A psychologist is born!

After starting on this journey pretty much exactly 10 years ago, it officially happened on Friday 20.02.2015.  I got my Masters degree in psychology, which now makes me a psychologist.  It's still hard to believe that I am actually finished... at least with the academic part of my quest.  Much more lies ahead, but for now this is a BIG step in the right direction.

Like at the Oscars, there is someone to thank for this and herewith I would like to thank my wonderful husband, without whom this would not have been possible.  Jack, thank you so much for all of your support throughout the years, encouraging me to keep going when I was ready to give up, giving me the time and opportunity to do my studies and believing that I can do it.  You are the best!  Ever!

Immigration more risky for small children?

Apparently latest research claims that immigration at a young age is associated with an increased risk of psychotic disorder such as schizophrenia. Furthermore, "those who immigrated when under the age of five had a twofold higher risk than those who immigrated at age 10-14 years, and a threefold higher risk than those who immigrated as adults." Pretty interesting finding. I always thought that the younger one is, the better he/she adapts... but I suppose adaptation and mental health are not identical things. Hmmm... something to ponder on.

Can you do better?

This is my entry card to uni. It's by far the coolest one I've ever had. Even the IBM entry cards were just pure boring white. Can anyone say that they have a better one?

Academic future of the great-to-be psychologist

It has been a while since we posted here. Mainly due to extreme lack of time. Jack has gotten a new project at work that keeps him busy days, evenings and weekends. I have been busy organising my future academic life and various things around the flat (to be reported in due course). And Tim has been busy being Tim - growing himself, growing teeth, practising walking and running, making sure his opinion is heard loud and clear and generally being cute :)

I haven't been accepted into masters at my old uni because my average score wasn't perfect. So I had the option of either waiting a year and re-applying, giving me an advantage of having two Wartesemester (semesters where you wait for a place and don't study in the meantime, which somehow gives you a competitive advantage) or applying for a course at a paid university. The problem with the first option was that there's no guarantees that I'll get a place next year. Additionally I was hoping to use this year of waiting to get some work experience, but for most work-experience places it turns out that you need to be a student to be able to do it. Because if you're a student you can't sue your employer for not paying you a cent - normal German practice. Finding a paid placement for someone with a Bachelor of Psych is next to impossible since there isn't actually much you can do with this degree as it is.

Thus as of next week I'm going to study at International Psychoanalytic University doing a Master of Arts in Psychology. Unfortunately it costs an arm and a leg, but for that I don't have to wait a year. It also looks like the education that I'll get there might just be a little bit better than what the previous university was able to offer me - smaller class sizes, better facilities, what-looks-like lecturers who are a little bit more interested in teaching rather than just doing their research. The other upside is that it's in the centre, so it cuts my travel time by about 20 mins and I can also get there on my bike riding through central park.

We'll see. I don't want to get my expectations too high to avoid being too disappointed, but so far it's looking good.

Последний Звонок (The final bell)

Yesterday I had my final exam. The very last exam of my Bachelor of Psychology. I still have to submit two essays before end of July, but I don't have to go to uni for that anymore... so that part of it is over. Wow - hard to believe that I actually managed to get through it. I definitely couldn't have done it without Jack helping me and supporting me all through these years and also without Mum being here to help with Timmy this semester.

Unfortunately my grade average is not brilliant, so I haven't been able to get into the Clinical Psych masters that I wanted to. Sadly at the time of application I didn't have my very final mark ('cos that was still before I finished the subjects I was doing now), so it might've been better if the marks I get now will be good *fingers crossed* But I had two interviews for two other masters (one in Social, Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience and another in Work and Organisational Psychology). I am yet to hear the results of those interviews and whether I got a place. And I'm still to decide if I'll take the place even if I was offered one, because it's not exactly what I want to be doing in the long run... and investing another two years into doing something that's not exactly what I want to do - is a question.

Either way I have a pretty good plan for next year if I don't get into masters... and that is to get some work experience working as closely as possible with a professional psychologist and people with mental disorders. Have to see what will be possible there. And then I'll reapply again next year for Clinical Psych masters, as the Humboldt university and university of Potsdam, which are not offering masters at all this year, should be offering them then as well.

So there you have it - Polina is one step closer to her dream job :)

Birthday, Kitas, Bedarfsplanung, 37 weeks and peekaboo!

Jack on his birthday :)

It's been a while since the last post. We've been crazily busy. With my summer semester quickly approaching we've been looking for a kindergarten for Timmy. So far with very little luck. You might think we're slack for living it to the last minute. Well I'll tell you that's not quite right. While I was still pregnant Jack went and looked at a bunch of kindergartens (or Kitas, as they're called here) and we got Tim onto waiting lists at two of them, for April 2011 as the starting time. We regularly called/emailed these kindergartens to make sure that they know we still need a place. Normally the intake happens in August, as older kids move onto school, and new groups are formed. We knew this before but got told that if someone moves or takes their child out of the group in the middle of the year, then we'll get a spot. Well nothing of the sort has happened, so we don't have a place for April. And now they're not even promising us a spot from August. Over the last two weeks I've called probably around 30 kindergartens in our area, further out, and even around my uni. No luck. We're now on about 5-6 waiting lists for August, but nothing for April. There might be a chance at a new Russian/German Kita, but they won't know until end of March and it's also about an hour away from us on public transport, "kind of" on the way to my uni and Jack's work, but that trip door to door (ie. home -> Kita -> work/uni) will take about 1.5 hours one way. Not so fun! So yeah - that's been a big pain in the butt.

Another thing that I recently discovered is that Berlin (and a number of other states) has a limited amount of doctors clinics that's regulated by the public health insurance authority. In other words you can't just finish studying your psych degree or medical degree and open private practice. The only way to come to own one is when someone else retires/sells, or if they lift the restriction on the number of clinics. And there are huge waiting lists for both options. This is petty rediculous, considering that people wait sometimes years to get into therapy. So naturally the prospect of studying for 8 years and then not be able to do what I want is not that shiny brilliant. At the moment I'm looking at what job opportunities will there be at the end of my study overall, but so far it's not looking great.

Timmy is growing. We're at 37 weeks now. He's 9 kgs and very much enjoying his solids. He's eating so well that recently I've been forgetting to breastfeed him. He has also started sleeping in his own room. We have converted the small room into a nursery and he seems to like it. He's been loving his swimming classes and even doesn't mind diving. Well, diving is not really exactly what he's doing, but either Jack or myself dunking him into the water. Some babies in the group are already starting to be able to kind of swim by themselves. It's pretty cool.

One thing that's been worrying us a little is that he's not showing any desire to crawl yet. He's rolling over fine and kind of does circular rolling when on his belly, but no getting up on his knees yet. He's also not showing any desire to "talk" yet - so no "bababa or dadada". So in the start of Feb we're going to our paediatrician and she's going to do a proper check of his development. Apart from not reaching these milestones he's his usual happy and bubbly self, so on that front I'm not worried, but still need reassurance that everything is fine.

Some photos from the last couple of weeks...

Tim has also finally started getting interested in peekaboo :)

Another example of obviously useless research

Impulsive Behavior in Males Increases After Periods of Heavy Drinking

Amazing - who would've thought?!

I am getting old and it's a good thing

Read this article which claims that people get happier as they get older. One part of it really struck a cord with me: "As people get older, they're more aware of mortality... So when they see or experience moments of wonderful things, that often comes with the realization that life is fragile and will come to an end. But that's a good thing. It's a signal of strong emotional health and balance." This is exactly the way I began to feel after Tim was born. Perhaps this means that my emotional health is getting stronger and I have more balance in my life? hmmmm

Boys keep marriages together?

anInteresting article... Do Daughters Cause Divorce?

Need to read more on the topic to be able to actually form an opinion, but if the statistic is true (parents of 3 girls and 10% more likely to divorce, than parents of 3 boys)... it would be interesting to know why.

Being a Russian protects me from depression?

Interesting and somewhat surprising read: Brooding Russians: Less Distressed Than Americans

Apparently Russians can distance themselves better from negative feelings, even though they brood more over their problems. Hmmm... I wonder how true this really is...

More useless research

"Socioeconomic Stresses Could Lower Life Expectancy, Researcher Says" - really?! sounds pretty obvious to me...

Midweek Reflections

Right now all of us (ie. myself + 0.5, Banjo and Unix) have confined ourselves in the study, because we have workers demolishing part of the lounge room. Well, to be fair, they're demolishing with the goal to fix, as there has been cold air coming from one of the walls and we suspect that there might actually be a hole in the outer wall. We have to be grateful to our body corporate for speedily arranging this, as in minus temperatures in winter it is less than optimal. Ahhh - the wonders of high-rise construction :)

Unix is hiding under the couch, and Banjo in the corner behind a bookshelf. Poor kittens... they are very stressed and haven't eaten anything and both are sitting curled up with their eyes wide open trying to work out what all the strange and loud noises are. The baby is also demonstrating his disapproval, by kicking in every possible direction. I am the lucky one with ear plugs... the bliss!

In the meantime, despite all the drilling, hammering and crunching noises, I finished the first draft of my bachelor thesis. I'm meeting with my supervisor on Monday - see what he says. Overall I think it's not too bad, but the statistical analysis hasn't really provided that many eye-opening results. Although I did find that older soviet migrants are significantly lonelier than older Germans... I just can't seem to figure out why - no predictor variables seem to be significant. May be it has nothing to do with social networks (which is what my theory is)... oh well - we'll see.

Stating the obvious

I have a lot of respect for psychologists. As such I wouldn't be studying it, if I didn't. But I do think that some of the research that gets done these days is really unnecessary, because it really does point out simply the very obvious things. Like this article Serious Emotional Disturbances Found Among Children After Katrina. I mean - isn't that really obvious?! To me it's like saying - people who survived the Holocaust had various emotional disturbances afterwards. Isn't it more interesting, and perhaps useful to look at how these can be avoided, or minimised, or what therapy methods work best during crisis situations and thereafter. Simply stating that - yeah, some kids were disturbed after seeing their homes destroyed and dead bodies floating on the streets, doesn't really do much, does it?

The oldest old and the Tummy Tub

We're doing 'psychological disorders of ageing' this week in clinical psych. Here's a curious little quote from the textbook* that I found very inspiring: "When researchers have studied people over 95 years of age - often called the "oldest old" - they have been surprised to learn that these individuals are on average more healthy, clear-headed, and agile than those in their 80s and early 90s. Although some certainly experience cognitive declines, more than half remain perfectly alert. Many of the oldest old are, in fact, still employed, sexually active, and able to enjoy the outdoors and the arts."

* Comer R. J. (2010). Abnormal Psychology. 7th Ed. Worth Publishers; New York.

On a completely unrelated note, I was looking through a 'baby-stuff' catalogue last night, and came across what Jack and I thought was the funniest and weirdest thing - the Tummy Tub Bathing-Bucket. It is "das Babybad, in dem sich Ihr Nachwuchs sicher und geborgen fühlt. Ein Entspannungsbad mit vielen Vorteilen für Mutter und Kind. Ihr Baby ist bis zu den Schultern im Wasser und friert nicht. Sie halten Ihr Baby nur leicht am Köpfchen fest und es nimmt sofort eine embryonale Haltung wie im Mutterleib ein. Babys mit Schlafstörungen werden entspannter und ruhiger." (Engl. "the baby bath where your children feel safe and secure. A relaxing bath with many benefits for mother and child. Your baby is up to the shoulders in water and doesn't freeze. You hold your baby only slightly on the head and it immediately assumes the embryonic position as in the womb. Babies with sleep disorders are more relaxed and calmer.")

Need I say more? I mean apart from the fact that the whole thing just looks weird, the idea that you just hold your baby by the HEAD?! And of course babies become calmer and more relaxed - they're afraid you're going to drown them in that bloody thing! Oh... and the woman in the picture really looks like one mean and crazy mummy.

I love buses

I am reading a chapter on anxiety, and came across some interesting things that I thought I'd share.

The probability to:

- be killed on your next bus ride is 1 in 500 million
- die as a result of a collision between an asteroid and the earth is 1 in 500 000 (this made me think whether that's actually true, and I came across this page, which makes this seem true indeed)
- die in a tsunami is 1 in 500 000
- drown in a bathtub is 1 in 685 000

So - it is more probable to die from a tsunami, than drown in your own bathtub. And buses are super safe - unless an asteroid falls on top.

Also some more interesting forms of phobias, that I have not yet mentioned on this blog:

• Gamophobia - fear of marriage
• Phobophobia - fear of being afraid
• Hedonophobia - fear of pleasure

Life trauma, Crisis, Depression

Such was the topic of the conference I went to on the weekend. The main topic underlying the somewhat tragic title was suicide, and suicide prevention. This was the first conference I went to, not counting the time when back in high school I came with Mum to Sydney to some sort of art history conference, but spent most of my time exploring Sydney and much less time being interested in all the presentations.

The conference was very interesting. There were a lot of different topics, and even one whole part dedicated to my two favourite topics of immigration and the elderly and the associated rate of suicide. Here are some (what I think) interesting facts that I took away with me:

GENDER DIFFERENCES

• women are 2-3 times more at risk of depression than men
• every 5th man, and every 3rd woman will suffer from depression at least once in their life
• men have a 3 times higher suicide rate than women
• women have 3 times higher rate of suicide attempts than men
• preventative programs (against suicide) work on about 90% of women, but almost never on men
• marriage or having a loving partner works as a protective mechanism against depression and suicide for men (that's why a lot of men can't get over the loss of their partners - rate of suicide amongst older men is much higher than in older women - see below), but for women, children (not partner) seem to be that protective mechanism
  

ELDERLY

• older men (men over 60 y.o.) have a 5 times higher rate of suicide than same aged women
• only 7% of people who call crisis hotlines are people over 60 y.o.
• out of 9402 suicides in Germany in 2008, 3993 were by people over 60 y.o. (2790 men, 1203 women)- that's almost 43% - however the number of preventative programs for older people is significantly less than for younger people, because suicide amongst the elderly is more accepted than that in young people
• the rate of suicide dramatically increases after 80 y.o.
• flexibility to changing life circumstances, acceptance of help, social support systems play a protective role

DEPRESSION AND SUICIDE

• in all people who get depression, in 85-100% it is likely to reoccur at some point in their lives
• of all people who get depressed, 12% have depression that lasts longer than 2 years
• out of all people who commit suicide, 60% suffered from depression (perhaps not so surprising... the interesting thing would be to look at the other 40% and see what was the underlying condition there)
• people with unipolar depression are more at risk of getting cardiovascular diseases
• people who have bipolar depression have a higher rate of diabetes than in general population
• 50% of people with anxiety disorders develop depression
• 340 million of people in the world suffer from depression

IMMIGRATION AND SUICIDE

• after immigration, the risk of suicide dramatically increases 10 years after arrival
• according to WHO, in Russia, 70.6 men (per 100 000 people) commit suicide, compared to 11.9 women (compared to 21.2 men, 5.1 women in Australia; and 20.2 men, 7.3 women in Germany)
• amongst migrants the rate of suicide is much higher in the second generation migrants than in the first
• in Germany the highest rate of suicide is amongst young Turkish women
• in Berlin, 23.45% of total population are migrants... out of these 40.7% are under 18 y.o.
• education seems to be one of the more important protective factors against suicide - along with religion, tradition, family and being able to speak the local language
• the rate of suicide amongst migrants reflects the rate of suicide in the country of origin (ie. the rate of suicide amongst Russian migrants in Germany reflects the rate of suicide in Russia)

YOUTH AND SUICIDE

• in Germany, 10% of young men, and 20% of young women have suicidal thoughts
  
• 10.1% of young men and 19.9% of young women physically harm themselves (eg. cut their arms, etc.)
• in 90% of cases of physical harm, suicidal thoughts, or suicide attempts, the parents have no idea
• in the USA, suicide is the most common cause of death amongst 10-19 y.o.

The very first presentation was about a British singer and songwriter Nick Drake, who committed suicide when he was 26. If you don't know his music (and to my shame I didn't before this presso), it's amazingly good :)

On Age

This semester we're doing developmental psychology, which for the commoners among you means "the scientific study of systematic psychological changes that occur in human beings over the course of the life span." (thanks Wikipedia). As part of this course I've taken a seminar on successful aging, which is something that has interested me for the last couple of years.

I have to do a presentation in this seminar, and the topic I picked is "layman's ideas on what successful aging is". So far I've read five different studies and here are some findings that I thought were very interesting (I am not going to give direct quotes, because they won't make sense without also giving all the statistical data, which will take ages, so I'm just going to summarise in my own words):

• most people over the age of 65 consider themselves as ageing well or very well, and most report being actually happy
  
• people who are miserable in their old age are usually so due to a physical impairment, which prevents them from doing things. This is not as self-explanatory as it sounds though... a lot of people even in wheelchairs are happy and see their wheelchair not as an obstacle, but as something that actually helps them move and be independent. So the people who are not happy are the ones who are either completely bed-ridden, or haven't found anything positive in their situation.
• 40% of people, having reached "old age" found it to be better than what they expected (as in what they expected it to be when they were still younger); with 52% saying that their earlier (younger) perception of "old age" hasn't changed, and 8% said it was worse.
• people who keep mentally active in their older years are a lot less likely to suffer from dementia
  
• physical appearance is still important in old age. This was interesting, because many young people think that older people don't really care about what they look like, or don't try to look attractive.
  
• being happy in old age does not only depend on being healthy, but on many other factors, such as financial status (having enough money), being able to do things for oneself, and one of the very important aspects is having social relationships and being able to help others.
• even quite a few people with chronic conditions were happy in their old age, as they were able to find things (compensate) which they were able to do instead and take pleasure from that, rather than looking at things that they couldn't do anymore.
• when asked what age would be the "ideal" age, most people considered middle age to be the best age.
  
• Men and women understand what it means to be "successfully ageing" in identical terms, and there is no great difference in gender and how happy they are in their old age
• even though in general our bodies don't function as well in older years, cognitive losses are reversible... so we don't have to forget things "forever"... with training we can still do calculus even if we're 90

The reason I find all this so interesting, is that for some time now I've been thinking about what it will be like to be old. Of course it worries me, and makes me wonder whether I'll be happy or how not to be scared of it. But reading all this really opened my eyes onto the fact that the majority of old people are actually quite happy, even in the cases of those who are very ill. A lot of people found old age to be better than what they expected. On top of that something that we always talked about in my immediate family is that cognitive function is very important in order to prevent dementia and not to be "out of it" - and now I have some "scientific proof" that this indeed is the case. So really being old doesn't sound all that different to being young... it sounds like it's just about adapting to what life throws at you, and taking things as they come. Ahhh... I think I still have a lot to learn :)

"One of the many things nobody ever tells you about middle age is that it's such a nice change from being young." Dorothy Canfield



For fear of breaching copyright, here is the list of articles where my summaries are from :) ...

1. Rowe, Kahn "Successful Aging" 1997, The Gerontological Society of America
2. Knight, Ricciardelli "Successful Aging: Perceptions of adults aged between 70 and 101 years" 2003, Aging and Human Development
3. Charbonneau-Lyons, et. al. "Opinions of college students and independent-living adults regarding successful aging" 2002, Educational Gerontology
4. Phelan, et. al. "Older Adults' Views of "Successful Aging" - How do they compare with Researchers' Definitions?" 2004, JAGS
5. Bowling "Lay perceptions of successful ageing: findings from a national survey of middle aged and older adults in Britain" 2006, Eur J Ageing
   

Shrinkery and Beyond

Some of you were asking me what it is that I'm studying in psychology these days... and I thought I'd share some amusing things with you.

First of all, after reading the chapter in the textbook on Personality and Abnormal Psychology I diagnosed myself with all of the following disorders:

• Obsessive-compulsive disorder (symptoms exhibited by the patient (AKA me) - "Forbidden, aggressive, perverse sexual thoughts, images or impulses; Concern with household items; Concern with environmental toxins")
• Antisocial personality disorder (symptoms - "Failure to conform to standards of decency")
• Mania (symptoms - "Wild, exuberant, unrealistic activity unprecipitated by environmental events")

Oh well - who am I kidding - my great auntie died of schizophrenia - why am I any better?!

And just in case you have a fear and don't' know what's the technical term for it, here are some of my favourites:

1. Ailurophobia - Fear of cats
2. Belonophobia - Fear of needles
3. Nyctophobia - Fear of darkness
4. Siderophobia - Fear of railways
5. Syphilophobia - Fear of syphilis
6. Taphophobia - Fear of being buried alive
7. Triskaidekaphobia - Fear of Thirteen

Keep rockn' you lot!!!

Piaget - it's French for very smart

Chilrden begin masking their emotions at the age of 6 and up... it's called 'dislpay roles'. These can be pro-social or self-protective. And it goes together with Piaget's constructivist theory. Here is my psychology summary for the week.

Denis is here... well I haven't seen him yet but he's in town... yesssss... the two weeks of drinking are about to being .... yeeeee-haaaaa!