Halloween

Hello Everyone,

This past week was super busy, but I managed to get my one hour in. In light of the Halloween weekend, my volunteering was halloween based as we prepared for costume, candy, and various games. My life has been super busy lately with everything going on at school, work, and applying to graduate school; however, I still found some time to donate to volunteering. This week I participated in a halloween-based game party on Sunday evening. Even though I had lost my voice this past saturday night, I still could participate by handing out prizes for the best costume and the winners of the various games. There was bingo, jeopardy, and musical chairs. Through all the people there, I got to relive my childhood and boy was I nostalgic. Being a senior in my undergraduate career, I really miss my childhood and how simplistic my view was back in my teenage years. I have been so wrapped up in college life lately, I forgot about the problems I had when I was a teenager. Being an outsider kind of helped me see what they were dealing with in a different point of view. This allowed me to really see different problems teens have regarding everything from little crushes to fitting in with the crowd that they want to hang out with. In relation to the LGBT community, I saw that teens struggle so much to find their identity, and it must be very difficult to have to seem like you are not like everybody else regarding sexual orientation. My teenage years were hard enough, I can't even imagine dealing with being an outcast based on nothing that could be changed. When I was playing games with the teens, I was able to reach out to them and tell them how strong they are. I think they really appreciated that they weren't alone which made me happy. I want to work in the future to keep helping these teens feel like they are not alone.

That is all for today. Thanks for reading!
Nadine Obeid

Purple

This week my volunteering turned out interesting. I helped with a local event in which people are wearing purple in support of the LGBT community. I helped organize this event as well as helped with the little things going on during it. It was a short but busy event as people around the LGBT community got together in support of their cause: awareness and prevention. At first, I was super iffy about this whole volunteering thing because I have never really volunteered at a place I enjoy as much as working with the LGBT community. I feel that they all are so accepting and understandable. They are always willing to talk about daily issues whatever the subject. This really helps no matter what community you are a part of. Going to volunteer really helps my own emotional and mental health. As a consequence of volunteering, I feel more satisfied and happy with myself. There are positive things happening in my life by just simply giving an hour back to the community every week. It was cool seeing how much people can come together whatever the cause and whatever their stance on the cause. I just like the idea of a community being able to share ideas without necessarily disagreeing but rather understanding each other's point of view. That would be an ideal society to me. I think that's what the LGBT community needs: just support and acceptance. I respect the volunteer place that I volunteer at because I realize how much work they have committed to purely helping people. By helping to coordinate this one event, it has showed me the passion that these people have into improving their own community and effectively teaching and helping others to understand.

That is all for now!
Nadine Obeid 

Looking Back

peopleoftheweb,

Last week I had no time to volunteer; however, I found time during the fall break today to volunteer. Today they had a game night, so before the game night I helped prepare. This volunteering week, I have been volunteering for 5 weeks now, which is halfway through the ten weeks. Thus, with this blog, I want to do a lot of reflecting upon the first half of my service learning project. When I look back at when I first started, I remember I was kind of weary about volunteering at a center for the LGBT community, because I myself being heterosexual, I felt like I was not going to fit in. But that was not the case, AT ALL. I have learned over the past five weeks that no matter your sexual orientation, you are HUMAN. What their sexual orientation is really has no effect on how I am living my life. In fact, I feel like my life is more enriched now that I am aware of people different than me. Also, it has made me aware of many medical issues associated with the LGBT community such at STDs and depression. I never thought depression was one of them until I saw how bad the LGBT community is bullied for being different. That's exactly why this experience has no made me an advocate for this community and I encourage people to go out of their environment by volunteering in places that one would not normally think of volunteering at. I am excited for the next five weeks to come and to be a part of many more upcoming events within the LGBT community. Thank you for reading my blog! :D

Thanks,

Nadine Obeid

LGBT Education

This week at Montrose Counseling Center I volunteered by assembling education materials like condom packs. Even though this wasn't an "important" job per say, whatever I can do to help helps. Education materials consist of many packets and trinkets having to do with STD prevention and LBGT support materials.  Looking at the packets gave me an idea of how to make my brochure at the end of the semester. The packets were not only educational, but they appealed greatly to the audience which were the teenage LGBT community which is important because as far as I can tell, teenagers aren't really big on reading anything that they aren't assigned to read. Being a biology major, I am always interested in the science explanation behind things and also, the scientific researcher inside me was really curious on this whole LGBT issue. For example, there are many questions within the LGBT community that are very important for the scientific community to ask. Such as, Is there a gene involved in sexual orientation? or Can there been certain vaccinations for STDs? I started contemplating these answers and it seems super interesting to me to research. I started looking at scientific literature and saw many different kinds of research being done on model organisms to determine what exactly controls sexual orientation. It would be interesting if they start finding the same kind of things that are analogous to humans. Then, if there was a scientific explanation, the whole political issue would be void, hopefully and the world will be at peace. ha ha, but no really. Anyways, I am looking forward to volunteering next week!

Thanks,
Nadine Obeid

HATCH

Dear Followers,

This week I volunteered at HATCH. HATCH is a weekly meeting for adolescents to come together an talk about their problems. Specifically, HATCH stands for HATCH is dedicated to empowering Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender and Questioning (GLBTQ) adolescents, ages 13-20, to become responsible citizens and positive contributors to society by providing a safe, affirming social environment for GLBTQ youth, offering role models and peer support, providing education on health issues such as HIV, Sexually Transmitted Infections (STI's) drug and alcohol abuse and suicide prevention, and hosting a variety of helpful and affirming programs for GLBTQ youth. I thought it was really interesting to see the types of things people my age and younger deal with on a daily basis. This provided a lot of insight to what we need to improve on within our society. It is really crazy how wrapped up you can be with all you are doing in your life for a moment in time, but when you see people dealing with harder issues, especially younger than you, it really puts your life into perspective. I may be dealing with my own daily life stresses such as classes, work, and graduate school applications, but all these seem minuscule when compared to bullying, HIV, and their own self esteem. It breaks my heart that people with another sexual orientation have to put up with so much. Like seriously, are we stuck in the middle ages? And, what country do we live in? It really bothers me that these issues are not in the forefront of political issues. And even if they are, people are so worried about how it affects them, rather than how it affects the people of different sexual orientation. We are in the midst of a very important election and I believe that people should be as informed as they can in order to choose a political candidate. Honestly, at first, before I came to volunteer at this clinic, I had no idea of how pervasive these issues were throughout society. But just volunteering here for barely a month has put a lot in perspective. That's why I strongly urge that people get involved with their community before they engage in politics, you must truly know all sides to the issue.

Thanks for reading!
Nadine Obeid

Gay and Lesbian Switchboard

This week I got an opportunity to work on the Gay and Lesbian switchboard. This switchboard is a hotline for gay and lesbians with many different services such as depression and suicide prevention, HIV/STD information, and community events and support information. It was my first time actually encountering these issues. I would like to point out that you don't have to be of a different sexual orientation to feel depressed or the urge to commit suicide. Not many of my calls had to do with depression and suicide, as much were more for information requests. I thought this topic was very relevant because last week was suicide prevention week. Personally, it made me feel bad because, no matter what your sexual orientation, you should never feel bad for being alive. Also, another pervasive topic in the LGBT community is consequently HIV or any STDs in general. In the 1980s, HIV was regarded particularly with the LGBT community, but later they found that anybody can get HIV. Working the hotline, actually informed me more probably than the people I was speaking to on the other end. It gave me insight on what other people are thinking around me and what is going on in their lives. Many times during their calls, I had to take a step back and hold my breath because what they were going through is way bigger than anything I have had to go through in my life. Sadly, their decisions involved "Should I carry on with my life?," while mine are more "What should I do with my life?" This got me thinking into the big picture of life and I felt grateful for not having to deal with asking those particular questions. That, I was that well-off, thanks to my parents for their hard work and acceptance, that I was secure with myself in my personal life. The people in the LGBT community, thanks to the non acceptance of the people around them, feel so isolated that they do not wish to carry on with their own lives. It is such a shame that the community around us has returned to it's primitive state. Just like we once discriminated on color, religion, political affiliation, and gender, we are now discriminating against people for their sexual affiliation.

Alright, that's enough on my ranting. Thanks for reading!
Nadine Obeid

LGBT Montrose Orientation

Dear peopleoftheweb,

Last Wednesday (September 12th, 2012), I went to orientation at Montrose Counseling Center. Montrose Counseling Center is a center  that helps the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) community in Houston, TX. I was excited because, even though I am heterosexual, everyone deserves the right to express themselves in their own sexual preference. At the orientation I learned many valuable things about the community as well as some upcoming events that I am going to help work on. The first event is on October 6th entitled "Love Your Block" in which the Montrose counseling center will improve the landscaping around their block. I hope to be helping weekly with the outreach program in which people help send information about the LGBT community and also help make condom packs for a safer and STD free LGBT community. Personally, I think people need to be more aware of their community. Being a student at the University of St. Thomas, we are in the middle of Montrose and thus in the middle of the LGBT community in Houston. We owe is to ourself to be informed about the community we are around most of the day. I am excited about getting to know more and getting other people informed about this community. At the end of this experience, I hope to help make a difference in LGBT youth, be more informed, and get other people informed about what is going on around them in the Montrose area.

Thanks for Reading!
Nadine Obeid :)