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This commentary originally aired on WAMU, American University Radio in Washington, D.C.
By Beza Mesfin
I remember the last time it happened. My friends called me outside, and when I got there, I saw them in the car… fighting.
He had her by the hair and was punching her over and over. “Stop him!” said my friends who had gathered outside. “She needs your help!”
He and I are close – we grew up together, and his girlfriend has become a good friend. But even so, for a few seconds, I just stood there and watched. I knew even if I stopped this fight I probably couldn’t stop the fighting. It’s been happening several times a week for over a year now.
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There’s a reason students at the University of Chicago call it “the place where fun comes to die.” Its students are competitive. Its teachers, unforgiving. In short, the school demands 110 percent from you. Which, I can only imagine, is hard to give when you’re starving.
Natalie developed an eating disorder as soon as she left home for U of C. She skipped meals and purged multiple times a day. She danced 10 hours a week. She couldn’t stop working or start eating. Her behavior became so extreme that she suspected she might have bipolar disorder. At which point she finally decided to go to the university’s student resource center, thinking the staff there could help her overcome whatever psychological problem was keeping her from eating. But she said the counseling center’s health professionals addressed only her body mass index, not her mind.
“My behavior was basically dismissed,” said Natalie, who is now 22 and uses medication and therapy to treat the diagnosed bipolar disorder that she thinks made her anorexia so severe. Each visit to the center was the same. “Before discussing medication or asking me how I was doing, [my doctor] would march me upstairs to the bathroom, weigh me, and then march into her office, where she would whip out a body mass index chart to see if I had crossed the magical line or not.”
Natalie is one of three Chicago alumnae I talked to about coping with eating disorders while attending the academically rigorous college. (Fellow alumnae I should say – I graduated two and a half years ago.) I asked to hear their stories after reading a recent study released by the American Academy of Pediatrics that found eating disorders in young people at levels higher than they’ve ever been. I wanted to know how these disorders play out on college campuses where young people develop unhealthy eating behaviors, and where others bring habits that started in high school.
It turns out the University of Chicago is not alone. According to a recent New York Times article, college campuses across the country are struggling to provide the mental health resources for behavioral problems that take a physical toll, like anorexia and binge drinking.
“The only treatment that we know of that is effective is the restoration of calories and weight,” said Becky Steinhauer, a psychiatrist at the University of Chicago’s health clinic. While medication can help with the psychological symptoms that accompany eating disorders, for the physical ones, Steinhauer says she uses the body mass index (BMI) to calculate whether a student is healthy or not.
But the former students I talked to who struggled with eating disorders said their doctors focused so much on their BMIs, they all but ignored the mental issues they had simultaneously.
It’s the holiday season and someone’s in the kitchen baking something delicious... add the eggs, the flour, and sometimes a dash of nutmeg.
Harmless?
Think again. Young people are apparently using their kitchen cupboard nutmeg to get high.
Fosters.com reports, “While no one from the foundation could be reached for comment, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration through the Department of Health and Human Services categorizes nutmeg as a psychoactive drug in a 1967 study listed in the FDA's Poisonous Plant database.” According to the article, the Not My Kid Foundation recently brought the issue of children abusing the spice to the public's attention.
The article reports that the effects of ingesting or inhaling nutmeg in high doses can cause mild hallucinations and a high feeling. An article on Yahoo.com Associated Content reads, “Nutmeg contains an active psychoactive compound called myristicin, which belongs to the deliriant drug family. When taken in sufficient quantities, nutmeg off a spice rack can produce deliriant effects.”
A website called Cracked.com, lists nutmeg as one of seven common household items that have drug-like effects when ingested a certain way, including large quantities of mulberries, rye grain, and Stilton cheese, which can apparently cause one to have strange visions.
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Even though California voters voted not to legalize marijuana, young people in America are less worried about its effects and continue to smoke it at an increasing rate, reports a recent study from the University of Michigan called, “Monitoring the Future.”
The study sampled over 46,000 8th, 10th, and 12th graders, and found an increase in marijuana and ecstasy usage, but a decline in alcohol usage.
Alcohol usage amongst 12th graders is the lowest it has been since the study began in 1975, and 8th and 10th graders show the lowest usage rates since they were included in the study in 1991, despite reporting that alcohol is “very easy” or “easy” to acquire.
These declining numbers comes as a shock in relation to a recent advertising study released by the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth (CAMY), which shows that youth exposure to alcohol advertising on television increased by 71 percent between 2001 and 2009. Apparently, ads for distilled spirits on cable television make up for a large percentage of the increase in youth exposure. The study says, “The average annual number of alcohol ads seen by youth watching television increased from 217 in 2001 to 366 in 2009, approximately one alcohol ad per day.”
Marijuana usage, on the other hand, is now on the rise. The usage rates for all three grade levels increased significantly. “Daily or near-daily use is defined as use on 20 or more occasions in the prior 30 days; the rates for grades 8, 10, and 12 were 1%, 3%, and 6% in 2010. In other words, about one in sixteen 12th graders today uses marijuana on a daily or near-daily basis,” reports the study.
Ecstasy usage increased in all three grades as well, and youth responded that they perceived fewer health risks associated with ecstasy than in the previous five years.
Vicodin and OxyContin usage among youth is higher than in 2002, and concerns researchers because of the addictive nature of the drug. Most teenagers reported coming into possession of these prescription drugs through a friend. Typically, someone finds leftover pills from a prescription and then gives or sells them to a friend.
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The following originally aired on KCBS.
By Sayre Quevedo
My friends say that even though I’m gay, I don’t act it. But lately I’ve been wondering: what does that even mean?
When I walk through the Castro in San Francisco I can see that there are a lot of different types of gay people. Some of are effeminate, some are macho, some look like they just rolled out of bed while others look like they spent hours choosing their outfits. So, how can people say that I don’t ‘seem’ gay when there are so many different people out there?
I’m not particularly into fashion and don’t act flamboyantly so I guess I don’t fit the mold of what people think of as typically gay. I’m not particularly offended when people tell me that I seem straight but it does confuse me. It feels like they’re telling me that my sexuality is an act as opposed to just a part of who I am.
I don’t expect these stereotypes to change overnight but I do hope that by just being myself I can show that there is more to a person than their sexuality, no acting involved.
Previously:
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More than Media…
Youth Radio is committed to improving the lives of young people in every way…
Originally broadcast on NPR's Morning Edition on September 22, 2010.
By Molly Adams
Before health care reform was signed into law, President Obama made a speech where he was pretty much talking to me when he said: "If you're a young adult, which many of you are, you'll be able to stay on your parents' insurance policy until you're 26 years old."
This was good news for me -- two years since I became an official independent adult. That rite of passage was graduating college and being removed from my parents' health insurance coverage. And since then I haven't been able to find an affordable plan as a single person who works three different jobs. So when the law was signed I called my mom, Sheera LaBelle, and I asked her a question to which I could guess the answer: "Mom, will you take me back?"
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Youth Radio is committed to improving the lives of young people in every way… As part of the Youth Radio Health Department, Youth Radio promotes physical health and well being through free exercise classes. Current classes include Yoga, Kickboxing, and Afro-Brazilian Funk, and are offered free of charge to all Youth Radio students and staff. All classes take place in Youth Radio’s Mind Body Health Center, a dedicated space for exercise, mediation, and relaxation. Read more...
Summer is something to look forward to at the end of a long school year, It's a time for relaxation as well as fun and romance. Beaches,pools,barbecues and sun is what comes to mind when I think of the months of June, July and August. They are by far the hottest months in our twelve month year and some of the craziest. Summer is filled with wishing and dreaming, since theirs no school work holding back teens they are able to roam free with some boundries.
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This story originally aired on NPR's Morning Edition, March 24, 2010
President Obama signed the health care overhaul bill into law yesterday. Still, some health organizations want more to be done to provide care to uninsured Americans including the American Dental Association. They opposed the bill because it didn't increase funding for dental services paid by Medicaid. And that, the ADA says, won't help the millions of Americans without dental insurance. Youth Radio's Jennifer Obakhume visits one family dealing with that reality. 
Cesscia Rojo and her sister Adriana are young and healthy, except they have dental issues. Major ones. Cesscia says, when they needed care, they used to go to Tijuana, Mexico.
“I went to Tijuana and that’s where they started the root canal. When I came back, all the problems started with the drugs dealers, so I wasn’t going back to TJ anytime soon.”
Both sisters have tried to get dental care in the U-S. Adriana used a free clinic in Southern California to have a broken tooth pulled. But she needs more dental work.
“I still have a hole in my mouth. It hurts sometimes if I chew bread cuz it goes in there and it hurts, but other than that it’s good.”
The sisters live at a home with their parents. Cesscia says they enjoy cooking dinner together every night.
"See really you know, Mexican culture, we, they hold on to us until we’re married. And we’re not married, and we’re here until we finish school. And then we’ll take them in. And we’re just going to stay together."
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