Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS)

So for my free write for this week I wanted to talk about something special to me. I mentioned in a previous blog that I had a disease that makes me gain weight, no matter how healthy I eat or how much I work out. I wanted to take some time spread some awareness about my Disease that not many know about and no one really likes to talk about.  The disease I have is called Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS). This is an endocrine disorder or in simple laymen terms a hormone imbalance. This makes it extremely difficult to lose weight, because my body doesn’t process food like everyone else. It also has a lot of other side effects as well and sometimes side effects from weight gain. Some women with PCOS can grow facial hair (and I am talking lady with a beard in a circus), your hair can fall out and get what’s known as male pattern baldness. But what seems to hit most women the hardest is it also makes conceiving a child extremely difficult if not nearly impossible.  One and four women have PCOS and most don’t even know they have it. It can affect your time of the month and either make you not have a period or constantly have a period. Either way neither of those option are fun. Most of the side effects I have said show on the outside, but it effects the inside too. You can get things like heart disease and diabetes, painful cysts on your ovaries, and so many other things. I really wanted to talk about this more because so many people just see a fat person and assume they are fat because they eat too much and they don’t know healthy food, or they don’t work out and they are just lazy. Now don’t get me wrong I’m not trying to be the PC police and say stop fat shaming I’m just saying to be educated on what some fat people may be going through. This Disease has made me gain nearly 75 ponds in the last 3 years. But not only did I have to struggle with weight gain I also have to deal with that I may never have children of my own. And anyone who knows me knows this is very important to me and has been a dream of mine since I was a very young girl to have my own children. It’s because of this is why I decide to have weight loss surgery. I needed something else to help kick start my weight loss. Because nothing I did worked. Its has been 12 days today since I had my surgery and for the first time in over three years the scale is finally going down and not up. I’ve lost 14 pounds. And some people may think that weight loss surgery is the easy way out let me reassure you it is the furthers from easy. This is by far one of the most difficult things I have ever done. It is challenging mentally, emotionally, and physically. For the rest of my life the most food I can consume in a setting is no more than ¾ of a cup. The first month after surgery you feel like your starving, literally. You’re on a pure liquid diet for the first three weeks after surgery. Trust me there is only so much soup someone can eat before they lose their mind and want something else. And that leads to the emotional have you ever cried because you were so hungry but you couldn’t eat! Yea it’s hard and the pain after surgery is just crazy, I have never felt anything like it! But in the end it is worth it those 14 pounds I’ve lost and the possibility that I have helped increase my odds for having children is worth all the pain and tears.

Well thanks for stopping by

Tammie 

Interview Your Boss

I have two dream jobs at the university which is why I chose to intern here at ASU.  One being a provost or a Dean of student affairs and the other is an advisor. I know they are drastically different but in a way they have a lot of similarities mostly the interaction they have with students.  From my very first blog I have said I really like working with students. This to me is really a dream job so since I also am a student work here in the college I have always worked closely with adviser and picked their brain on how I could become one. Since I have for a while been talking to many advisers here in the college I wanted to go for the provost of the downtown campus. The Assistant Dean of Students and Down Phoenix Campus Dean of Students is Dr. Ronald Briggs and unfortunately I wasn’t able to meet with him recently. However over the summer in my previous student worker job I was able to work with him some and I actually had an opportunity to talk to him about how he got to where he is today. During the conversation I had with him we talked a lot about his education and what degrees he had why he chose them and how they helped in becoming an Assistant Dean of Students. We talked about While he was an under grad he was a student worker just like me he worked in housing, and said that was what really kick started his career in academia. Although we never got around to what his under graduate degree was he did say if you plan on going to graduate school, that your bachelor’s degree doesn’t really matter pre-say. It matter that you have it just not what you have it in.  He went on to discuss that he got his Masters in higher education and went on to get his Ed.D. He said to be any kind of Dean at a University you must have some sort of doctoral degree, and the Ed.D. is an education doctorate which the slight difference is the Ed.D. is a terminal degree. What that means that you can’t become a 10 year professor and do research. It is meant strictly for people who want to work in the administrative side of academics. At the time of our conversation I hadn’t made up my mind about what Master’s degree I wanted. Most people I talked to said I should just get M.Ed. but I wasn’t sold on it. What if for some reason I didn’t always want to work in education, my degree would be pointless and I wouldn’t be able to get a job. In the conversation I asked Dr. Briggs what he thought would be better for me and my journey. I told him I was thinking of the M.Ed. and the MPA. I explained to him that I wanted the MPA more because if for some reason I didn’t want to work in the academic setting any more I could get a job elsewhere with the MPA more so then the M.Ed. He said I was on the right track, that yes the M.Ed. is a good degree for working in higher ed but the MPA would allow me to work the same position as well as outside of the university setting as well. I asked him then if I would still be able to the Ed.D. from the MPA, he told me of another student within our college that got his MPA and is now working on his Ed.D, and has very similar aspirations as I do, so yes it was very possible. That conversation with Dr. Briggs is what made me decided to get my MPA and although some other things that I want to do have changed since that conversation it still made a huge impact on my education and what decision I have made about what degrees I want to pursue.  

Leadership in the work place

Leadership played a big role with my internship and with the people I work with. We all have to have leadership skills. My supervisor for my internship was also running a summer program called Young African Leaders which is a grant run project that was given to us by president Obama. So before that started my supervisor and I sat down and she gave me a task list. It was my job to get all of it done with little to no help from her. At times it really sucked because I had never done anything like this but at the same time it did teach me great leadership skills and really how to just take inactive and trust my gut feelings on things.  

As for everyone in the office, we all have to pretty much be leaders. No one really watches over us or tells us what to do. We all know that we have tasks that need to be completed and we have to get them done because if we don’t students could not get dropped from classes on time or added to class late. Or maybe some people may need help with finical aid. We deal with some many things in the office of student affairs that we have to be on top of our stuff all of the time. 

New Job

To keep my theme of good and exciting news going for this set of blog posts I wanted to share that upon my return to work I will be starting a new job as the receptionist for the School of Public Affairs. I am so excited for the new opportunity because I love serving our college and I am planning on getting my masters degree from here.

Career Services

In preparation for the job opportunity in the School of Public Affairs I had career services help me overhaul and update my resume. I would say that the experience was helpful as I ended up getting the job that I wanted. My next goal is to find full time employment at the university.

The Best College Experience Yet

I am very happy to share that a few nights ago I got an email from the office of the president asking me to share my story about the experience I've had at ASU and what this university means to me at an even geared toward encouraging underprivileged youth to attend college. I was so honored to be chosen for such an occasion because it's all I've ever wanted from my time here to show how much ASU means to me and share my love and passion for being a Sun Devil with others. It gets even better because I get to have lunch with President Crow and several top CEOs and political leaders. I am so grateful for the experience so I wanted to share it on my blog.

Finally Got My Surgery

So my blogs are going to be very short tonight as I had surgery earlier today.  Unfortunately Ive been super busy trying to get things in order for this surgery that I had to put my blogs on the back burner. My spelling might not be so great because I'm on pain medication and in lots of pain but I wanted to get them done! Today I got the lap-band procedure which was a big step in my life because I've been transforming ever since I started my college journey. I have a disease that makes me gain weight and although I eat healthy I can lose weight. So a while back I made the decision to undergo weight loss surgery because I want my outside to be representative of the woman I have become on the inside.