Where Have I Been?

It has been almost a year since I have posted.  That is okay, as I am the only one who reads this puppy.  I can’t say that I have been soo busy and haven’t had time.  The time was there, I am simply lazy.  Every now and then I remember that I have a blog and check in.  This is the first time this year that I have been motivated to type anything.  And such and interesting post!

I am not on my own computer, or a photo or two might have made it.  Must remember to do that .  Photos of what? Well, I have done one or two things in the past 12 months.  Worked, naturally. Perhaps a story or two may be remembered at a later date. (Yeah, right.  You probably won’t post  again until next November!)  Got a new dog, not Fluff, but a new shelter dog.  Her name is Sally.  Went to Washington, DC for a September 11 tea party.  Yes, I can now say that I have marched on Washington.  Drove to see Biltmore House.  More on that later.

Menopause is progressing nicely.  My hormone patch protects me from the worst of the hot flashes.  But they do keep it awfully warm at work some nights! 

The babies are growing up so quickly.  Yet I can’t imagine how life was without them.  Syd is almost four years old! And such a girly girl, sitting with her legs crossed, gesturing with her hands as she tells you about her day.  Morgan is her size already, and into everything puppies and dinosaurs.  MBQ is only three, but seems six!  So busy and intent on doing everything just right.  Briggs is a happy, content baby most of the time.  Although he is only four months old, he wears 12-18 month outfits.  Baby Q2 will be here in a few weeks.  MBQ has assured us that she will take good care of her little sister! Imagine, five children by Christmas.  We are so blessed.

As for my household, it is just me and my tiny menagerie.  Two dogs and a cat.  Although, by the amount of dog hair covering everything, one would think that I am running a shelter!  Freddy is Freddy.  Sally is a rotweiller mix who hates cats, but loves me.  I wouldn’t exchange her for anything, but she is not what I had planned to get.  Fluff went back to my sister as I couldn’t lift him following my surgery.  I got Sally last January.  It started simply enough.  I called my vet to inquire about a small dog they had posted on Petfinder.com.  That dog was already adopted, but they had another sweet child in need of a home.  Well, it was just as I knew it would be.  I could not refuse her, especially when I saw her.  I am such a pushover that I could not say “no” to any animal offered me.   She smells.  She sheds a lot.  She eats my shoes.  What’s not to love?

Well, enough for this year I suppose.

Camellias

One of many beautiful blooms

I have camellias again! Throughout my  childhood I associated camellia blooms with Christmas.  The two camellia bushes that grew in the yard of my youth would inevitably bloom around Christmas. I love their blooms, and have always wanted a home with a camellia bush. My new house is almost as old as the house in which I grew up, but with better landscaping! I knew about the azaleas and the crepe myrtle trees. My dogwood tree sits to the side. It wasn’t until I saw other bushes blooming that I remembered seeing a bush with some familiar leaves in the rear of my yard last summer. Did I have blooms as well?  What a wonderful surprise to discover my deep pink and white blossoms.

I don’t claim to know anything about gardening, but I am going to have to learn to keep up this yard. There is simply too much to enjoy in my new space. Now to just locate a blue hydranga…

What was I thinking?

My dog Freddy, has long needed a playmate. Oh, he would disagree, I am sure. But I am the boss. Really.

My beloved cat, Portia, died a few weeks ago. She was 16 years old. So I knew it would not be long before the canine bug hit. Now that I have a large, fenced yard a second dog should be no problem. The plan was to get a dog from a shelter. A female, as Freddy is so alpha male, would do nicely. I wanted a normal dog. One large enough to jump on my bed by herself, but not so large as to knock over everything when she came barrelling through the dog door.  I still have one cat that hangs out outside, so tolerance of felines is required. While I have taken to walking several times a week, I wanted a basic “couch potato” who didn’t bark and was not picky about her food. One with little grooming requirements.

Enter Fluff. While walking my dog and listening to my sister plead with me to take her dog, I heard myself saying “bring him over.” Male. Not female. But he and Freddy play together fine.  Well, one out of seven….

He barks. Several years ago he required surgery when one of my cats almost took out an eye.  The dog door isn’t an option yet, as Fluff’s head does not reach the bottom of the flap.  Needless to say, my bed is certainly out of reach! And he is allergic to everything but the most expensive prescription food and treats. Not to mention daily pills and periodic injections for scratching/itching.  Freddy is so possessive about food it is a constant challenge to keep them apart when eating.

Little grooming? Well…

But he is so happy when I put him on the bed with me. He loves to have his belly rubbed. And I get doggy kisses. Freddy plays and such, but he isn’t much of a cuddler.

Now if I can just ignore my boss, who has been telling me about her mistreated dog…

The Holiday Weekend

A young woman was upset because her boyfriend had to work on July 4th. A friend tried to calm her down. Don’t know if he noticed the knife. I admit I have done some crazy, ill-conceived things in anger, or on impulse. One or two may have even involved a sharp object. But it takes effort to slice through every tendon and nerve, and both main arteries in a man’s arm.

How do people get that way? In what world is this type of behavior acceptable? He wasn’t mad at her. “She’s just like that. Its her way or hell to pay.” Indeed.

Take Me, I’m Yours

Do I look easy? I never thought of myself as easy. I must be, however, considering how many times people have tried (and I suspect succeeded) to take advantage of me. Yep, I’m easy…but not cheap. You see, I have recently relocated. Picking the new house was easy. I once told the owner that if she ever sold it, to give me first option. Three months later I get a call that she has bought a new house, and when can I be ready to buy her old one! Great. Now to get my house ready to sell. In this market. A house that needed a little work. They saw me coming a mile away. They called their friends.

We started this process in April, aiming for a June first ready date to put on the market. I am well aware of the current date, thank you very much. I keep writing it on the many checks required to repair this “little work” that needed doing.

My main frustration stems from people not doing things properly, or not keeping their word. If it isn’t going to be ready by Friday, don’t tell me that it will be. Don’t send a contracted man out to install my cable, appropriate work order in hand, who doesn’t have the CableCard listed on said work order because contracted techs can’t be issued them. Don’t send a handyman to hang a ceiling fan who just injured his back that morning. Don’t let me think about the landscapers. Don’t let me go there.

I Hate Acronyms

In my youth, I was a STAR student. Once I was my unit’s STEP representative. Let’s not forget being a TEAM player.  It seems that with every new project, comes a new acronym. Many times it is blindingly obvious that a word was proposed and then the “pillars’ were filled in.  Look at TEAM for instance. A great word for a group. And so many possibilities!

TEAM

• Training, Education, Assessment, and Measurement
• Together Everyone Achieves More
• Time, Energy and Money

Can’t we just be excited about a project?  Does it have to have a contrived name? Not to pick on one, but if you were to guess what the HOPE project was? Could you? In this case HOPE stands for “Healing of People Everywhere.”  Nope. A worthy cause, but a misleading name.

Who is the crazy one?

We were warned early on: she is going to be a handful. Are you ready for the next one? Just wait…

The OR team said she was making threats, screaming about Jesus and the devil. Calling one doctor “devil-man” when he approached. She was actively psychotic, obviously.

She arrived in our unit still asleep. We planned to keep it that way for as long as possible. Monitors were carefully attached. Oxygen mask on. Vital signs all looked good. The OR team was still warning us to be prepared for when she woke up, laughing at how crazy the whole thing had been. L–, the circulator told us he made sure to get the staff anesthesiologist to write for Ativan for us.

We were ready, it was all under control. Between my partner and me we have over 35 years of experience at this. Then the anesthesia resident approaches the bed, checks her oxygen saturation (95%), and proceeds to perform a sternal rub while yelling for her to “wake up.“ I physically pushed him off the patient and asked him what did he think he was doing? As an afterthought, I did say that I did not mean to “get physical” with him. He said he wanted to make sure she was breathing, but that we needed to enjoy her the way they had pre-op!

The patient’s primary nurse had to stand guard until he left about 15 minutes later. Until he gave up. She had to threaten him as well.

When the patient did awaken, we found her to be loud, yes, but cooperative. She was sad and pitiful. This woman was scared of us. She knows she is crazy, which is more than I can say for her physician.

Just a Job

I know nurses who consider nursing to be “just a another job.” A paycheck. Postmodern cynicism overtakes the idealized angel of mercy. Hey, it is job, and a hard one at that. I can’t complain about the money.  I can complain about the problems with the profession and with healthcare in general. I am no idealist, but to call it “just a job:”

This past week I had a teenager ask me if they were able to save his leg, and I had to tell him no.

I listened to a woman admitted for emergency surgery tell me about the fire that had destroyed her home and all she owned the day before.

A quadraplegic with no family confided that his strength and will were fading.

I cared for each of these people for less than two hours, but I was allowed to witness some of their most intimate moments.  I am a stranger. I am privileged to be a nurse.

Chicago

Well, I am in Chicago for BlogHer07. So many new blogs! As I am a slow, not to mention newbie poster, I am not sure how well I shall do on posting about this conference. My thoughts go everywhere. Since the speakers were announced a while ago, I began reading some of their blogs, if I hadn’t read them already. It was kinda cool to see them in person. A few weeks ago aag discussed buying swag for the conference. First thing this morning I see a woman with a BlogHer badge carrying lots of bags. Its aag! Cool. Later on I see Birdie, and attend one of her sessions.

No photos of todays session. My battery went dead. I did get some pictures of Chicago Thursday. Although I have had a horrible cold, I did manage to get to my favorite place in Chicago. This is The Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park. As bad as I felt, I had to visit this place. Else why come to Chicago?

On the Month of July

One nurse I know takes off the month of July so she doesn’t have to help break in the new doctors. They have been physicians for less than a month, don’t even have a DEA number yet (that means they can’t write scripts for controlled drugs) and they are “in charge” of the ICU. Right. Nurses describe docs in many ways: helpful, smart, cocky, conscientious, quiet, eager, etc. Our biggest compliment for a new doc? “He/She can be taught.”

Our “babies” aren’t really new in July. They have been rotating through other services in the hospital for a year as interns. We see the interns come through with the surgical and medical teams, but Anesthesia runs our unit and no interns rotate through anesthesia. Does the year experience help? Only if they have learned that they need to be taught. It is not just new physicians that we deal with. We have new nurses, med students , SRNAs, CRNAs, student nurses and radiology techs stopping by. I have started more IV’s this month than I have all year. Lack of proper tape? Or are you too afraid to sedate properly? Patients arrive with swollen lips. An acknowledged hazard of intubation. Especially novice intubation. Report takes twice as long, because they either haven’t finished their paperwork and need coaching from their partner or they are being rushed off to do the next case and are flustered.

This July has been pretty decent. Any know-it-all’s have been keeping quiet or have been weeded out already. Our staff docs have us evaluate the residents, both formally and informally. Most of us enjoy what we do, and we enjoy exchanging knowledge and experiences with each other. Even with the new guys.

Now if we can just teach them not to leave a mess behind after IV and A-line starts!