my first real day of clinical practice at toronto rehab consisted of another member of my clinical team swinging the door to the locker rooms open and smacking me in the head.
6:45 am, 15 mins before i'm due on the floor in my unit, i'm bleeding profusely, seeing stars and wondering how the hell this could have happened to me.
after freaking out my new clinical instructor with the amount of blood on my hand and saturated paper towel, i'm left with a 2" vertical laceration above my left eyebrow and a massive goose egg (not correct terminology, i know) which is every shade of blue/purple/yellow, combined.
looks lovely.
but it did initiate conversations with patients and nurses alike.
i am now known on the floor as "the girl with the big bandage above her eye". atleast i'm known on the floor, right?
my clients are a mix of lovely and interesting.
i'm drawn to 2 in particular, one being lovely, and one being interesting...and difficult.
i have a woman, whom i thought was only about my age, but discovered later is actually 41, who, as a result of cerebral palsy, has very limited movement & function, and has kyphoscoliosis (kyphosis=hunchback, scoliosis=an s-curvature of the spine).
i also helped care for a woman who has a history of drug/alcohol abuse with ODs relating to suicide attempts and withdrawal seizures but was admitted after a domestic dispute with her then common-law spouse left her with severe brain damage, resulting in left-sided hemiplegia (paralysis). when she came into rehab she had a trach tube and had staples holding the skin on her skull. she's been on a slow road to recovery, although it'll never be complete. she has learned to read and write at a about a grade 2 level. she yells at me and she likes to throw her shit on the wall.
speaking of trach tubes, i got to clean the mucus spewing out of someone's whole in their neck and see the stoma created to attach a colostomy bag. i saw intestines. amazing.
what's not so amazing is the smell from the bag.
i figure, when your waste goes through the intestines, it's reabsorbing water to dilute the concentration before it exits your anus. if you're catching the waste before it's been through the intestines, it is pure, undiluted, concentrated waste, mixed with bile and acid. it's enough to make anyone vomit.
9/15/06
while visions of marshmallows danced in my head
i woke myself up the other night making this noise, like "ahhhh", but in a sexual kinda way...and you know when you're so noisy in your sleep, you wake yourself up, startled?
so it seemed kinda like a sexual thing when i woke up, but in fact it was a laughing type "ahhhh", kinda like "ahhh, don't!" because i realized i had been dreaming about being pelted with marshmallows.
a fun, harmless, marshmallow fight.
not sure why, with who, or how that came to be, but it wasn't sexual.
although, i suppose it could be...if you think in that perverted sort of way.
yesterday as i mad dashed to the mall to find some new white shoes for my clinical tomorrow, i realized that in the 8 years i've lived here in the city, this is the first month that i've ever purchased a Metropass™.
it's a liberating feeling, really. not that i hadn't already started to feel like a part of the city a few years back, but now it's official: i am a Torontonian.
i like how i can just scan my way through the turnstiles. a little beep and i'm through.
no more fumbling with tickets or change.
i guess moving east means using more transit. but it also means carrying my bike down two long flights of stairs. so i guess it boils down to laziness.
dammit. my liberating Metropass™ has gone from the height of my status quo, to reaffirming the fact that i've gotten lazier. and perhaps a part of the blue collar masses that use the subway on a daily basis.
dammit.
so it seemed kinda like a sexual thing when i woke up, but in fact it was a laughing type "ahhhh", kinda like "ahhh, don't!" because i realized i had been dreaming about being pelted with marshmallows.
a fun, harmless, marshmallow fight.
not sure why, with who, or how that came to be, but it wasn't sexual.
although, i suppose it could be...if you think in that perverted sort of way.
yesterday as i mad dashed to the mall to find some new white shoes for my clinical tomorrow, i realized that in the 8 years i've lived here in the city, this is the first month that i've ever purchased a Metropass™.
it's a liberating feeling, really. not that i hadn't already started to feel like a part of the city a few years back, but now it's official: i am a Torontonian.
i like how i can just scan my way through the turnstiles. a little beep and i'm through.
no more fumbling with tickets or change.
i guess moving east means using more transit. but it also means carrying my bike down two long flights of stairs. so i guess it boils down to laziness.
dammit. my liberating Metropass™ has gone from the height of my status quo, to reaffirming the fact that i've gotten lazier. and perhaps a part of the blue collar masses that use the subway on a daily basis.
dammit.
9/13/06
school: week 2
Levinson did a research study in the '70s and found that peoples' lives are like seasons. all stages have their place and no one is better than another.
he said that every lifetime has 3 eras (after childhood): early adulthood, middle adulthood & late adulthood.
within each of these eras were periods and transitions. the transitions between eras were big "cross-era" transitions, lasting ~5 yrs, and a source of turmoil and confusion. the transitions between periods were small.
just before early adulthood comes a cross-era transition when you're half child/half adult (~17-22 yrs) where you're trying to gain independence.
as you enter early adulthood there's a calm period, the novice period (~22-28 yrs) where you develop dreams and have mentors. then there's a small transition (~28-33 yrs) where you question if you're heading in the right direction, which is followed by another calm period he called "calmination".
before you enter the second era of middle adulthood, there's another cross-era transition which causes the mid-life crisis (~40-45 yrs).
this pattern continues into late adulthood, where there are periods of self-reflection and coming to terms with dying.
alhtough this is just one man's theory and has many criticisms, as do many theories, i can honestly say that i've been through the first periods of early adulthood. i had that novice period, where i formed my dreams, and then the small transition where i questioned whether i was headed in the right direction. and i answered it. and did something about it.
if this psychologist is on the right track, i am still in that small transition, and just as i graduate, i'll be headed into my period of calmination.
interesting.
Music to my ears: tool - lateralus
In reality: Neanderthals and humans lived side by side
he said that every lifetime has 3 eras (after childhood): early adulthood, middle adulthood & late adulthood.
within each of these eras were periods and transitions. the transitions between eras were big "cross-era" transitions, lasting ~5 yrs, and a source of turmoil and confusion. the transitions between periods were small.
just before early adulthood comes a cross-era transition when you're half child/half adult (~17-22 yrs) where you're trying to gain independence.
as you enter early adulthood there's a calm period, the novice period (~22-28 yrs) where you develop dreams and have mentors. then there's a small transition (~28-33 yrs) where you question if you're heading in the right direction, which is followed by another calm period he called "calmination".
before you enter the second era of middle adulthood, there's another cross-era transition which causes the mid-life crisis (~40-45 yrs).
this pattern continues into late adulthood, where there are periods of self-reflection and coming to terms with dying.
alhtough this is just one man's theory and has many criticisms, as do many theories, i can honestly say that i've been through the first periods of early adulthood. i had that novice period, where i formed my dreams, and then the small transition where i questioned whether i was headed in the right direction. and i answered it. and did something about it.
if this psychologist is on the right track, i am still in that small transition, and just as i graduate, i'll be headed into my period of calmination.
interesting.
Music to my ears: tool - lateralus
In reality: Neanderthals and humans lived side by side
9/9/06
trying to focus when everything is new
back to school. and orientation always just serves to disorient me.
i'm overwhelmed and having trouble focusing.
getting distracted and not getting back to reality in a reasonable hour.
summer is over but the feeling won't stick.
new place, new people, new toys.
a desk with an uncomfortable chair.
==
my placement is at toronto rehab this year. could be cool.
Food for thought: still reading Into Thin Air (which is fantastic, by the way) but now i'm also reading Adult Development and Aging, Canadian Essentials of Nursing Research, Pharmacology and the Nursing Process and Medical-Surgical Nursing in Canada. ahhhh.
In reality: i can't believe that in the UK you could get away with taking someone's DNA and getting it tested without their knowledge...until now.
i'm overwhelmed and having trouble focusing.
getting distracted and not getting back to reality in a reasonable hour.
summer is over but the feeling won't stick.
new place, new people, new toys.
a desk with an uncomfortable chair.
==
my placement is at toronto rehab this year. could be cool.
Food for thought: still reading Into Thin Air (which is fantastic, by the way) but now i'm also reading Adult Development and Aging, Canadian Essentials of Nursing Research, Pharmacology and the Nursing Process and Medical-Surgical Nursing in Canada. ahhhh.
In reality: i can't believe that in the UK you could get away with taking someone's DNA and getting it tested without their knowledge...until now.
9/4/06
a brief descent into the land of poutine & pepsi (and apparently hotdogs)
i love montreal.
i've decided. and it only took the 2 hours we spent there to come to that decision.
i don't care if there is only pepsi.
the real cheese curds on the poutine make up for that.
and i don't care if the waitress snickers while you try to order in your broken and basic conversational french, but refuses to speak english even though she can.
sometimes there's no other way to learn than to be laughed at.
i love the houses and the low-rises and the lack of high-rise condo complexes.
it's all very european. and, like europe, smartly designed.
somewhere between hwys 20 est & 720 sud-est (which is essentially the same road, save for some merging in the tunnel) bob says:
"the bridges here are crazy. look at that! it's so bladerunner."
later, over a pint of rickard's at a pub nearby the station centre-ville, waiting for the overnight bus to take us back to t.o., we both decided to live in montreal for a while, sometime in the future.
food for thought: Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
(found a copy in a used bookshop in kingston, on the way to quebec. having already read Into the Wild--actually, devoured in one night--i was happy Bob pointed this one out to me. it's based on his deadly adventure to the summit of Everest as a journalist for Outside mag...here's the original story: http://outside.away.com/outside/destinations/199609/199609_into_thin_air_1.html
it's already addicting...i guess since school starts again tomorrow i'll just have to finish it today...before working at 5...heh)
**sidenote to Bob: you're mildly suspicious (but i hope still trusting) at the secrecy of my online adventures. but just so you know, this is it. there is no rich old man from tallahassee on the other end, begging me to come bear his children. nope. the secrets lie in this. something i said i'd never do: have a blog. and i never made it completely public. but i never lied about it either...well, not really. and truth be told, i KNOW you're the only one who reads it, even though you pretend it doesn't exist. you can find just about anything by googling it. it's amazing, n'est pas?
i've decided. and it only took the 2 hours we spent there to come to that decision.
i don't care if there is only pepsi.
the real cheese curds on the poutine make up for that.
and i don't care if the waitress snickers while you try to order in your broken and basic conversational french, but refuses to speak english even though she can.
sometimes there's no other way to learn than to be laughed at.
i love the houses and the low-rises and the lack of high-rise condo complexes.
it's all very european. and, like europe, smartly designed.
somewhere between hwys 20 est & 720 sud-est (which is essentially the same road, save for some merging in the tunnel) bob says:
"the bridges here are crazy. look at that! it's so bladerunner."
later, over a pint of rickard's at a pub nearby the station centre-ville, waiting for the overnight bus to take us back to t.o., we both decided to live in montreal for a while, sometime in the future.
food for thought: Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
(found a copy in a used bookshop in kingston, on the way to quebec. having already read Into the Wild--actually, devoured in one night--i was happy Bob pointed this one out to me. it's based on his deadly adventure to the summit of Everest as a journalist for Outside mag...here's the original story: http://outside.away.com/outside/destinations/199609/199609_into_thin_air_1.html
it's already addicting...i guess since school starts again tomorrow i'll just have to finish it today...before working at 5...heh)
**sidenote to Bob: you're mildly suspicious (but i hope still trusting) at the secrecy of my online adventures. but just so you know, this is it. there is no rich old man from tallahassee on the other end, begging me to come bear his children. nope. the secrets lie in this. something i said i'd never do: have a blog. and i never made it completely public. but i never lied about it either...well, not really. and truth be told, i KNOW you're the only one who reads it, even though you pretend it doesn't exist. you can find just about anything by googling it. it's amazing, n'est pas?
9/1/06
the late great Bill Hicks
to add to yesterday's post, a quote from one of my heroes, Mr. Bill Hicks:
"i don't care what you believe but you gotta admit: beliefs are odd...a lot of christians wear crosses around their necks. you think when jesus comes back he ever wants to see a fucking cross? that's like going up to Jackie Onassis with a rifle pendant on..."
"i don't care what you believe but you gotta admit: beliefs are odd...a lot of christians wear crosses around their necks. you think when jesus comes back he ever wants to see a fucking cross? that's like going up to Jackie Onassis with a rifle pendant on..."
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