a day in the life….

A DAY IN THE LIFE

God grant me the serenity

to accept the things I cannot change,

courage to change the things I can,

and wisdom to know the difference.

I start every day offering up quiet prayers. I’m only one person but I know I can make a difference in everyone I come in contact with patients and co-workers alike. Work has been very difficult but little people like me really can make a difference. My voice crying out in the darkness has been heard and things are changing by the minute. Perhaps, the higher ups are afraid of me leaving-throwing in the towel and moving on to green pastures. They don’t have to worry. I have decided to stay put and move forward and become an advocate for my wonderful patients. I love them as much as they love my kind words, back rubs, kisses, and all the little extra things that I do for them.

The last day of February

5:00am [Out of bed]

“Each day when I awake I know I have one more day to make a difference in someone’s life” –James Mann

Snuggle with my best friend, my love. I love to snuggle, kiss, and roam my fingers everywhere. We have so much love.

Shower, make coffee, turn on the news on channel 7, find a place on the couch, plop my lap tap on a pillow and surf away on the internet.

6:45 am [Drive to work]

I only live one block away from my job. When I’m at work sometimes I can hear my dogs bark. One time I got my mail delivered right to my desk-talk about speedy mail service. Did gas prices go up? I only fill my tank every 3 months.

7:00am [start of work]

Read nurses notes from the weekend. It looks like the weekend nurses held up the fort ok. The higher ups did some inpromptu visits to see if the caregivers were doing care. Looks like there will be some more write ups. Scanning down the page trying to read the messy handwriting of the scatter brain nurse. I did read very clearly, M had PASSED AWAY. I had to read this again a couple more times, thinking that maybe I had read it wrong. I had sent her to the hospital the middle of last week. Her Hct was way, way to low. Her Doctor wanted to wait it out, but nurses always seem to know better, screw her hematology appt for the 3rd of March-my little patient can’t wait until then. I got the order to send her out to the hospital of her choice, but it seems her choice and all the other local hospitals were diverted. This is happening more and more now a days. There really is a crisis in healthcare. My poor little patient needed medical care, but no place to go. I did manage do pull some strings and ship her out to a Catholic hospital on the edge of town. To no avail, she died over the weekend, cause of death–GI bleed, adverse medication reaction, mixed with complications of congestive heart failure. I guess there will be no need for me to do her 7:15 blood sugar check this morning.

Seriously, I really hate when this happens-I don’t have adequate time to grieve. I was really getting into her, albeit, she was a fiesty old soul. Thinking back here, last week when I was taking her blood sugar, I let out a flatus, a silent but deadly one. She looked at me and said did you just let out a “stinker”. I laughed, didn’t admit to it just laughed right along with her.

[7:15 – 9:00]

Time to put the grieving aside and start to pass out medications. I have 46 patient but only pass out meds for 20 people. My lovely med tech will do the rest. I do the category C medications. Patients who are unable to assist with their own meds. Most of these patients have to have their medications crushed and administered by spoon to mouth. Respirdal, Aricept, Namenda, Zoloft, Prozac, Ativan,Ditropan just to name of few of the any drugs I administer Today is my med tech’s last day of work. She is fed up with all the lack of care issues that never seem to be resolved. With her gone, I feel like I’m the lone wolf who is trying to make a difference.

[9:00 – 10:00]

I take this time to hang out on the South wing. There are 8 feeders and only two caregivers. So, I take my break to feed two patients. Today I sat between Mary and Harry. One bite Harry, one bite Mary and one bite Me.

[10:00 – 11:00]

Time for my treatment administration runs: artificial tears, flonase, albuterol inhaler, nitro patches, dovonex, xaltan, protopic, clotrimazole, azopt, cospot, warm compresses, dressing changes, combeveint, sling placements x 2,

[11:00 – 12:00]

I saw B’s son pick up her stuff, he forget her Glucometer–she wont need it now. Still cant believe that she is gone. They say that people die in 3’s

this is true

Phyliss died two weeks ago, one minute I’m feeding her and the next minute she is gone. Died right in the dining room. No death bed cheyne stroking, modeling, or morphine under the tongue for her. As soon as her devoted son left she decided to slip into the after life–just like that!

I took apart M’s chart and had it ready for the next soul whom ever that may be.

Wondering who will be the next to go

Pat?

Virgie?

They are both on hospice.

[12:00 – 1:00]

Went back to my self proclaimed “special care wing” the south wing. To help feed Jan and Harry. I just love Harry. I once wrote an entire entry about Harry but it got lost with the great OD hacker destruction of 911.

[1:00 – 3:00]

Picked out a video for the patients on the North wing

My Choice was Sinatra- of course –“PAL JOEY”

Ambulated Sara–she waked 79 steps!! A great accomplishment. She fell down a couple of weeks ago and fractured her shoulder. She has been afraid to walk but with my help she is gaining her confidence back.

We are going to walk a 99 steps tomorrow!

Helped Richard dial his wife’s phone number. He calls her about 15+ times a day. She doesn’t care and the conversation last only a few minutes. He recited the number to me but got hung up on the last two digits. His Alzheimers disease is progressing rapidly. He repeated the number to me so I could dial Oops, Got the wrong number. I apologized for dialing it incorrectly, the couple on the other end are retired and told me they get many calls from him, if fact, they have grown to love him and look forward to their chats with him. They could tell that something wasn’t quite right with him.

I wrote out his wife’s number in big numbers and posted it next to the phone. Richard seemed very relieved and gave me a big hug.

[3:00pm]

Time to go home