The Experience of Personal Distres

Another paper written for the Abnormal Psychology course.  Video was part of on-line classroom, and they can also be viewed here: http://animatedminds.com/the_films/

Videos on Demand: The Experience of Personal Distress

The topic I chose to write about was a ‘on demand’ film called Animated Minds.  The film is a collection of eight short narratives and accompanying animations  “attempts to communicate the subjective experience of abnormal psychological states”.  This film exposed me to some of the thoughts and experiences of different illnesses including schizophrenia, anxiety, obsessive compulsive, and self mutilation.  A common theme I noticed was each persons experience of personal distress due to their condition.  

Figure 1.3 of the text shows and example of the mood, distress and impairment experienced by two different people, Richard and Yoko.  While their situations may be similar, their reactions to the distress differ and it is this difference that helps to measure whether a person is suffering from a disorder.  For example, both Yoko and Ricardo experience anxiousness, worry and avoidance related to their situation but Ricardo experiences a greater amount of distress and impairment.  

It is because of this differences that people sometimes don’t understand how people with mental illnesses or disorders suffer.  That is why I liked the film, Animated Minds.  I was blown away by the symptoms these people experienced.  In the first film, Dimensions, the narrator describes that he was “living outside of consensus reality” and how it was pleasant at first because he experienced feelings of grandeur, but with shifts in his realities came unpleasantness.  In one reality he was experiencing nuclear fallout (including symptoms of radiation poisoning) and in another reality London was under 100 meters of water.  When the voices started talking in his head, they were pleasant at first and mostly of his family members but later were persecutory and essentially encouraged self harm.  The narrator reflects, “I do find it amazing, the power of the human brain to recreate, you know, ten to 20 voices perfectly.  This person experienced personal distress related to his condition.

In another film, Over and Over, the narrator is describing the feeling of needing to check things over and over (windows, doors, light switches, etc) even though there was a part of him the knew what he was doing was ridiculous.  He said that the number 8 was the only number he could trust; he liked even numbers but even then it wasn’t right because, for example, a six is made up of two threes and he doesn’t like odd numbers.  These are interesting compulsions, and are familiar to me because I once had a friend that had these symptoms.  She would have to check the stove, oven, windows, and door before we left her apartment; at the time I thought it was odd but amusing and I played along.  I do recall that she did everything four times which seems reasonable considering that others suffering from the same disorder may have to do it many more times before they feel satisfied.  The driver for the narrator was the worry that something bad would happen if he didn’t repeat the action, causing him distress.

The narrator of Fish on a Hook summed up my point nicely.  This person described his distress over the thought of going to the grocery store for food; his chest would tighten, his breathing would shallow, he felt as if he was being strangled and he was sure that if he went out, others would actually hear his heart beating.  He was overwhelmed anticipating what was going to happen, and then overwhelmed by the experience of actually being at the store.  He explained that from the outside, his distress may look odd but that his distress is like being a fish on a hook - wiggling around because he is suffering - but others can’t see the hook.  Put it in context we would see why, “And so I think a lot of us are wiggling, and that is seen as a kind of illness.  Without the vision of the hooks that we’re bound by it seems that the behavior is very crazy but, when seen in context, it isn’t.”  Understanding that everyone can experience different levels of distress and impairment to a given situation can help us be more compassionate and tolerant of people suffering from a mental illness or disorder.

The Mind of a Killer: Case Study of a Murderer

Another paper from Abnormal Psychology course, films on demand were part of the on-line classroom.

Source:  Blackboard Learn; Films on Demand; The Mind of a Killer: Case Study of a Murderer

Joel Rifkin committed his first murder at age 30, on the second anniversary of his father’s suicide.  He doesn’t know how many times he hit his young female victim in the head with a metal object, he just kept beating her until he “basically got tired of swinging it” and that he had “no idea how many times that was”.  From 1989 to 1993, Joel murdered 17 women.  After Joel was pulled over by police in 1993 for a missing license plate, the body of the seventeenth young woman was discovered.  Hours later, the police had his confession.  Serving his sentence of over 200 years in prison, Joel poses the question of whether he is brain damaged or just plain evil.  The video explores the possible explanations for his behavior.   

Joel Rifkin was adopted in 1959, and according to his mother “was a very sweet and friendly kid”.  He was raised in a family with plenty of love and support, he loved to be read to and was always interested in learning.  He did, however, have dyslexia and was physically uncoordinated.  The trouble for Joel was at school, where he was socially awkward; a trait that may have contributed to the brutal bullying he suffered throughout his entire school career.  The target of pranks and physical attacks, Joel never defended himself because “if you defend yourself, you got really decked.”  “Over the years, scientists have found that many killers were taunted as children raising the general question, ‘Can constant humiliation and abuse lead to violence?’”  Perhaps these environmental factors contributed to Joel’s violent behavior.

This theory has been tested using the aggressive behavior of hamsters to study how abuse may lead to violence. In one experiment, a young hamster is put in the cage of a bigger, older hamster; in the video you can see how the older hamster bullies the younger hamster and how the constant threat changed the young hamster’s behavior toward similarly aged/sized hamsters (submissive).  But the most disturbing part of the experiment was the implications to human behavior when the ridiculed hamster, as an adult, was more aggressive than normal to smaller, weaker hamsters, ruthlessly attacking them.  One explanation for this was a chemical reaction in the hamster brain, with vasopressin and serotonin.  In the bullied hamster, the brain was sensitive to vasopressin (the chemical that tells the body to fight) and was numb to serotonin (the peace making chemical).  This combination sets the stage for a brain that does not have a ‘check and balance’ system for violence.  Studies of primates are even more disturbing, showing that emotional abuse is just as damaging.  This is a possible explanation for Joel Rifkin’s violent behavior.

In 1994, Joel Rifkin’s defense lawyer ordered brain scans and MRI’s of Joel’s brain; both scans were interpreted as being a ‘normal’ brain.   IQ tests revealed that Joel was above average to superior (120) which is probably why he was able to kill so many times without being caught. Joel did, however, have difficulty with tests that challenged his ability to follow instructions while ignoring conflicting information or “difficulty inhibiting a motor response even though he knew it was incorrect”.  This was an indication that Joel’s brain “did not function properly”, however the official diagnosis in 1994 was ‘moderate dysfunction in the frontal systems‘ ruling out the ‘diminished capacity defense’ and ‘reduced penalty’ (discussed more later).  As it relates,  chapter 10 of the text states that “poor functioning in the frontal lobe and other areas important for emotion as one of the many neurochemical features of personality disorders” (pg 296).

Further exploring the brain activity in the frontal lobe, the video discussed a study where the brain scans of 41 regular subjects and 41 murderers were compared; the scans of the murderer’s brains show little or no frontal lobe activity.  This may indicate a genetic connection - a brain with frontal lobe dysfunction is a brain vulnerable to violence.  This is because the frontal lobe is responsible for mediating, moderating, and regulating behavior; it “provides judgment” and “keeps us from acting on violent/aggressive impulses”.  Dysfunction of the frontal lobe may cause problems with impulse control making it difficult to stop a motor responses despite the desire to do so.  The video used railroad worker Phineas Gage as an example of the connection between compulsive aggressive behavior and damage or dysfunction of the frontal lobe.  After surviving an impalement to the front lobe of his brain by a metal rod, Phineas was a very different person.  While he was a pleasant man before the injury, he was violent and short tempered afterward.  

Studies of brain scans of killers also reveal that some who did not suffer childhood abuse/maltreatment still show little or no frontal lobe activity, indicating that there may be a biological cause for violence.  The video briefly explored whether a biological cause for murder, such as frontal lobe dysfunction, should be used as a courtroom defense.  The ‘diminished capacity defense’ is used to try to get criminal charges reduced or to avoid the death penalty.  Brain scans in the courtroom are considered by some to be less subjective than the testimony of a psychiatrist and help juries and others understand why a person did what they did (not necessarily to get them off of being punished for a crime).  Critics argue that brain scans are the latest ‘junk science’, and even some juries are skeptical as indicated by some court rulings.  Additionally, brain scans have the potential to be used by employers or insurance companies to discriminate or used by majority groups or governments for genocide, therefore it is incumbent upon the consumer to scrutinize research on the brain as it relates to violence.  We are urged to remember that the brain is still “largely a mystery,” “it has 10 billion individual cells”and there is no  ‘murder spot’ (one specific area that causes violence).

I cannot conclude this report without mentioning Joel’s mother, who seemed to me to be too ‘matter of fact’ about the murders and even still lives in the house where the murders occurred.  On one hand her reaction/coping mechanism seems healthy; she said she would go crazy if she thought about it for any length of time, but “what are you gonna do?”   She demonstrated a “general lack of emotional expression” and disconnection from the murders (Ch 10, pg 285) that I would not expect to see from the mother of a man who killed 17 women at the family home.  

As the video turns once again to Joel Rifkin, he still just just wants to understand what is different about him; how was he able to commit these crimes with no feeling or remorse.  He wants to be able to explain his behavior and possibly prevent it in the future. The film focuses on both the environmental factors of his life (bullying) and the biological factor of his frontal lobe dysfunction; both appear to have contributed to Joel’s inability to control his violent impulses.  At the end of the video, Joel is asked whether he would kill again should he be released from prison to which he responds, “I didn’t think I’d kill again after the first one.”

*All quotes are from the video unless otherwise noted.

Should sexual fantasies be discussed between partners?

Another paper written for Abnormal Psychology course, the 'Infotrac' was also part of the on-line classroom.

Infotrac: Should sexual fantasies be discussed between partners?

Sexual fantasies are personal “private mental events whose sole purpose would seem to be to induce pleasurable feelings of sexual desire and arousal” and where a person is not inhibited by what others might think, by “practical and legal barriers, or by fears of embarrassment, criticism, or rejection” (Article A123120064).  Sexual fantasies play a large role in sexual arousal for both men and women and indicate a healthy sex life (some consider not having sexual fantasies to be pathological).  Although Fraud theorized that sexual fantasies are a sign of a dissatisfied person, today’s researchers note that "the people who have the most sexual problems fantasize least." (Article A17382261).  Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder is a of “lack fantasies of desire to have sexual relations (Chapter 11, page 313).  Fantasies, like other behaviors, are conditioned and are reinforced by arousal and orgasm.  Fantasies are “treasured possessions, yet we're ashamed of them" (Article A17382261).  Sexual fantasies are taboo among conservatives; for example, one study revealed that nearly half of conservative Christians feel sexual fantasies are "morally flawed or unacceptable" (Article A17382261)) however, the fact of the matter is that most people have sexual fantasies and it is completely normal.

There are differences and similarities in men and women’s fantasies, and gender roles do seem to have an influence.  Common fantasies for both men and women “include forbidden acts, seduction, and dominance” (Article A17382261) and fantasies about past lovers.  “In a sample of college students, researchers found that men fantasized or thought about sex 7.2 times a day, compared to 4.5 for women” (Article A17382261).  Men's fantasies involve “more interactions with multiple partners than did women's (Article A123120064) and “ninety-eight percent of men compared to 80% of women reported having.. fantasies” about other people (Article A75820037).  Studies also show that the longer people are in a monogamous relationship, the more fantasies they have involving “someone other than their current partner” indicating that longer relationships “may lead to a decrease in the excitement associated with fantasizing about one's partner, an increase in the excitement associated with fantasizing about someone else, or both” (Article A75820037).

Men’s fantasies often include more than one partner, especially when fantasizing about their own dominance. Men’s fantasies are usually ‘sexually explicit’ and focus on the physical aspects and pleasure of his partner.  This is reflected in material popular for men, such as Playboy Magazine, showing “big-busted women exposing their attributes, in almost clinical detail, from a variety of angles and positions” (Article A17382261).  One study revealed men “were four times as likely to focus on their fantasy partner's physical characteristics” (Article A17382261).  One reason for this may be because once arousal has occurred in the male, orgasm is highly likely; the focus on the pleasure of their partner in fantasy may be influenced by the fact that in reality it is more difficult to detect a female’s orgasm.  

Women tend to have more emotional and romantic fantasies, for example “tales like The Bridges of Madison County and cookie-cutter Harlequin romances” (Article A17382261) where passion and romance are main features and the woman feels desired.  One popular fantasy among women is the ‘submission fantasy’ which is also referred to as ‘rape fantasy’ where the sexual act is in some way against their will or forced, but it is important to note that "women who find submission fantasies sexually arousing are very clear that they have no wish to be raped in reality" (Article A17382261).  Women tend to focus on their own pleasure rather than their parters in their fantasies, despite the emotional or romantic aspects.  One author connected this to the fact that in reality, women are “encouraged to focus on their partner's desire and pleasure rather than on their own” so it isn’t surprising that in their fantasies “women might choose to emphasize their own needs rather than those of their male partners” (Article A123120064).  Another reason women may focus on their own pleasure and not their partners is because they are less likely than men to have an orgasm during intercourse.  

Should sexual fantasies be discussed between partners? Opinions differ.  One critic opined, “if your beau is fantasizing about other women, then clearly the two of you are not as deeply psychologically engaged with each other as you think. (Article A144403050).  A more conservative critic believes that “sexual fantasies can be addictive and lead to dissatisfaction. I give my "dream man" all positives and no negatives--then compare my husband unfavorably with an unrealistic portrait of another man (Article A155824722).  My recommendation to a person considering sharing their sexual fantasies with their partner is to be discerning in what is shared in case the partner would feel threatened (for example, if the subject of the fantasy is someone they know or if the fantasy is not-so-far fetched).  Overall, sharing sexual fantasies seems to me like a reasonable if not healthy thing to do, especially when a relationship is longer term, “then the fantasy can add zest to it,” because partners “could share their fantasies and explore them with each other” (Article A55588155).   

References:
Jet, August 16, 1999 v96 i11 p17; Should You Reveal Sexual Fantasies To Your Mate? (Brief Article); Full Text: COPYRIGHT 1999 Johnson Publishing Co.; Article A55588155

Psychology Today, March-April 2006 v39 i2 p52(1); He fantasizes about my friends. (UNCONVENTIONAL WISDOM); Article A144403050

Psychology Today, Sept-Oct 1995 v28 n5 p46(4); The safest sex. (sexual fantasies) Peter Doskoch; Article A17382261

The Journal of Sex Research, August 2004 v41 i3 p288(13); Power, desire, and pleasure in sexual fantasies. Eileen L. Zurbriggen; Megan R. Yost.; Author's Abstract: COPYRIGHT 2004 Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, Inc.; Article A123120064

The Journal of Sex Research, Feb 2001 v38 i1 p43; Sexual Fantasies About One's Partner Versus Someone Else: Gender Differences in Incidence and Frequency.; (Statistical Data Included) Thomas V. Hicks; Harold Leitenberg; Article A75820037

Marriage Partnership, Winter 2006 v23 i4 p52(3); Affairs of the mind: why romantic brain candy isn't all that sweet. (Viewpoint essay) Linda LaMar Jewell.; Full Text: COPYRIGHT 2006 Christianity Today, Inc.; Article A155824722

The torment of Schizophrenia

Another paper written for Abnormal Psychology course.  The films were part of the on-line classroom.

Films on Demand: The torment of Schizophrenia

The film shows us the lives of a few different people suffering from schizophrenia; a young woman, a picture of what schizophrenia looks like in a family, a homeless man, and a father struggling with his son’s disease.  Each story demonstrates a different aspect of the disease, about how the person copes with it, and how others cope. Weaved throughout these stories is the information about schizophrenia such as symptoms, causes and risk factors and treatment.   

The first scene is a group of young adults discussing the onset of their disease, each had onset between the ages if fourteen to twenty.  One girl said she was fine one day (going to school, doing normal things) and then suddenly she’s in the hospital.  A man described feeling as if others could hear his thoughts and, being only fourteen, this greatly confused him.  Another girl described how loud everything seemed to her, so loud that it was painful.

The next story highlights Marie, who started having hallucinations at age fourteen.  She heard voices issuing commands that she cut herself; once she even saw herself crucified.  She described feeling totally overwhelmed; when she looked in the mirror she did not recognize her reflection and felt “like a stranger to myself”.  Sometimes she feels like she is “in everyone’s brain at once”, that she can read their minds and control their thoughts.  She feels above everything, and in everything; she is the tree, she is the sun shining, she is everywhere in everything on every planet... her mind races and she has insomnia for three days. It’s higher than any high, too much to bear, and too strong; a “major compulsion can end in death”.  The narrator of the film explains that a schizophrenic brain cannot sort and filter incoming information and imbalanced exchanges bombard their senses. This due to dysfunction in the cortex (thought, conscious awareness), the limbic system (emotion, memory) and frontal cortex synthesizers which are needed to perceive and function within reality.  Dopamine neurotransmitters are either too weak or too active.  If too active, positive symptoms occur such as hallucinations and delirium; too weak results in negative symptoms (deficits) such as difficulty planning and organizing information.  Chapter 12 of the text highlights negative symptoms such as ‘flat effect’ (showing little or no emotion), ‘alogia’ (language is basic and brief), ‘avolition’ (inability or unwillingness to engage in goal directed activities), and ‘anhedonia’ (lack of pleasure or interest in life activities) (ch 12, page 351).

Richard, age 47, talks to his hand; yells at it.   The talking and voices inside his head seem real to him and he becomes overwhelmed, detaches from reality, loses his social capacity and his language ability, and he a low attention span.  was diagnosed with schizophrenia when he was 24.  His mother also suffered from schizophrenia and admitted to a hospital when he was young, leaving him to be raised by his grandparents and before eventually running away.  Homeless, he did not receive proper nutrition and his living and hygiene conditions were lacking.  This is a demonstration of  factors that contribute to schizophrenia: genetics and stressful life events.  The St. James shelter, for people suffering from mental illness, is one place Richard can recieve help.   Counselors help with controlling his medications, managing his finances and assisting with social issues/problems that might arise.  But what he likes most is that the shelter serves supper every day.

Another example of the genetic prevalence of schizophrenia is family in the film where the grandmother and mother both suffer from schizophrenia.  From the granddaughter’s point of view, Grandma is like a little clown;  when she is laughing, talking incoherently, screaming... that’s just her.  She is flesh and blood and she is important.  Life was different, however, for mother (Elise) who grew up without her own mother, placed in foster care separate from her sister. Grandmother’s relapse occurred after her third child; her husband was away at work at night and she was always afraid a man was coming in with a knife, then she was afraid it was her husband and that he wanted to sever her body.  She would notice herself hitting her children, and she knew it was unusual because that was something she wouldn’t do.  She hated the sound of the telephone ringing, and a timer that ticked really got to her because it made her think of war, which she hated.

Mother (Elise) had her first episode after asking for a divorce her husband, who instead he tried to kill her before committing suicide.  With children ages four and nine, Elise was grief stricken and began hallucinating and hearing voices, which were all negative.  She did’t watch TV, she ‘entered’ it.  Once she thought there were people under her floor and not long after that she was admitted to the hospital.  Elise’s sister was crushed when she found out about the illness; she confirms the difficult childhood, distraught and filled with a longing to see her mother and knowing  she couldn’t.  Elise’s daughter (and the granddaughter previously mentioned) talks about her mother’s illness; she noticed at age eleven or twelve, that little things would make her mother mad and have little fits of anger.  She tried to protect her brother but eventually they too found themselves in foster care, shocked and wondering how abandoning mother was going to help.

Schizophrenia is caused by a combination environmental factors and genetic weakness.  Factors that might provoke an onset of schizophrenia are viral infections, malnutrition, problems with pregnancy, and obstetric factors related to birth.  Family environments where emotions are strongly expressed may not cause illness but can affect behaviors.  Main neurological connections are established between the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus during fetal development, and completion of this communication system occurs during adolescence.  Problems occurring during these critical developmental periods can impact the number and quality of neurological connections in these ares of the brain.

Signs of a possible onset of schizophrenia in an adolescent might include a child who has friends and then suddenly withdraws, displays poor hygiene,  or a sudden decrease in academic performance.  Of course these may be normal, developmentally appropriate behaviors but the idea is to consult a doctor regarding marked changes.  It is also important to talk to a child regularly, find out about their world so that the chances of noticing something out of the ordinary are increased.  If their internal world changes, they might not talk about it; the more talking early on, the better chance of catching potential problems early.  Once schizophrenia begins, progression depends on medications used as well as any comorbid conditions.  

Treatment of schizophrenia has changed in the past fifty years when typical antipsychotic medications were used to reduce hallucinations and delusions; however, these usually cause unbearable side effects such as trembling, tremors, stiffness, apathy and passiveness.  Today there is a new line of medications called atypical antipsychotic medications that better balance the frontal cortex and limbic systems to decrease both positive and negative symptoms with less side effects.  Unfortunately, most people suffering from schizophrenia don’t like to take their medications but early treatment of schizophrenia with medication can help.  If the disease is detected within the first year of onset and treated for at least five years, there is a good chance for the person to live a somewhat normal life.  Community support and programs also help people suffering from schizophrenia take their medication consistently and receive support such as the financial and legal assistance available to Richard at St. James.  This type of assistance is not readily available, however, and usually those suffering from the illness receive less than optimal care.

The last story to highlight is about a father is struggling with the fact that his son suffers from schizophrenia.  It pains the father to know that when he walks down the street with his son, he knows his son doesn’t see, feel, or hear the same street as he as his son does a magical, sweeping hand gesture that is somehow supposed to make everything okay.  The father knows he must get rid of the prejudice he has toward his son’s illness.  He knows his son is not a monster or a mad man but he refuses to take medication and doesn’t accept his illness.  Dad tried to take him in after a hospital stay, but it was very awkward and uncomfortable and ultimately did not work out.  Now his son either lives in supervised residences, in a home, or alone.  

People can and do live their lives with this illness.  As previously mentioned, medications sometimes help, social/community support helps, and sometimes family can help.  Sometimes they can’t.  The last time the father saw his son, he said, “Don’t worry about me, Dad.” To which the father replied, “Well, see ya, son.  I’ll forward your mail.”  Today, Marie isn’t yet ready to return to school or work but she does have goals and dreams, which she feels is significant for her.  Elise is optimistic, has improved with medication and treatment and is even trying to work at a volunteer organization when she can.  Richard still hallucinates; sometimes he is afraid to go to sleep because he’s not sure where he will wake up. He wishes that people would treat him like any other person with a handicap; he just wants to breathe his fair share of the air like everyone else.  

‘The aging brain: Through many lives’

 This essay was written for my Abnormal Psychology Course taken on-line through the community college.  This article has some interesting information about overcoming limitations after a stroke, and information about how stem cells may help regenerate brain tissue.   At the end is one of my favorite poems....

PSY-170
Chapter 14 Written Report
Videos on demand, ‘The aging brain: Through many lives’
Quotes: All quotes are from the video unless otherwise noted.

The video walks the consumer through a series of scientific studies and discoveries on the aging brain, which has surprising powers of renewal. Aging does come with a normal slowing down of neurocircuits, and for some people “memory and thinking changes become much more severe as they age” (Ch 14, pg 420). In this video, we learn how scientists have “begun to unlock the secrets of the aging brain”; for starters, neurons are designed to last about 120 years!

A study at the University of Alabama at Birmingham demonstrated the ability of the brain to rebuild circuitry by using patients who have had strokes and lost the use of a limb.  This method of physical therapy has shown amazing results.  Stroke patients are generally told that the use they have of a disabled limb within 6 months to one year of the stroke is as good as it will ever get.  Kent Miller suffered a stroke and lost the use of his left arm and hand.  He was frustrated because he was unable to do the things he used to, from combing his hair to tying his shoes to mowing his lawn.  Like many stroke patients, Kent is struggling with feelings of uselessness.  This study demonstrated that the neurons in injured areas of the brain can recover by overcoming non-use of the limb through repeating use, and over and over and over....  One of the exercises Kent was given was to use his left hand/arm to pick up and flip over a domino; from watching the video one can see it was quite exhausting.  Over time however, he did show improvement in the use of his limb and with repetition of tasks he will continue to see improvements; in this way the brain is like a muscle, the more you use it the better it gets.

The affects of aging begins once our bodies have fully matured; approximately age 20.  Over time, our bodies decline inside and out.  Cognitive effects include memory loss, impaired ability to “recall information after a reminder is given”, frequent forgetfulness, forgetting “how to do simple things like tying a shoe-lace or using a microwave oven”, “trouble learning new tasks”, “the need to repeat oneself or to constantly ask the same question to get information and remember it”, “personality changes, loss of social skills”, and “loss of interest in daily activities” (Ch 14, page 420). However a study at University of California at Irvine found that the same things that work to keep our bodies healthy also work to keep the mind healthy. Physical exercise is at the top of the list because it helps to rejuvenate the brain by “boosting production of vital brain proteins”. The study exercised rats consistently, with a control group that did not exercise; the brains of the rats that exercised had doubled in levels of a protein that help neurons grow in areas “critical to memory”.  In fact, exercise induces many different molecules that keep neurons healthy.  For Stanley Kunitz, the activity is poetry, “What makes the engine go? Desire. Desire. Desire.” As long as you exercise your spirit and your vitality with something that we care about (poetry, art, family, etc.). Another preventative measure is to eat the ‘Mediterranean diet’ consisting of fish, fruit and vegetables with moderate intake of red wine. 

For a long time, neuroscientists have believed that “neurons in a fully developed brain never reproduced themselves and can never be replaced” however, neuroscientists are now studying stem cells, which become more dormant with age, and how they might be used to stimulate the production of new neurons and thus repair damaged brain tissue. In laboratory experiments at Harvard Medical School, researchers first killed many neurons in the brains of mice, then several days later injected stem cells.  Jeffrey Maklis was amazed at the results, “They moved to exactly the right location, they turned into the right kind of neurons, and most strikingly some of them could send long connections to the correct targets.  In other words, they rebuilt circuitry in the brain.”     This research may eventually help people with Parkinson's, a disease that slowly kills neurons in the brain.  The only thing doctors can do at this time for people suffering from Parkinson’s disease is to try to help relieve symptoms such as a stiff body, trembling hands and trouble walking for as long as possible, but death is the eventual outcome of this disease.

Alzheimer's is a disease marked by “impaired ability to plan or organize daily activities, engage in abstract thinking, or understand the sequence of events, such as maneuvering driving turns to get to and from a grocery store”.  It gradually “robs a person of the qualities of being human” due to the “slow and irreversible progression of dementia” (Ch 14, page 424) and there is no way to test for it. Instead diagnosis must be made by examining the patient and interviewing family and friends close to the patient.  Examples of questions asked of family or friends: What has changed? What have you noticed? Do they depend more on you for help than before?  Exam of the patient includes questions to establish whether the person knows what year and month it is, questions about favorite sports teams or significant dates such as birthdays.  All of these help determine whether there is cognitive loss or just normal cognitive signs of aging.

Specific to alzheimer's are tangles and plaque, which scientists first thought were the ‘tombstones’ of the disease only to later realize they are the disease in action. Tangles (neurofibrillary tangles) are caused by neurons (consisting of “a microtubule, or skeleton structure held together by a protein substance called tau”) that have collapsed after twisting and tearing apart, leaving only broken strands. “Fragments from these neurons eventually collect in spheres and other shapes” (Ch 14, page 432).  Plaques (neuritic plaques or beta amyloid) are a sticky protein in the cell that clumps together and attaches itself to a neuron; this causes the brain to react in a protective manner by releasing chemicals to kill the ‘invader’.  Sadly, these chemicals end up destroying the neuron in the process, so the brain is actually killing itself.  Scientists are researching ways to protect tau, by interfering early to prevent the progression of Alzheimer's;  a protein called Pin-1, a known trigger for the formation of tangles, may be able to stop Tao from becoming abnormal.  Another hypothesis scientists are working with is using beta amyloid itself to as part of a vaccine to prevent stickiness and clumping in the first place; in one study, mice vaccinated with Pin-1 showed almost no plaque formations while the control group was riddled with them.  Being able to use this type of treatment on humans will obviously take some time, but discoveries like those covered in the video give us hope for a cure.

Finally, weaved throughout the video were parts of a poem dictated by Stanley Kunitz (included below) who is 95 at the time of the filming is still writing and reading poetry. One fan, obviously a doctor, says to Stanley, “If all of my patients were like you I’d be starving.”  Stanley stated that his poetry is his exercise of the soul at what keeps his mind young.  When asked for advice for those who don’t write poetry, he offers, “To care about life, to care about others, to remain active. For example you plant a seed, you cultivate the soil, you watch it flower; you’re participating in an ancient ritual of life itself”.  If you pay attention when watching the video, selected phrases from the poem subtly introduce the coming segment.


The Layers
BY STANLEY KUNITZ

I have walked through many lives,
some of them my own,
and I am not who I was,
though some principle of being
abides, from which I struggle
not to stray.
When I look behind,
as I am compelled to look
before I can gather strength
to proceed on my journey,
I see the milestones dwindling
toward the horizon
and the slow fires trailing
from the abandoned camp-sites,
over which scavenger angels
wheel on heavy wings.
Oh, I have made myself a tribe
out of my true affections,
and my tribe is scattered!
How shall the heart be reconciled
to its feast of losses?
In a rising wind
the manic dust of my friends,
those who fell along the way,
bitterly stings my face,
Yet I turn, I turn,
exulting somewhat,
with my will intact to go
wherever I need to go,
and every stone on the road
precious to me.
In my darkest night,
when the moon was covered
and I roamed through wreckage,
a nimbus-clouded voice
directed me:
“Live in the layers,
not on the litter.”
Though I lack the art
to decipher it,
no doubt the next chapter
in my book of transformations
is already written.
I am not done with my changes.