to bring Mother Hildegarde. Master Raymond spoke to Claire briefly before leaving again, calling her Madonna. But since Claire didn't have a child, was the name appropriate?
Master Raymond: "I didn't call you Madonna because you were with child, my dear. Everyone has a color about them, all around them like a cloud. Yours in blue. Like the Virgin's cloak. Like my own." (INTERESTING!)
Claire acknowledged the risk Master Raymond had taken to come and help her, but he maintained that he was her friend and had to help her. When Claire asked if she would ever see him again, he told her to have faith.
When Mother Hildegarde arrived, they praised God for the miracle of Claire's healing. Claire asked again for any word about Jamie, and Mother Hildegarde finally revealed that he was in the Bastille for dueling and would remain there at the King's pleasure. Mother Hildegarde saw a bit of a silver lining because since Jamie didn't kill his opponent, he wouldn't be sentenced to death. So, Black Jack Randall was still alive and in England… "the cat with nine lives…" So what was the point of all this? Even more than that, Claire felt deeply betrayed by Jamie:
Claire: "Revenge mattered more to him than me or his child. One year of grace is all I asked, to which he agreed. One year. He may as well have run his sword through me."
Mother Hildegarde: "God says we must revel in mercy, tread sins underfoot and hurl iniquities into the sea."
Claire: "I'm not sure there's a sea deep enough."
Weeks later, Fergus came to see Claire and asked her to come home. She did, but it was clear that, even though her body was healed, she was still dealing with serious emotional trauma. When Claire arrived back at the apartments, all the servants gathered to welcome her home. Fergus helped Claire down from the carriage and she went to enter the apartment. The servants bowed, and Suzette in particular was emotional. She sobbed for Milady's loss, taking Claire's hands and kissing them. When Claire got to the door, Magnus was there too. She took his hand, thanked him, and then curtsied to him (perhaps for getting Claire to L'hopital).
That evening, Fergus brushed Claire's hair before she went to bed. When he went to put the brush down on the table, she noticed he was disturbed… something about her perfume bottles…?
However, Claire couldn't sleep that night. She seemed overwhelmed by the grief, especially when she came across the Apostle spoons Jamie had brought for Faith. (I was so scared Claire would throw those spoons in the fire, but she just flung them under the bed.) She left their room and walked through the apartment, trying to quiet her sobs. This was how she came upon Fergus having a nightmare, crying and screaming out. Claire encouraged him to tell her about his dream; it would make him feel better.
Fergus: "It's not just a dream…"
And Fergus then told Claire what happened to him while at Maison Elise. As he told the story, we saw the flashback. When Jamie had gone to the brothel to pay Prince Charles debt, Fergus had went around looking in the rooms. In one room with the door open, Fergus saw a bottle of perfume that he wanted to take for Claire as a gift. (In the present, we saw Fergus give Claire the bottle…oil of lavender… which she recalled as Black Jack Randall's scent, the one that triggered Jamie's nightmares of Wentworth). But once he pocketed the bottle, we saw Black Jack Randall close the door. BJR: "You're not what I ordered. But, um… no, you'll do."
And BJR raped Fergus. Fergus screamed out, calling for Milord. Downstairs, Jamie heard and came barreling through the door. He punched BJR until several men came to separate them. As Jamie was forced out of the room, he demanded a duel.
Fergus felt so much guilt, thinking it was his fault that Jamie dueled BJR and was now in the Bastille. But Claire embraced Fergus and comforted him. She now knew and understood why Jamie broke his promise to her.
The next morning, Claire went to L'hopital and asked Mother Hildegarde for her help gaining a private audience with King Louis. She wanted to appeal to him to release Jamie from prison.
Mother Hildegarde: "His Majesty is a mercurial man. There is a price to such requests… The King may expect to lie with you."
Claire: "If it comes to sacrificing my virtue, Mother, I'll add it to the list of things I have already lost in Paris."
Claire arrived at Versailles, looking every bit of the regal lady, dressed in a gorgeous forest green embroidered, caped gown, her hair perfectly coiffed, the stone she received as a gift from Master Raymond nestled in her chest. She was led to Louis private rooms where he received her.
Louis asked Claire to sit and offered her a cup of hot chocolate and an orange. After their drink, Louis asked what he could do for Claire and she requested that Jamie be released from the Bastille. Yes he had broken a royal decree, but Claire tried to explain that Jamie's defense of his honor when provoked was a Scottish trait. Claire emphasized, with subtlety, that she would be grateful and willing to express that gratitude in any way the King saw fit. Louis took Claire's hands, noting that she wore two wedding bands. When she said that she had been married before, the King was impressed that she would still, loyally, wear that ring. Louis kissed Claire's hands and then asked for a favor in return.
He led her through a secret door to another room, that was decorated with various mystical insignia. Louis wanted to use Claire's skills as La Dame Blanche…
…Monsieur Forez was also there and Master Raymond and Le Comte St. Germain soon joined them room. Master Raymond and the Comte were accused of sorcery and exploration of the dark arts. They even brought evidence from the apothecary and St. Germain's home. Louis wanted Claire (La Dame Blanche with a pure heart) to judge each of the men and ascertain if there was darkness within them.
Claire agreed and first went to look Master Raymond and St. Germain in their eyes:
Claire: "I see a shadow behind your eyes, Comte. I see an image. A gang of men in the street dressed as aristocrats but wearing masks…Les Disciples."
Le Comte was ENRAGED! He yelled that he knew nothing about Les Disciples and called Claire a liar and a witch… after all, she drank poison and survived. How did he know this? St. Germain admitted to poisoning her himself! Claire didn't balk at the accusation, saying instead that she was a white witch, practicing white magic.
Claire claimed to see darkness in Master Raymond too, but only the darkness that lived in the souls of all men, "Even a king's. Four without darkness, there can be no light."
As a final test, Louis brought out a massive snake. The Bible said that a true believer could handle a serpent and would not be harmed. This would be a way to discover who among Master Raymond and St. Germain was really a servant of God. But Claire proposed an alternative. She would put together a poison and if they drank and survived, this indicated they were NOT evil and could go free. Claire looked through the things brought from the apothecary, found bitter cascara, and poured it into a cup.
Claire took the cup to Master Raymond first. He drank, experienced some choking and pain, but all was well. However, when she took the cup from Master Raymond to give to St. Germain, the stone on Claire's necklace turned black. THERE WAS POISON. She and Le Comte saw this and knew that Master Raymond had put something else in that cup… sleight of hand. So, St. Germain was trapped. If he refused to drink, Louis would kill him, and if he drank, he'd die.
St. Germain took the cup and there were tears in his eyes. He cursed both Master Raymond and Claire, saying he would see them in hell. Le Comte drank the poison, fell to the ground, choked, and died.
Louis stepped over Le Comte's dead body and the ordered Master Raymond to leave France and never come back again. Claire watched him being led away and thought "I'm going to miss you most of all" from the Wizard of Oz. Louis would honor Claire's request to free Jamie… but first he demanded payment. He took Claire back to his room, laid her on the bed, and had forced himself on her. (Claire: "I closed my eyes and thought of England.")
The King seemed to finish quickly. Claire sat up and adjusted her hair and skirts. Louis agreed to pardon Jamie and arrange one with the English crown as well if they wanted to return to Scotland. Louis dismissed Claire, and on her way out, she took an orange. (Me: "Claire, girl, you better take that orange. Hell, take all of them… you EARNT that orange.") Claire then left Versailles.
Eventually Jamie was released and made his way back to the apartment. Claire watched as he climbed the stairs and when we saw him, Jamie looked bad, unclean and with a full beard. However, Claire couldn't look him in the eye… in the background we heard the constant ticking of the clock.
Jamie knew of the miscarriage but remarked that he didn't even know if the baby was a boy or girl. Claire wouldn't respond. She poured herself a drink and sat down across the room. Claire eventually told Jamie the baby was a girl, named Faith, now buried in the cemetery next to the convent. She also told Jamie she knew what happened to Fergus and that Black Jack had to be punished.
Jamie: "Do ye hate me for it Claire?"
Claire: "I did hate you…"
Claire then told Jamie about holding Faith at L'hopital… how beautiful and small she was, with hair and eyes like Jamie. We saw a flashback of Claire singing to Faith… after a time, Louise de Rohan (pregnant herself) joined Mother Hildegarde and helped Claire let go of Faith so she could be buried. Claire wailed and sobbed.
Claire: "So yes… I hated you. But, it was me who asked the impossible of you. It was me that put Frank before our family. It was me who followed you to the woods.
Jamie: "Frank is your family too."
Claire: "But he's not here, and now neither is our daughter. It's not your fault. It's not even Randall's fault, not this time. It's my fault."
Jamie: "I asked your forgiveness once. You said there's nothing to forgive. The truth is I already forgave you, long before today. For this and anything else you could ever do."
Then Claire confessed to "sleeping" with Louis in exchange for this freedom. Jamie responded: "You did it to save my life. Just like I gave myself to Randall to save you." (I CANNOT HANDLE THIS PAIN.)
Jamie went to Claire and knelt before her, they would have to carry their pain together. She asked him to take her home to Scotland and he agreed.
But first, Jamie and Claire went to Faith's grave and he left an Apostle spoon on the tombstone.
Jamie: "If we must bury you here in France, let's leave a bit of Scotland wi' ye."
Jamie and Claire knelt at the grave, made the sign of the cross, and held hands while they mourned.
If you missed tonight's episode, you can watch "Faith" on STARZ Play online HERE or via the STARZ Play app.
How are we doing tonight Sassenachs? You know, one of my Outlander mentors said something to me while I was reading Dragonfly in Amber, and it's always stuck with me: Everything bad that can happen to Jamie and Claire *will* happen to Jamie and Claire. If you can imagine it, it will happen. However, there will also be a J/C HEA. When it's all said and done, they will be together and in love. I held on to this tonight and will continue to do so through the remainder of the season.
Share your thoughts and feels in comments.
Incidentally, fellow WSN fangirl Katie had some hilarious (and spot on) reactions to tonight's episode. Read her feels HERE!
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The new C Series loader backhoes feature Tier 4 Interim engines, improved engine response, fuel efficiency and serviceability, and an optional auto ride control. The line-up includes the B95C (pictured), B95C TC, B95C LR and B110C. With backhoe bucket breakout forces of 12,933 ft.-lbs. and lift capacities at 12 ft. of 3,940 lb., the machines are ideal for job tasks such as digging trenches or placing pipe. The new engines deliver faster response and increased fuel efficiency — up to 4% over previous models. In addition, a new tilt-forward hood, which replaces the flip-up hood on previous models, is easy to open, and provides wide access with low effort for routine maintenance needs.


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Congressional Progressive Caucus PAC Congratulates Candidates on Primary Victories in Connecticut, Minnesota, and Wisconsin
Washington, D.C., August 15, 2018 – The Congressional Progressive Caucus PAC (CPC PAC) – the political arm of the 78-member Congressional Progressive Caucus – today congratulated CPC PAC endorsed candidates following their wins in yesterday's primary elections. The winners include Jahana Hayes in Connecticut's 5th Congressional District, Angie Craig in Minnesota's 2nd Congressional District, Ilhan Omar in Minnesota's 5th Congressional District, and Randy Bryce in Wisconsin's 1st Congressional District.
"Congressional Progressive Caucus PAC endorsed candidates continue to win primaries across the country, building momentum and leading the way for Democrats to take control of the House of Representatives this fall. Our candidates are well-positioned to not only keep blue districts in Democratic hands, but also win key swing districts, including the one currently held by Speaker Ryan," said Rep. Mark Pocan, Co-Chair of the CPC PAC. "CPC PAC endorsed candidates are committed to serving the communities they represent, not special interests, political donors, or corporations. Once elected, our candidates will fight to reverse Republican policies that have stacked the deck against working Americans."
Jahana Hayes, a lifelong resident of Connecticut and a former social studies teacher, is the recipient of the 2016 National Teacher of the Year Award. She is running to serve the people in her community who have become disenchanted with Washington politicians who fail to prioritize the needs of Connecticut families. Hayes has dedicated herself to service, engaging her community on the need for equity in education. As a Member of Congress, she will be a strong advocate for our nation's students, teachers, and future.
Angie Craig is running for Congress to build a Minnesota for all – where every member of every family gets a fair shot at an outstanding education, the career training or retraining for a good job, and a better life. She's running because she's spent over 20 years working in healthcare and understands that every Minnesotan deserves quality, affordable care. As a Member of Congress, Craig will fight for the education, healthcare, job training, and infrastructure investments that will support thousands of new jobs. Craig is committed to ending a broken political system that works for special interests, not Minnesotans or Americans.
Ilhan Omar is an accomplished legislator, policy analyst, community organizer, non-profit leader, public speaker, board member, youth mentor, and an award-winning human rights advocate. As a refugee who fled Somalia's civil war with her family, Omar has experienced our immigration system first hand and she will be a strong advocate in standing up to attacks on immigrants and refugees by the Trump Administration and Republicans. As a Member of Congress, Omar will continue the advocacy work with which she's long been involved and will continue to fight to advance important issues, including support for working families, educational access, environmental protection, and racial equity.
Randy Bryce is a U.S. Army veteran, cancer survivor, and union ironworker. He's running for Congress because he's experienced the struggles facing working families, and he wants to ensure that their voices are represented in Washington again. Having experienced serious family health issues, Bryce is committed to strengthening our health care system and fighting Republican attempts to undermine it. As a union member, he knows that economic opportunity depends on good-paying jobs and that unions are critical to building an economy that works for everyone, not just the wealthy few. As a result, he will fight to increase access to apprenticeships and stand up to Republican attacks on our nation's teachers and other public sector unions. Bryce will never stop fighting for working families in Wisconsin and across the country.
CPC PAC will continue to provide support for Hayes, Craig, Omar, and Bryce, and looks forward to welcoming them as members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus – the largest values-based caucus in the House of Representatives – in the 116th Congress.
Congressional Progressive Caucus PAC Congratulates Candidates on Primary Victories in Connecticut, Minnesota, and Wisconsin2018-08-152018-08-15https://weareprogressives.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/pcblue-1.pngProgressive Caucushttps://weareprogressives.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/pcblue-1.png200px200px


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Watch away!
Best Media Apps for the Oculus Quest in 2020
Sean Endicott
Best Media Apps for the Oculus Quest Android Central 2020
The Oculus Quest is an excellent device for VR gaming, but it's also an excellent headset for enjoying videos and other media. Whether it's streaming YouTube videos, streaming films and TV shows, or watching your own videos that are stored directly on the headset, these are the best media apps for the Oculus Quest.
Watching the web: YouTube VR
Shows and films: Netflix VR
Foxy viewing: Fox Now
Time for a show: Showtime Anytime
Primetime: Prime Video VR
Viewing versatility: SKYBOX VR Video Player
Social streaming: Bigscreen Beta
Cloud and local viewing: Oculus Gallery
VR events and sports: NextVR
YouTube has billions of views for a reason; there's an almost unlimited amount of content. That only expands on the Oculus Quest with support for 360-degree videos on the headset and access to all of YouTube's other content on top of it.
Free at Oculus
Netflix has been in the streaming business for years. Its native app on the Oculus Quest puts a giant screen in front of your eyes and makes it feel like you're watching Netflix content in a cinema. It's a great way to watch an action flick, though your head might tire during more extended viewings.
This app lets you watch Fox shows live and on-demand. You can watch Empire, Gotham, Family Guy, The Simpsons, The Orville, Fox NFL Sunday, college football, and more. Just make sure to sign in with your participating TV provider.
You can log in to your Showtime account in this app and watch all of your favorite Showtime content, including Inside the NFL, The Affair, tons of movies, and more.
In this app, you can watch all of your favorite Amazon Prime content in a virtual theater. Movies, TV shows, and Amazon's original content can all be viewed inside your own private cinema.
This video player supports DLNA media streaming, can stream your PC to your Oculus Quest, and can help you view natively stored content. It supports up to 5K videos, and the PC client can even stream out the same content to multiple Oculus Quests at once.
This video streaming application allows you to watch content with your friends. With it, you can stream your PC to your Oculus Quest, whether you want to watch video content or even stream PC games for all your friends to enjoy.
This is Oculus' own content-viewing application. It supports viewing videos from Facebook, Dropbox, media servers, and local storage. It also supports viewing photos, both in 2D and at 360 degrees.
NextVR allows you to view events as if you were there. You can catch up on NBA games, WWE matches, soccer games, and concerts in an immersive view.
Stream and play on the Quest
The Oculus Quest isn't just for gaming. There are plenty of apps to stream videos and watch movies stored locally on your Oculus Quest, from your PC, or just on another service entirely. You don't have to put your headset away if you want to watch TV since you can do it all with the headset on. If you're looking for a versatile player that can handle local files and content from a media server, you should check out SKYBOX VR Video Player.
If you want to enjoy 360-degree videos and some of the most popular content from around the web, YouTube's own YouTube VR is a great choice.
All of these media players are free, and to be able to view all of the content that you'd like, you'll probably have to download a combination of them. They aren't exceptionally large applications, so there's no harm in downloading all of them to increase your options.
Truly portable VR
A Star Trek Adventure just joined the full library of Oculus Quest games
The Oculus Quest allows you to play VR games without requiring a PC, phone, or external sensors. Here's every game you can buy or download for free!
Products to keep your Quest charged
While the Oculus Quest comes with its own USB-C charger, there may be instances where a different cable is needed, or your original cable may become unusable. We give you our best picks for replacement charging cables for the Oculus Quest.
Quest for greatness
These are the best accessories to improve your Oculus Quest
The Oculus Quest is an excellent standalone headset, but you can make it even better with the right accessories. Here are the best accessories for your Oculus Quest.


Seventy students signed up to attend an afterschool computer club that a teacher and I are facilitating. Given that only 2nd through 5th graders could join, it means 30% of our school's eligible students elected for this program.
We had so many kids, we ended up moving the 2nd graders in with the K-1 students for the Get Active club in the gymnasium. A few may not have been happy with this move, but we literally did not have enough devices!
So why would so many kids choose to spend an additional hour after school at school? In a word: Minecraft. It was mentioned in the brief description of the club. For those kids who have access to it at home, it can be all-consuming. Students join each others' worlds to build (and sometimes destroy) things together, playing for hours on end.
I have tried it myself and see the draw. One minute I was asking myself, "What's the point?" Three hours later, I was quietly cursing the zombies that dared to trample over the flower garden I just planted.
But is this type of activity all we want for our kids? A glorified arcade? I feel like public schools should hold ourselves to a higher goal. We should have more purpose behind the programming we provide. As the lead learner in my school, I also feel obligated to consider how to extend these technologies in ways that can enrich students' lives academically, socially, and emotionally.
This leads into our essential question: Where do we begin?
The teacher I am teaming with on this club wanted to show the students some cool tools they could use on the iPads and iMacs. I was focused more on designing a series of activities that would lead to outcomes that would benefit our community. What we both eventually realized was we hadn't asked our students what they wanted.
Yes, they want to play lots of Minecraft. But what is it about this game that engages them to such a degree that they would stick around after school two nights a week to play it? Why are they so passionate about it?
I reference the three motivators Daniel Pink describes in his book Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us (Riverhead, 2011) to consider some possible answers.
When someone enters Minecraft, the world is their's to create. They are in control of their destiny. What a stark contrast to our students' lives in school. The standards are set, the assessments are pre-determined, and the plans have been prepared. All without the students' input. If this is their learning to own, we don't always do a very good job of including them in the process.
Within Minecraft, they make the rules. They can choose to start from scratch and battle the elements (see: zombies), or select the creative mode, which gives them access to all the tools available and few constraints to worry about.
Because the world of Minecraft is so open, there is room for lots of different reasons to play it. In my limited observations and experiences, some students like to play because they can create their own shelters and "live off the land." Others want to connect with friends and interact in their personal (Minecraft) worlds. A few simply want to build stuff and then subsequently destroy it.
Whatever the reasons, all of the learners I have seen use Minecraft will stick with it for an extended amount of time. When I have asked them what they are doing, every student has been able to clearly articulate their goals for playing. That is an engagement rate that any teacher of formal academics would love to see consistently.
Students immersed in games like Minecraft will persist with the challenges provided because they have a purpose, but also because they believe that their goal is attainable. This ability to envision what one wants to accomplish, along with the awareness of what it will take achieve this outcome, requires some high level thinking skills.
Metacognition, reflection, and self-assessment are constantly in play when learners believe that they can achieve their goals at a high level of competency. There is lots of deep thinking and essential skill development going on here. Because they are embedded within a video game, maybe that is why these tools for learning haven't achieved a broader acceptance within education.
Considering all this, my teacher partner and I backed off a bit on our preconceived ideas about what our students would learn during Computer Club. Instead of providing a detailed day-to-day schedule of activities they may not want to do, we conducted a multiple intelligence survey to help them start to appreciate and focus on their strengths.
My co-teacher got all of the 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders set up with a Google Drive account to create, store, and share information. Students had the opportunity to discuss their interests and passions with peers, without the expectations of a written summary about their experience afterwards.
When we dismissed the students, they appeared more excited about this club than when they came in. You could almost hear the collective sigh of relief from the kids when they realized that we weren't here to dictate what they would learn about, but to guide them toward possibilities.
Watch this space for more reports from Matt on the club's progress. And please share your thoughts!
When you said, "You have begun, just barely, to scratch the surface of the attraction that Minecraft has", I found myself nodding in agreement. In my next post, I plan to describe our initial experiences in rolling this out for kids. Hint: It was messy, but in a good way! I think I am going to learn more from this experience than the kids.
Hi, Matt. I think it's awesome that your school is experimenting with Minecraft. It's incredibly important that adults (especially educators) seek answers to "Why do kids find ___ interesting?" rather than dismissing the unfamiliar.
Thank you Jon for sharing these resources. I will share them with my co-teacher. This is what being connected is all about!
We home school our four children ages 7, 10, 13, and 14. Our 14 year old has taught himself, and has become very proficient in, binary code and binary mathematics. I'll never forget The day I walked into his bedroom and found him surrounded by index cards cards covered in ones and zeros. That was the day that I began to understand the value of Minecraft as a learning tool and not just a video game. Thank you for bringing an open mind to education in a day of such constraint!
Interesting connections to mathematics. I had considered geometry and spacial awareness in general, but not what your son was doing. Thank you Tom for sharing.
Thank you Matt for some helpful clarification on the mystery of Minecraft. As your article mentions, my son will play hours on end, unlike any other digital game. He has graduated to using Skype with kids all over the world to meet up and create new worlds. Although too much time online doing anything could be a problem, your article points out the very basic reasons so many kids are drawn to the game, and as a result, makes the mystery much less of a worry.
Kevin, I appreciate you sharing how your son has connected other tools like Skype to Minecraft as a self-motivated learner. We hope to help our students make the same connections as they explore these digital tools with more purpose. Also, I agree with you about not allowing kids to spend too much time online. Everything in moderation!
I was fascinated to discover ways students could incorporate Minecraft into their learning. Recently a group of my 4th graders built Native American shelters with descriptions as a way for me to assess their learning. First time they enjoyed being tested!
Sheila, that is a very creative way for allowing students to show what they know. Thank you for sharing the possibilities of this digital tool!
This is a great idea…and the timing is quite serendipitous. I run a postgrad course at a university and for years we have been using Second Life as part of teaching the students about engaging learning in a 3D virtual world. Just yesterday I was discussing the course with my colleague and suggesting that we need to look at other options, such as Minecraft, as I believe that the future of learning online actually lies in "not-designed-for-learning" spaces rather than the sanitised online learning environments that we create. And so it was great to see that you are doing something with Minecraft, and I'm hoping my students will pick it up too and we can see where it leads.
Thanks for sharing this. I am always inspired to "meet" others who are pushing the boundaries of using technology for learning!
I am glad you have found this post helpful, Craig. I agree with you that the future of learning may not be as teacher-directed and outcome-based as it has been. I know what you are saying in the "not-designed-for-learning" comment…wondering how this could be rephrased to better represent what digital tools like Minecraft have to offer.
Just curious…what was the male/female ratio of the 30% that signed up for the club?
There are 19 girls and 31 boys in the group.
That's a good question, Patricia. Although more boys than girls signed up, I don't feel like the ratio was too much in favor of boys. Hopefully that's a result of promoting this opportunity equally to all students and hosting the club in a gender-neutral environment like the library.
We homeschool our children and use minecraft as a learning tool. I have a 1st grader working on building animal habitats in the different biomes and learning about some of the elements found in mine craft and the periodic table. My 6th grader is amazing at how he uses redstone to power things with different circuits, etc. My 8th grader (who is a girl) and a real life horse rider, enjoys farming and horse training (some of the minecraft wild horses have different abilities at jumping, etc. when saddled). They Skype with kids around the world (Ireland/France/Australia), and play on a server that has a world in which they have economy packages – they have tried different "jobs" as miners, hunters, etc. and have opened their own "stores" selling items that they've mined and created. They have built roads and railways to increase traffic to their stores. So many opportunities for learning… We LOVE Minecraft!
Wow Jennifer, I had no idea how diverse the opportunities are within Minecraft. Is this through Minecraft EDU? We are only using the Pocket Edition on the iPads at this time. Your experiences you share have definitely opened my eyes to the possibilities.
I have just started a minecraft pilot at our middle school. The kids are so excited and have begun discussing a way to use minecraft to inform others about tornadoes using the tornado mod. They want to create a a storm chaser minecraft world. I have no idea if this can be done, but I think the kids will get it done. I look forward to our time after school as much as the kids do.
Irma, when you said, "I have no idea if this can be done, but I think the kids will get it done.", I found myself smiling in appreciation. How often do we as educators take that same attitude with the core academics during the school day? Maybe experiences like the ones we are undertaking will help us recalibrate our expectations for what our students are truly able to accomplish.
We have also just started a MinecraftEdu exploration at our middle school. It is both amazing and magical to be a part of this experience. The students ask to come during advisory, lunch, after school, anytime to work on the virtual school we are creating. We also have plans to build a virtual digestive system in the near future. Students will build various organs together and then take the virtual tour. They are plotting various ways to use it in the classrooms; some of the ideas are so creative! The biggest reward so far is to hear the kids say "That was the most fun I've had."When can we come back?" I wish I had something like Minecraft when I was in middle school.
The more comments like yours, Lori, that I read, the more I am questioning the limits of digital tools such as Minecraft have for deep and conceptual learning. Thank you for sharing the way you have connected the prescribed curriculum with something students are immensely engaged in.
I have 27 secind graders who use their math, writing , reading to build our town growing thought time in minecraft. It is so challenging for them to build together and they have to integrate all of their curriculum to complete the project. They are on a LAN to comply with CIPA but it is such an engaging process for all of us.
Anne, the concept of community is represented in your integrated unit on multiple levels. On the surface, students are creating a virtual community that requires them to connect important social studies concepts to a tool they know and enjoy. Digging deeper, they are creating another community, one maybe more important. Your students are learning critical social skills in this process, such as collaboration, communication, and consensus. These concepts, much more than any content standard, will benefit their lives and their futures. Kudos to you for having the courage to engage 27 second graders in this complex learning activity.
I would love to learn more about how you have accomplished this. My second graders love Minecraft and would love to figure a way ti "mine" to extend this love past writing activities.
Great insights! As a Middle School principal, I start my mornings wandering through our Commons, checking in on students. Sixth grade boys are immersed in Mincraft and when I ask them what they are doing, I prepare myself for a spirited and detailed description of their current project. Indeed, allowing kids to have a say in their world, free of adult-inspired rules and regulations that stifle creativity, is a big reason why I love seeing this type of activity before the school day begins…As teachers, we must capitalize on this approach to learning!
Thank you Bill for sharing your school experiences. Asking students about their interests, like you do, seems like such a simple thing, but I think it means so much to them. I probably don't do this enough. Hopefully with the maker space we have created after school, students will see that we do value what they find engaging in our actions and words..
Matt, would you be willing to share the multiple intelligence survey you did with the kids?
I have not necessarily understood or even tried to understand my son's fascination with Minecraft. He has been deeply entrenched in it since 2nd grade. He is now a 3rd grader and is working to build his own Minecraft server. As a "techie" and staff member in teacher education, as soon to be M.Ed. Instructional Technology graduate, I go back and forth between supporting and opposing this endeavor. I look forward to reading more! Thank you!
Judy, by allowing your son to explore his interests, I believe you are supporting his passions and not opposing anything. My son is also engaged in Minecraft. Thank you for joining me in this collaborative inquiry.
1) Pick up a copy of Pink's book Drive. About 1/4 of the way through and there are some very very interesting ideas spawned out of the book already.
Thanks again and looking forward to the "Day 2" follow up?
Hi Jack. Glad you have found his book helpful. I would also recommend his most recent release, To Sell is Human. I may reference it in a future post here.
I perused your blog. That maker faire at the White House was an interesting event. I did see the video clip of the marshmellow gun. I think the President was as engaged as the boy was!