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Show UVU REVIEW OPINIONS A6 Wingmen forever • Addiction takes the brother of a UVU student By Sean Stoker Staff Writer @theroyalthey I come from a mixed family. My parents both had kids from prior marriages before they married each other and had me, rounding our family out with a rambunctious lot of nine kids. During my mother's pregnancy with me, my oldest brother Jason was livid that his dad had made a baby with this new woman, Jason's stepmom. Though Jason would eventually warm up to her, at that time the prospect of sharing a blood relative with his stepmom seemed somehow unfair in a way only a teenager could justify. All this changed however when he met me, an eight-pound baby that melted his black, little heart. He took to calling me "Fatboy," a term of endearment that would last for years. While I was growing up, we did nearly everything together—he toted me around as his pint-sized wingman. I vividly remember being five-yearsold and sitting on his lap as we drove through the neighborhood. He even let me steer. Around that time I began referring to him as "my favorite brother," a title he wore as a badge of honor. As my favoritism was unwittingly offending my other brothers, my parents asked me to refrain from playing favorites, though I would still occasionally whisper in his ear, "Don't tell anyone, but you're still my favorite!" For as long as I could remember, Jason was a smoker. He tried for years to get the nicotine monkey off his back, but eventually just settled on e-cigs, which, while probably a bit better than old-fashioned Camels, was still an addiction. It wasn't until my teen years that I found out that cigarettes were just the tip of the iceberg. I learned that when I was younger, Jason had habitually abused prescription drugs, weed, cocaine, heroin and basically whatever he could get his hands on to dull the pain of losing his biological mother and a host of other demons he battled daily. Luckily, I was assured that he was on the way back, and that tobacco and alcohol were the last two monkeys of the veritable troop that had once hung upon his back. Near the end of 2011 while snowboarding Jason went over a rise in the hill to find that two men were standing and chatting in the middle of the slope WINGMEN A7 Therapy, it actually helps Therapy can help anyone cope with the struggles of everyday life By Michael Houck Staff Writer mikehouck0604@hotmail.com For people with social anxiety, every day situations can be incrediblly stressful and overwelming. This can hinder daily life. PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY LAURA FOX Social anxiety, bullying and the Wolverine Society anxiety disorder affects a large number of the population, including students By Brittany M. Plothow Opinions Editor @brittanyplo Most people don't view a simple hallway as a terrifying and overwhelming thing. I do. Whether it be overcrowded with bodies or almost entirely empty, it is equally crushing and paralyzing. This is what it is like to have social anxiety disorder. As long as I can remember, I have been uncomfortable in large buildings with or without large groups of people. By the time I was in high school, it was disastrous. My high school experience made everything worse. I was bullied in high school. When I was 16, through various events, I changed my entire group of friends. The ANXIETY A8 Normally I don't mention my therapy or bring it up unless I think talking about my personal experience would help in some way. So when I got the email from my editor that the next issue of the Review was going to focus about different school anxieties, I thought my experience with going through therapy would help readers understand it is not a bad thing to go through. First let me talk about why I even went to therapy to start with. Back in my freshman year of high school I was asocial. I went back in my freshman yearbook to remember how alone I was, and I only had about seven to nine signatures. Along with being asocial, I was failing my classes, probably got detention once a week and just got depressed. It was such a struggle to get through the day at school that all I wanted to do was to retreat back home to play my video games, to hide away. Unfortunately, it just got worse when I got home with my dad and I fighting about all these problems. The more I look back I realize he tried to help me but not in the right ways. He tried to get me involved with sports, went through my studies with me, wanted me to stop playing so many video games and tried to make sure I was in line. His trying to help it made us fight more. When I tried sports I felt more insecure with my weight, and I wasn't athletic. When we studied we just argued more when I didn't get the subject. I still secretly played more video games, and I just in trouble more often. After months of us trying to deal with this by alone, my parents decided it was time to go see a therapist. I didn't really want to go see a therapist, I thought that people that do were considered crazy or troubled. I didn't want that label on me along with the "weird loner kid" label that I had in school. We went for a couple visits, twice a week. I wasn't really open at first, and I didn't want to talk at all. I figured if it stopped the fighting at home, I would go through it. After a few months of giving the therapist the whole "rebel teenager" act, something traumatic happened to me during the summer. In front of the Energy Solu- THERAPY A8 |