Sick day...

On Friday, I came into work feeling a little queasy; had thrown up several times that morning, but took a few tums. Was hoping I could come into work early, talk to my boss about my insurance situation (lack thereof) and have a mellow day.

My boss wasn't there... Friday is her day off right now, I guess I'd forgotten.

I started feeling worse and worse. My coworker left for her lunch break and I was at the desk alone. Tweny-five minutes into my shift, mid-interaction with a resident, I had to excuse myself quickly to go throw up in the bathroom. Repeatedly. And then, with the heaves of my stomach, the runs came out the backside too, without warning.

There I am, in the restroom, puking my guts out and trying to make my way to the toilet and finagle my soiled underpants off without soiling my office clothes as well, dripping various bodily fluids on the clean tile, still someone waiting to finish a transaction at the front desk....

People ask sometimes, "What has been your most humiliating moment so far?"

I want to say this is close to the top.

I had to send a runner up to the dining room to tell my coworker I needed help, have the bus driver cover the desk in the mean time, and attempt to clean myself up and wipe up the sh*t on the floor with paper towels.

I was clocked out about 10 minutes later, told my coworker to wipe *everything* down with disinfectant, and she called the housekeeping to sterilize the bathroom.

The rest of that day, I spent in bed, and well into today. I had a fever that made me so dizzy and week I felt like I couldn't even roll over in bed. Sometime in the night, my fever broke, and I started feeling a little better.

Today my throat is sore, I'm congested. I pooped my pants again, without warning. But no vomiting anymore. Ugh.

I was supposed to work the 7:30-4 shift today, which my coworker is now covering. I'm sure she's not happy about that, but I know the residents where I work don't need to catch this stuff. A friend of mine who used to work eldercare told me that under similar circumstances, her company made their caregivers come in anyway, and wear adult diapers. Yuck.

I feel like I really shouldn't go in tomorrow, either. I am going to wait and see how I feel in the morning.

Now that my fever has passed, I feel strong enough to get out of bed and get some low-key house chores done, so I've been doing laundry, washing dishes, watering plants. Cleaning the algae covered walls on my aquaria. Things I haven't had time for recently. I've only been up out of bed for 4 hours and I feel like it's probably time for a nap again. Whew.

Two more weeks until I get a day off

Next week I'm finishing my last two weeks of classroom training for phlebotomy, so I'll have two more class sessions and then be out at my externship site (still to be determined) possibly as soon as next Thursday. Boy that's scary. I've only done 2 live draws so far, and that's better than most of my classmates. Hopefully I'll be feeling more confident by the end of the week.

Teaching is going well, but I'm way behind on grading because I feel like I just don't have time. I have two assignments (x 50 students) that I'd like to turn back next week. Maybe at least one of them.

My coworker at the retirement home who's been off on maternity leave is coming back in about two weeks, so I'll have weekends off again, can stop trying to find subs for my hospital volunteer work, and will actually have my Sundays back again. Whew.

This week in lab they are giving presentations of their group research project ideas. I usually observe another teacher on Tuesday mornings, so hopefully I can go for the first hour of that and then use the rest of the time to grade instead of watching them all.

One of the friendly seniors at the retirement home who's always been very kind and polite to me woke up a couple days ago and couldn't walk. He's at the hospital having tests now. He was very private about it. He called his family (his son is a doctor) to come help him instead of calling or paging the front desk for help. I hope it turns out alright.

I'm at work right now (in a lull between handling an emergency and starting lock-up), and there's a guy from the power company in the lobby. I guess he's been trying to get through to one of our residents on the phone and she hasn't been taking his calls or returning them. He wants to buy some land she owns up north somewhere, to run a power line through. I've called the lady up in her apartment and she said she would come down but it's been a while and she isn't here yet. I hope she's with it enough to deal with this kind of thing on her own. It's independent living here, and all of our residents are supposed to fall under that category of self-care, but several of them really don't. I think I may have been a little bitchy to the power company guy. He was trying to be friendly and conversational, and I don't know, I am feeling protective of our residents.

The other day a 80-something lady that I don't know well yet came to the front desk and said that she and her husband had been gone for a few hours and that a purse with valuables in it had been stolen from a shelf in her closet. I was doubtful, but called the police for her like she asked. I figure it's better to be safe than sorry in that instance. But then I listened to her talking to the other residents in the living room, having trouble finding her words, talking very slowly...I was doubtful enough that I figured I'd better call her husband. He knew nothing of the purse and told me not to call the cops, that he'd come down and get her. I called the police back and canceled the request. Ugh. Tough judgement call. I wouldn't want to ignore her issue if it was by any chance real.

I am listening to the power guy talk with the resident now, and it sounds like she's sticking up for herself alright. She told him she's not interested in selling the property, and he's talking about getting some sort of "easement" instead to put the line in.

I feel like I just want to curl up in bed for the next week. Too much going on, too much to think about. I didn't have to be to work until noon today, and I thought I'd get up and get a bunch done (laundry, dishes, garden, etc) but I basically stayed in bed until I had to get up for work.

I think I'm going to find out where my phlebotomy externship is tomorrow night.

Worn out :(

I haven't had a day off in 6 weeks now...

I am tired all of the time.
The food is getting moldy in my refrigerator because I don't have the energy to cook.
My house is a mess. Cat hair tumbleweeds blow by, my dishes from days ago sit by the sink.
There are piles of leaves in front of my house, smothering the plants below. I don't have time or energy to rake.
I have canvases that I bought to paint for a show next month that are still sitting blank in their plastic wrapper.
Sometimes I am lecturing the class I teach and I lose my train of thought.
I am supposed to be finding subs all this month to cover my volunteer shift at the hospital (so I can work at my retirement home job) but I'm running out of willing volunteers.
A couple days ago, one of the residents at the retirement home made a nasty remark to me during lunch and I was in tears for half an hour and distracted all afternoon.

I'm burnt out.

Next month, my coworker at the retirement home is going to be back from maternity leave, and my hours there are being cut from 38 down to 20. I am so relieved. I'll be able to go back to hospital volunteering and still have an entire weekend day off.

85 year old woman takes diet pills

....causing ER visit for shortness of breath.

She at first described it as a "medication problem" she was having and then fessed up that she'd been taking some diet pills. Most of our residents are on heart medications among other things. This lady doesn't even fit into my definition of "fat". She's very tall, maybe 5'10", and if I had to guess, maybe 170 or 180 pounds.

I hope that's not me at that age, still fretting about the size of my body. I hope I have grandchildren and kitty cats and a full life to fret about instead.

Poor woman.

Rockin' score on my phlebotomy written final!

I had my written final for phlebotomy last week. I'll admit, I was a little nervous. I hadn't studied much in the week leading up to the test. But I figured, I'd been doing a good job of studying the material all along (rather than just finding the answers and moving on, I'd actually write out the questions as a statement).

I was the first person to finish in our class of ... I think we're 13 people now? I turned in my test and waited for the others to finish out in the lobby. It took quite a while. It was a 2 hour, 200 question test and I think I was done in less than 45 minutes. Most of the questions were ones I'd seen before on homework or quizzes at various points in the semester. I was unsure of about 12, but put down my best guess and didn't revisit them.

The last person to finish, a mid-twenties blondie type, was in tears when she left. She said she was sure she didn't pass, and didn't want to wait around for her score. She's had a lot going on this semester...working plus planning her upcoming wedding... but I don't have a lot of sympathy given my own current situation.

Our teacher said that in past years, she has called people individually into the back storage room to tell them their scores. This year, she just told us that "everyone in the room right now passed." Meaning that blondie type probably didn't. She passed out our tests one by one then. When she got to mine, she stood next to my desk, and said..."and you, Smarty Pants!". She was smiling, so I know she said it in a friendly way. I got a 98.5% ! Yay. My friend Stefania got somewhere in the 90s too, and my carpool buddy Cathy got 77%, which is passing, and she was very happy about. She's working full time, got a small child at home, and English is her second language, so multiple choice tests can be a struggle.

I've put in my availability for externship hours, and requested to: (a) if possible, get an externship in the town where I live, and (b) not be stationed at the lab where I worked for 2 weeks this January where I had such a bad experience. I think we're going to find out next week what our assignments are. I'm nervous.

I'm pretty sure that next week is the last week of classroom time, and we're going to use it for practicing, practicing, practicing. I hope it continues to go well.

First blood draw!

I drew blood from a classmate for phlebotomy practice for the first time recently. It's an amazing feeling, when you get it right.

The first time I tried, I didn't get the needle in the vein. I had palpated the vein with the tourniquet on, then swabbed the site with antiseptic, and turned away to assemble my equipment while the arm air-dried. And that was my mistake. I thought I had some physical landmarks to go on, and could remember where the vein was, for the few seconds it took to turn away and assemble my equipment (that's the way we've been practicing on the fake arms), but I wasn't 100% sure anymore when I looked back at my classmates arm. What I should have done at that point, was re-tie the tourniquet, re-palpate, re-cleanse, and try again. But I was nervous (it was my first time doing this after all) and I thought I could probably remember the right location, so I just went for it. Of course, it didn't work out.

My teacher wanted to make sure I had a successful experience before I left that night, so she called another person up for me to try on. This time I didn't take my eye off the site (it was pretty obvious, too) and I got it. As soon as I put the vacu-tube onto the needle holder, blood flowed in.

I had to let someone try on me afterward, but it wasn't bad. My carpool buddy and friend, who took the class last semester but didn't end up passing the written final so is taking it again, got to try on me. She's good at the skills part, and I trust her. It barely hurt at all when it went in, and she used pretty good technique throughout. The only criticism I'd have is that she didn't use the "push and pull" technique when putting the vacu-tube on, or taking it off, the needle holder. So it wiggled more than was necessary in my arm. Still, way better than many experiences I've had at professional labs.

Got in "trouble" at work for hands on help

The other day I had a note in my mailbox at work to please refrain from physically helping the residents as it puts both myself and the company in a position to be legally liable if something bad happens.

I understand the concern. It's just a tough spot to be in, when the paramedics have assessed the resident and said she's okay, the resident insists she's okay, and then when everyone's gone home, said resident still feels dizzy and needs help getting back to her apartment. I thought I was staying on the right side of the line (dividing okay help from the type of help that's not allowed); I walked backwards in front of her and let her hold my hands to steady herself. She wasn't putting a great deal of pressure on me physically, having the contact just helped her feel safe.

I guess according to corporate, what I'm supposed to do in that situation is call the family (from 60 miles away) to come help her back to her room. Or call 911 again. Or just walk along side her, and if she falls, she falls, and then I call 911 again. Ugh.

I didn't get written up formally or anything, and my supervisor said she knew "my heart was in the right place", but that I had to refrain in the future from physically helping a resident.

This is so much more than a "receptionist" position.

New Job (And further scrambling...)

I haven't posted for a couple of weeks because I've been so darn busy. I took on another job. And didn't quit any. Which means I lost my 1 day per week that I had "off" (except for class).

I'm not sure it was the best decision, but it was the one that felt most right to me at the time. I got a call on Friday before the college quarter started on Monday, from the biology department at my local state university. One of their part time instructors had to leave town quickly due to a family emergency, and could I fill in teaching some labs this quarter?

I had put my application in to the part time pool months earlier; before I got the job at the retirement community, before I started my phlebotomy class. Before everything. And I didn't hear anything until now.

It's the department & school I got my bachelor's degree in, and it pays better than my retirement home job. And I just feel better being able to say "yes, I work two jobs, one as a biology instructor at X university and the other as a receptionist at X retirement home." I feel like that's some how more comfortable to say as someone with a master's degree than just "I'm a receptionist." Also, my previous experiences in teaching have been pretty fun. And I figured even though it wasn't ideal timing, this would be a "foot in the door" so to speak, and I might get further appointments with them later.

So now I'm working 7 days per week, about 60 hours per week, and still don't have benefits. And I am no longer able to volunteer at the hospitals on Saturday (temporarily) because in order to get the week days off that I needed to teach, I had to take on an additional weekend day at the retirement home.

In November, one of my coworkers who's been off on maternity leave, will be coming back to work, and she usually takes the weekend hours, so I can get rid of Saturday then (and go back to the hospital volunteering).

It's just all really unfortunate timing. On top of everything, my volunteer buddy (we share the Saturday shift) at the hospital has just been diagnosed with stomach cancer. I went in last Saturday to volunteer expecting her to be at the front desk and she was in a patient bed instead. Poor lady. I brought her a potted plant and talked to her for half an hour or so.

So I need to find someone to cover Saturdays for the next 4 weeks now, which is close to impossible. We're hiring someone new at the retirement place, and she starts next week. She said she'd like more hours, so maybe once she's trained up I can give her Saturday day shift.