I Just Want a Normal, Boring Day. Please.
It has been one crazy week. My car broke down twice, both times forty minutes from home, my three days at work were crazy and involved me taking bloody gauze out of an old guy's mouth, making stuff up about medications, and strapping a lady to a chair while she snored and muttered stuff about girl scouts...
Let's start from the beginning.
Friday was quite an interesting day. At work, I was put in charge of single-handedly getting this 250-pound 60-something year old man from the room he had surgery in, into a wheelchair, and wheeled down the hallway into the recovery room. I know next to nothing about anything medical, so I was just flying by the seat of my pants the whole time. I was glad that he was able to stand by himself and get into the wheelchair (unlike the old lady the day before) because I would not have been able to help him get up. Anyway, so I get him wheeled down the hallway and into the recovery room with only a little difficulty getting through the doorway and then I bring the wheelchair alongside the recliner and have him get into the recliner but at first I forgot to put the breaks on the wheelchair so the chair starts sliding around when he tried to stand up (oops) so I put them on but I couldn't figure out how to flip the foot rests back in so he's almost tripping over the foot rests trying to get into the recliner...anyway, he finally got situated and then I strapped his ice packs onto his face and left him there. Except apparently he wasn't supposed to be sleeping with his chin down, so an hour later I have my cousin come in and help me push the recliner back, so she's yanking on the back of this guy's recliner while he sleeps and I'm just praying he doesn't wake up and realize just how incompetent we are. Eventually he does wake up and is able to go to the bathroom by himself and then when he comes back I'm supposed to take the bloody gauze out of his mouth so I strap on some purple gloves and dig around in this old guy's mouth for not one, but three different wads of bloody gauze. It was awful and I was glad that he was probably so numb he couldn't feel me digging around in his mouth. Finally his daughter came to pick him up and I gave her the post-op information packet and explained that she had to pick up some nasal spray for him and I told her what it was called and how to use it and then she asks me, "And what's it for? Just to reduce the swelling?" And I had absolutely no clue what this nasal spray was for so I was just like "Yep, it just makes the swelling go down and keeps everything clear so that it'll heal properly." Honestly, most of my job is just acting like I know what the heck I'm doing.
And then earlier that day, my cousin and I were taking care of this lady who was getting sedated and her finger monitor thing kept beeping so we had to find a way to get her arm elevated and we wound up taking a bunch of the things they use as head wraps for ice packs, tying them together, and making a makeshift sling that held her arm up on top of her stomach and tied to the opposite arm rest...And then while I'm essentially strapping this woman down to her chair, she's snoring and muttering things to me while I'm like "Yeah, yeah...you're doing great!" and my cousin starts giggling maniacally and has to leave the room so I'm stuck there by myself strapping this woman down while she talks to me about girl scouts. Eventually I get her arm situated and as I'm leaving she mumbles "I just don't want to be any trouble" and I go, "Oh no, you're perfect!" (This woman wasn't supposed to eat or drink for eight hours before surgery and had ten glasses of water and scrambled eggs that morning. Talk about non-compliant).
After I left that day, the woman wound up bleeding all over my cousin after her surgery and just being a general nightmare of a patient.
Meanwhile, I got stuck in horrific traffic on 81, was finally able to get off at an exit near my grandma's house (I was going to go over to her house to alter some clothes I got at Goodwill and DL and I were going to try to go to the Amish market), but then my car started acting weird and wouldn't accelerate so I pulled off in a church parking lot, got out of the car and looked around it (as if I'd be able to tell what was wrong) until it started pouring rain, at which point I got back in my car and called my mom, who sent my dad to pick me up. So while he drove an hour in heavy traffic to rescue me, I reclined my seat and had a Princess Diaries "Catch a Falling Star" moment.
Day 1208 Song Recommendation: "Scars" by Charles Johnson.
Day 1209 Song Recommendation: "Shadow & Light" by Martin Luke Brown.
Day 1210 Song Recommendation: "Simple Things" by Ziggy Alberts.
Day 1211 Song Recommendation: "Run for Cover" by Gabrielle Aplin.
Day 1212 Song Recommendation: "I Dare You" by The xx.
Day 1213 Song Recommendation: "Waves" by Dean Lewis.
-SE Wagner
Let's start from the beginning.
Friday was quite an interesting day. At work, I was put in charge of single-handedly getting this 250-pound 60-something year old man from the room he had surgery in, into a wheelchair, and wheeled down the hallway into the recovery room. I know next to nothing about anything medical, so I was just flying by the seat of my pants the whole time. I was glad that he was able to stand by himself and get into the wheelchair (unlike the old lady the day before) because I would not have been able to help him get up. Anyway, so I get him wheeled down the hallway and into the recovery room with only a little difficulty getting through the doorway and then I bring the wheelchair alongside the recliner and have him get into the recliner but at first I forgot to put the breaks on the wheelchair so the chair starts sliding around when he tried to stand up (oops) so I put them on but I couldn't figure out how to flip the foot rests back in so he's almost tripping over the foot rests trying to get into the recliner...anyway, he finally got situated and then I strapped his ice packs onto his face and left him there. Except apparently he wasn't supposed to be sleeping with his chin down, so an hour later I have my cousin come in and help me push the recliner back, so she's yanking on the back of this guy's recliner while he sleeps and I'm just praying he doesn't wake up and realize just how incompetent we are. Eventually he does wake up and is able to go to the bathroom by himself and then when he comes back I'm supposed to take the bloody gauze out of his mouth so I strap on some purple gloves and dig around in this old guy's mouth for not one, but three different wads of bloody gauze. It was awful and I was glad that he was probably so numb he couldn't feel me digging around in his mouth. Finally his daughter came to pick him up and I gave her the post-op information packet and explained that she had to pick up some nasal spray for him and I told her what it was called and how to use it and then she asks me, "And what's it for? Just to reduce the swelling?" And I had absolutely no clue what this nasal spray was for so I was just like "Yep, it just makes the swelling go down and keeps everything clear so that it'll heal properly." Honestly, most of my job is just acting like I know what the heck I'm doing.
And then earlier that day, my cousin and I were taking care of this lady who was getting sedated and her finger monitor thing kept beeping so we had to find a way to get her arm elevated and we wound up taking a bunch of the things they use as head wraps for ice packs, tying them together, and making a makeshift sling that held her arm up on top of her stomach and tied to the opposite arm rest...And then while I'm essentially strapping this woman down to her chair, she's snoring and muttering things to me while I'm like "Yeah, yeah...you're doing great!" and my cousin starts giggling maniacally and has to leave the room so I'm stuck there by myself strapping this woman down while she talks to me about girl scouts. Eventually I get her arm situated and as I'm leaving she mumbles "I just don't want to be any trouble" and I go, "Oh no, you're perfect!" (This woman wasn't supposed to eat or drink for eight hours before surgery and had ten glasses of water and scrambled eggs that morning. Talk about non-compliant).
After I left that day, the woman wound up bleeding all over my cousin after her surgery and just being a general nightmare of a patient.
Meanwhile, I got stuck in horrific traffic on 81, was finally able to get off at an exit near my grandma's house (I was going to go over to her house to alter some clothes I got at Goodwill and DL and I were going to try to go to the Amish market), but then my car started acting weird and wouldn't accelerate so I pulled off in a church parking lot, got out of the car and looked around it (as if I'd be able to tell what was wrong) until it started pouring rain, at which point I got back in my car and called my mom, who sent my dad to pick me up. So while he drove an hour in heavy traffic to rescue me, I reclined my seat and had a Princess Diaries "Catch a Falling Star" moment.
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But less dramatic and no crying. Honestly, after the day I'd had, I found it vaguely amusing. Eventually my dad came and of course the car was driving fine by that point. What the heck, am I right?
Fast forward to Saturday. I'm back in my home town, on my way to my grandma's house with my bag of clothes to alter (I never wound up going to my grandma's on Friday or meeting up with DL), I get stopped at the railroad tracks for ten minutes and when it's time to go again, my car stalls out. I get it started again, but it won't go more than five miles per hour. So now I start freaking out because my car is stalling every 50 feet, I can't make it go faster than a snail's pace, people are getting impatient and trying to pass me even though I have my hazards on and am CLEARLY in distress so I don't know, just have a little patience please??? At this point I'm cursing profusely and manage to steer this craphole of a vehicle into somebody's driveway, call my mom again, explain that the car won't move, she sends my dad to rescue me again, I try to get the car to move at all, it won't budge and when I push on the gas, the engine just revs up really loudly and smoke starts coming out of the hood so I try to pop the hood to look inside but I can't figure out how to undo the latch under the hood and the metal is really hot and then it starts pouring rain (I kid you not, literally de ja vu) so I get back in my car and wait this torrential downpour out. When it stops raining, it's about a million degrees outside with 100% humidity so I decide to leave my car and walk to Dunkin Donuts, where I bought two scoops of ice cream in a waffle cone for lunch, walked back to my car, got it to move, was able to drive it to the Hospice parking lot across the street, my dad comes, I explain that I am not making this up about my car not working, I don't know what's wrong with it but it just completely craps out and then it works fine again an hour later. So he checked the car out, noticed it was out of coolant so he was going to drive it to the car shop to get some more coolant but when he got in to drive it it wouldn't budge! I felt so vindicated. Turns out there's an issue with the breaks that makes them get stuck on. Which explains why I couldn't make it move more than five miles per hour...anyway, so my dad had to keep pumping the breaks and shifting the gears until they got unstuck and then he was able to drive it home.
So that's why I have been away from this humble blog for the past week...it has been a little bit crazy. And on Thursday I leave for Haiti! I'm not ready at all!
Day 1209 Song Recommendation: "Shadow & Light" by Martin Luke Brown.
Day 1210 Song Recommendation: "Simple Things" by Ziggy Alberts.
Day 1211 Song Recommendation: "Run for Cover" by Gabrielle Aplin.
Day 1212 Song Recommendation: "I Dare You" by The xx.
Day 1213 Song Recommendation: "Waves" by Dean Lewis.
-SE Wagner
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