Unit 2 Reflection

My Unit 2 Health Reflection

Health is the balance of the five pillars of health; Nutrition, stress, social, exercise, and sleep. Each of these pillars, when in balance, creates a strong and healthy human being. When even one pillar is out of balance, the structure as a whole is much weaker. The four hormones that help with the balance of a person includes as followed; insulin, the break down of macroeconomic and the sorting of glucose in the blood; leptin, energy balance; glycogen, the release of of glucagon and stored fat stimulated by low blood sugar; cortisol, the stress hormone. These hormones will go out of balance with certain action such as "overcarbsumption" which will block insulin receptors, or not eating enough fats and forcing your body to tell your mind to eat more fats resulting in the consumption of too much fat. For the hormone of Cortisol, if a persons stress levels raise so does the cortisol. The stages of stress include the alarm stage, resistance stage and exhaustion stage. Alarm phase (1) raises blood pressure, and heart rate but is only a "fight or flight" instance where a person is ready for immediate physical activity. Resistance phase (2) is when large levels of cortisol is released, muscle protein is broken down into sugars, blood sugar s increased, and there is an increase in appetite. One way to relieve stress is through exercise such as aerobic, muscle or bone strengthening, and stretching.

The essential theme of this unit is how to keep ones body healthy and what it takes to make sure you are healthy. As for the students at SHS, they may think that they have everything going for them because they exercise and eat right, having a balances, moderate, variation, and adequate diet, and they include the nutrients they need; carbohydrates, fiber, lipids, protein, vitamins, minerals, water, and phytochemical, but they do not get enough sleep. During  class, I am a victim of this as well, many students constantly have micro-sleeps where they fall asleep ranging from 1 microsecond to 30 seconds. Also, waking up is a drag and our cortisol levels are not high enough in the mornings and through out the day so our biological time clock will be off since teenagers are feeling sleepy at 12 in the afternoon.

This is why my goal is to sleep better and to decrease my stress; I can accomplish this by getting ahead in homework so that I spread out my homework and won't have excrusiatingly late nights, and if I do, I will make time the next day for a nap. As for the stress portion, I will go on more runs or work out if I am feeling stressed before I try to solve the problems because after I accomplish my stress reliever, my mind will be more in focus and the solving time will be cut down.

One subject that I am comfortable with but not fully comprehending the subject is the secretion and release of hormones. Are they chemical signals that attach to the protein membranes so that a signal is sent through the cell, or are they just released? for next unit I could take the concepts that I learn and further my education in them to reply understand not just their function but the why and how of the subject.

A real world application for me was about 3 weeks ago when I got an average of 2-4 hours of sleep for 3 nights in a row, and then fell sick 5 days afterwards. My body was unable to fight off the pathogen going around school because of my sleep deprivation, and usually I do not get sick, but this time I added a factor working against me not with me, sleep deprivation. Since then, naps have been my best friend and i go to bed much earlier and I have been seeing much improvement. I wake up in the mornings awake, and during the day I do not feel as drowsy and tired as before.