Blog #4

Since beginning this course roughly a month ago, I feel like I have grown drastically as person.  For the last reading assignment I chose AIDS Memoirs and I found it to be a compelling.  It is the diary of a mother who finds out she is HIV positive after having a hysterectomy.  Her life from that point is turned upside-down.  Before this course, I never really thought of HIV/AIDS apart from the symptoms or the social stigmas attached to it.  The mother tells of her money troubles from paying her extensive medical bills, her problems at work, and her difficulties breaking the news to her family.  Seeing how someone's life can change so drastically has made me question how I am living my life and some of the decisions I make.  I also felt like the QOTW this week was a very interesting one as well.  It really put into perspective the possibility of having HIV/AIDS in college, and having partners and close friends finding out.  I thought this would absolutely ruin my life, unless I either moved to another university or graduated.  

This disease scares the crap out of me, honestly.  I really cannot imagine my life with the disease, so I try not to.  I feel like it is easy to sympathize with others like the character in my book or hypothetical situations like we deal with in our assignments.  I don't think anybody can fully empathize until it happens to them.  All I can do now is try to educate myself as much as possible and make the right decisions regarding the disease.  I usually put it into the back of my mind after I finish the assignments or write these blogs, but it really does affect me while it is fresh in my mind.  This is a serious disease and I am so thankful I have HIV free.  Yet there are a few more months of learning left in the semester I am sure I'll be an HIV/AIDS expert by the time our final grades come out!

DID YOU KNOW....

While searching for my fun fact for the week I came across some interesting ones dealing with a HIV positive mother giving the disease to their newborn baby.  This was also fresh in my mind after reading the novel for the book report assignment.  What are the chances?

"What is the likelihood that an HIV positive mother will transmit her HIV infection to her newborn baby, if the mother does not receive any anti-retroviral therapy?"

---->>25%. If women receive a combination of anti-retroviral therapies during pregnancy, the risk of HIV transmission to the newborn baby drops to below two percent. (HIV and Women 2009)

"Which factor does not increase the likelihood that an HIV positive mother will transmit her infection to her newborn child?"

---->>Delivery by Cesarean section. A delivery by Cesarean section decreases the risk for HIV transmission to the newborn, and is strongly recommend for HIV positive mothers with high viral loads. HIV is transmitted by breast milk, and for that reason HIV positive mothers should bottle feed their infants. (HIV and Women 2009)

I thought there would be a 100% chance since the child grows inside the infected mother's body? You learn something new everyday!

source: HIV and Women. 2009.  Retrieved September 30th, 2009 from http://www.funtrivia.com/en/subtopics/HIV-and-Women-187490.html

Blog #3

Just like last week, I will start off with a little UCF Men's Soccer recap of the past week and upcoming week.  We played in the UCF Fall Classic 2 this past weekend, losing to Houston Baptist University 2-1 and beating Manhattan College 2-1 on Sunday.  Tomorrow we travel to FAU to play and travel to Memphis to play our first conference game of our season.  It's going to be a big week!  Also, Michael Jordan and Patrick Ewing were both on the UCF campus yesterday!  Some of my teammates got to meet them, but I wasn't so lucky.  

But thinking about these two basketball legends got me to thinking about another basketball professional... one who is HIV positive...Magic Johnson!

Magic Johnson is probably one of the most well known professional athletes who is living with HIV today.  Although he has been living with HIV for over fifteen years, you wouldn't know it by looking at him.  He looks very healthy and doesn't look too affected by the virus at all. Johnson has been such a vital role in supporting HIV research along creating numerous charities to aid in promoting healthy HIV living.  I can recall that he was the first person I could ever remember that was infected with HIV.  My dad was talking all about it that day when he announced it to the world.  Also being a professional athlete, it really changed the sport and other sports.

Did you know??

-Johnson's HIV announcement to the world ranked as 7th in ESPN's top moments of the last 25 years (Magic Johnson, 2009)

Magic Johnson.  2009.  Taken from wikipedia.com.  Retrieved September 23, 2009 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Johnson.

Well since my last post, I've had a pretty eventful week.  We had a game against Jacksonville University (my hometown) and we tied 0-0, to our dismay.  It was a hard fought game and it was raining like crazy so it wasn't that bad.  We have a home tournament this weekend with games this Friday night and Sunday morning, so come support us if you can! 

Sorry, had to throw this in...

My topic of research for the week has been HIV in sports, by recommendation from Teach.  I really didn't know what my topic was going to be, so this suggestion seemed perfect for me.  While surfing the internet, I came across a peculiar case of a boxer who had tested positive for HIV in 1996.  His name is Tommy Morrison, and he tested positive right before a fight over a decade ago.  He had been trying for over 11 years to petition to box again, because he claimed that the test was a false positive.  Since then, he has taken a number of tests, all of which have come back positive?  Since an HIV positive competitor  is not allowed to compete in the United States, his career was ruined.  Could this have been a mistake?  He was finally cleared to fight after his 11 year absence from the sport.  Relating this to myself, I would be devastated if my professional career was ruined with news like this.  This was his job, his main source of income, taken from him in a flash.  With such a prevalence of blood in this sport, its no wonder why the boxing organizations would be so cautious about this type of situation.  

The Organization I chose to research is called "Grassroots Soccer" in Africa.  Founded in 2002, they "train African stars, coaches, teachers, and peer educators in the world's most HIV-affected countries to deliver an interactive HIV prevention and life skills curriculum to youth."(Grassroots Soccer 2009).  Their mission is to use soccer as a tool to help youth world-wide to lead healthier lives.  As you all may already know, the 2010 World Cup will be held in Africa, and this only helps rally what this organization is trying to do in this country.  Soccer is the most popular sport in the entire world, making this a very effective tool to teach effective life-skills.  Here is the link if anybody is interested: http://www.grassrootsoccer.org.

Did you know?:

Even though there is a risk or transferring HIV/AIDS through bloods in sports such boxing or mixed martial arts fighting, there has never been a reported case this happening in any sport!

Until next week....

Sources:

 

Morrison Medically Cleared to Fight Thursday.  Article taken from ESPN.com.  Retrieved September 16, 2009 from http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/boxing/news/story?id=2772386

What We Do. 2009. Taken from GrassrootSoccer.org.  Retrieved September 16, 2009 from http://www.grassrootsoccer.org/what-we-do/

First Blog!

Wow, this is my first time blogging! I never really thought that I would blog at any point in my life, but I guess if its a requirement for a class, then I don't really have a choice! First I'll introduce myself. My name is Matt Urbano and I am a Junior student-athlete here at UCF. I am on the UCF Men's Soccer team and really enjoying it! I am a Communication Sciences major and plan on being an SLP later down the line. Seriously though, everyone who reads this should check out the UCF Athletics website to check out our schedule and show your suppport at the home games! You might even get a free t-shirt or autograph! School is finally starting to wind up (homework and assignments that is), so time management is going to be very important in keeping up with practice, traveling to away games, and keeping my grades up.

Over the past 2 weeks I've dealt with some interesting concepts in this course. I have never heard of either thrush of PCP in the past, but doing the two simulations really put the severity into perspectice. To be honest, I have felt the affects of the PCP simulation in the past being an athlete. Doing fitness for soccer, I have felt the numb extremities and shortness of breath many, many times. Having this sensation on a regular basis would really suck. I am really looking forward to the next few assignments, as I don't know much about HIV/AIDS.

Ok for my first post? I'll keep working on it!