Before the "joy" of the season

So, I figured before the joys of the holiday season pick me up and throttle me to within an inch of my life, I should write something here. I know that most of my occasion blog readers think I have abandoned this project altogether...but Au contraire, mon frère! I am here, just having a difficult time sitting still long enough to write, or let my adult onset ADD subside long enough to make a single, continuous thought possible. And I know that when I actually get myself into "holiday hustling" this will be impossible. I have already stopped and started writing this 3 times already...in about 15 mins . Oye! My world for a ritalin!

Sam and school...please allow room for an edit after parent-teacher conference tonight. School seems to really going well this year. And I can't tell you how grateful I am for that, I could not endure another year like last year. I don't think he could either. Writing is still an issue with him, but the mix of maturity and more attention in the classroom everything else seems to be going well. We still have to work on his "internal edit button", when he calls his substitute teacher incompetent and such, but we are getting there. :)

Adam and I have traveled to Colorado for my cousin's beautiful wedding in September. I will attempt to post some pictures soon. I had an epic computer crash last month and although I don't think I lost much in terms of data, it has been a long and slow process to get my machine and my pictures in order. Back up your photos and documents, people! PLEASE! I had just moved several things to an external hard drive, only days before. I actually am such a freak that I back things up TWICE and store the other hard drive to keep it from harm. And I have a firebox for it. Freak...yes. Lost pictures and Photoshop goodies...no!

Work has been a joy. Oh yes. Precautions for H1N1 patients ( we have had several) are a pain in my ass. I am on the verge of constant face break-out from wearing a mask every day I work. That is not to mention all the call-ins from co-workers who are sick or have loved ones that are sick, leaving us short staffed most days. This is just a horrible season for illness. The thought of those long 13hr days is just not so much appealing anymore. ( ok, it never was appealing, but still, now less so)

So I am pushing through the season, because it is what I do. I have not found my writing mojo yet. Still looking for it under my comfy sheets of my bed. Maybe I need a vacation? Like a REAL one. Alone.

Dream on, Heidi!!

when your kid is smarter than you...

Listen, I am not even gonna make excuses. I am a terrible blogger. I will just deal with that fact.
So...a funny Sammy story to pass along. ( actually I have MANY in the wings, they will make it here...someday)

The other night when I was at work, Adam made dinner and served it to the boys. Adam made the ultimate faux pas and served Sammy vegetables on his plate.

Sam yells out "Heeeeey!!!"

Adam says "Hey is for horses"

Sam looks at him and says "ummm...did you think I spelled it with an A??"

Really? How can you argue with a kid that is smarter than you?

Time flies...but it wasn't all fun.

I can't believe I remembered how to get to this blog or (God forbid!) log in! Damn. Has it really been since May that I posted? What the hell have I been doing!?!?

Ahh...too many things to find the time to blog apparently. Let's sum it up, shall we?


The school year just about did me in last year. I think much of my stress and anxiety about that overwhelmed me and made it hard for me to sit still and write or even justify the time to myself to write here.

Sammy was finally diagnosed with Asperger's this spring. Fighting our way through the school system was insane and we finally got a meeting with the board on June 5th. I wish I could type how I was feeling at that meeting in all CAPS for you...the director actually said to me "well, if this happened earlier in the school year, we would think about moving him. But since it is June will will leave him in his current class"

BREATH.

DUDE! ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!?!?! I have had that kid into doctors and to see therapists since October 5th. WTF!?!

I was calm. I was rational even when I thought about reaching across the table to smack that man upside his head.

But...I digress.

We opted to place Sammy into a 12-1-4 classroom. 12 students. 1 teacher. 4 aides. All the children in that class are on the autism spectrum of some sort. Some are non-verbal. Some are like Sam. ( though I doubt ANYONE is quite like Sam). We are really hopeful that this situation will be less stressful for him...and us!

Here is Sam this year, on the first day of school. Not happy, but trying to look it for me anyway. :D


So many more pictures and summer fun to report on...and I am not promising anything! But I do have great intentions and I will try to get my butt back in here to write more. Adam and I are excited to head to my cousin's wedding in Colorado in a few weeks and the leaves are already changing there. Can't wait to work out the new camera and hopefully share! :D

Dear Elizabeth...nurse-to-be

So I get a very nice comment from a new nurse-to-be and she asked if I had any advice for her. Oh baby...do I ever.

I will not day something trite and stupid like so many others will tell you. Like "get out now" and "were you crazy for taking nursing" I hate it when people say that crap. If they hated it so much..they should leave. And what kinda way is the to welcome anyone into the field?? Personally, I wanna retire someday and I would like there to be bright, down-to-earth decent people taking care of me and mine when I do.

And that is not to say I love my job with some starry-eyed passion. Frig no. Not every day...not most days even. But I don't hate it. I am somewhere in the middle. You just have to see it for what it is. You have to know you are not going to change the world...but you might make one person's life or death a bit easier. You might smile at just the right time...You might catch a problem that everyone else over-looked...You might just have enough sleep, caffeine and neurons firing to keep someone alive...and you might let someone die when and how they need to.

Let me just say that some days will SUCK. I mean really, really suck. You will walk off the floor and cry all the way home. I hate to tell you that, but you will. Be happy about those days, they mean you are human. Far to many days will go by when you feel like you suck for being "heartless" and letting death and pain be a part of your normal day. You can't take on the day if you cry with every person. You will not get through it.

You will feel like you know nothing. I feel like that some days after 15 years of this career. Asking questions is your best bet. I still do...every day. It might take you about a year in the ICU to feel like you are not gonna faint when you get report and head into your patient's room for the first time. There will be days when you work all day to keep someone alive only for them to die 10 mins before your shift ends.

However, it gets better. So, so much better. You will feel (semi) competent soon enough. You will meet amazing people. My co-workers are some of the best people I ever met. You will develop a very strange sense of humor. And you will be the lifeline for many people.

All of it will work together to be a part of who you are...a nurse. God, I wanna shed that sometimes. So many times I don't want to think like a nurse. I want to NOT look at the guy in the grocery store and admire his veins for an IV. I want to not hear a cough and start diagnosing it in my mind. I don't want to have my kid complain of a headache and I am thinking CAT scans and ICP drains. But I never will stop. It is who I am. Who you will be.

It is a great adventure, my friend. The trip may be bumpy and filled with bodily fluids, but it is worth it. ( though maybe I am just saying that because I don't have to work tonight. hehehehehe) I hope you love it, Elizabeth.

Good luck!

Poor sad blog...

I figured I need to get in here and write SOMETHING...anything before I decide to never return. Which I am sure many of my "regular" readers have done...given up on me. But, No! I will be back and blogging pretty darn soon. Work has taken a much more "normal" schedule and school is almost out for the boys. THANK GOD!! I am so ready for them to be on summer vacation. I am one of those "weird" moms that loves them to be home with me. I am sick of permission slips, homework checks, notes from teachers, trips to school, and just about every damn thing that is related to school. Enough!

So I didn't go away and forget you, oh Blogsphere! I am planning my return. I swear. Really this time. No. I mean it. Really.

You are just gonna have to check back and see. ;-)

Quite a bit

Yup, quite a bit off my "game". My writing is not coming easily like it used to, my brain is all jumbled and I can't quite seem to sort it out into a cohesive paragraph.

It happens. Often. I think of all the things I wanna say and just can't get it out. Plus, I have so many things I wanna share about work, but I have to do it in a generic and safe way as to not be too specific with patients or situations. After I try to figure out what to say, how to say it, and all that crap...my brain hurts and it seems too difficult to even bother. Some medical bloggers do it with such ease, but try as I might I struggle with it. And God, are there some interesting things going on at work. Every day I am amazed or amused or shocked by the patients or their families. I need to work on my medical story telling. I just have to figure out how to protect myself and them. It will be a work in progress.

And we are in this limbo place with Sammy. We are towards the end in the process of diagnosing his issues and once that happens then the work of finding things that will work with him in school. At home, he is really fine and not a problem at all. At school, when his anxiety is at panic level, he just will not get any work done. Either he won't or can't calm his "school brain", as he puts it. It seems as though we are heading to a diagnosis of Asperger's, but at this point I don't care what we call it. I just want my child to not hate school every day. A small thing to ask, I think. He is an absolute joy in my life and I just want to do what is best for him. The task seems exhausting, but I know it is doable. We have some amazing people helping us, both at school and privately.

In other news, my cousin had her baby. For the record I was right..a boy. I have my flight booked for Colorado in April to fly out there and meet the little man and spend some MUCH needed quality cousin time. My best friend had her baby too. And I was right about that too..a girl. I have gotten to cuddle her a few times already.

Ack. so between the dentist ( for Josh), the doctors and school visits for Sam, work, life in general and all the other assorted crap I do, I guess I am tapped out. Not to mention with the change in season, which plunges me into melancholia. Recipe for non-writing. But I am working on it. I need to add some pictures and share all kinds of insanity with the blog-sphere. Today, I was so messed up schedule-wise that I showed up to work when I was not working until tomorrow. I swear it is impossible to keep my life straight these days. I have not done that in 15 years of working there. Pray for me. :D

excuses, excuses

Ohh, do I have piles of excuses. Tons. But you don't wanna hear that crap. You just want me to get on with it. I am sure many of you thought I fell off the face of the earth. Not true. I might have wanted to, but I am still here. Damn gravity.

So I thought I would jot down a funny little conversation from my favorite little funny man, Sam. That kid cracks me up like no other.

So we are waiting for an appointment and he asks me if I know the difference between fiction and non-fiction. He tells me he prefers non-fiction books and we talk about some of the interesting titles he as been bringing home from school. What kindergarten kid do you know that reads a book on the origins of the Pony Express? He LOVED that book.

Anyway, Sam says to me, "I know what fiction is. Fiction is that bears wear ties. That is all fiction"

and that made me laugh. Not only does he get it, he has an example. Too smart for his own damn good, that alien child of mine.