Happy Memorial Day Weekend

This is just a brief post, have to go to work. Hope everyone who reads my rantings and babblings has a beautiful weekend. Throw some hotdogs or burgers on the grill, enjoy your family and relax. Count your blessings. Sit in that outdoor lawn chair, laugh, reflect and really make the most of the family time. When the day is over, every day that is, family is all you have in the world. Time to put on the waitress uniform and get in my "happy" mode. May the tip God smile on my pockets today,lol... Peace...

The Pulp Mill

Have you ever seen a pulp mill? I have. That is the thriving factory in my little town. You know you are almost there because your nasal passages tell you so. Powerful smell. Down here that is "The Job" to get. If you drive past it at night, it looks like a city unto itself. Brilliant lights glow, the hum of machinery, and again, that smell. This factory seems to be thriving. We take numerous carry-out orders for the employees. Yes, cuts loom and jobs are on the line. The plague of economic crisis hanging like a thunder cloud ready to dump. I wait on these men and women. Some of these men have worked there for 30 years. The labor is etched on their face. The pride in being able to take their family out for a nice steak dinner on Friday nights visible. The sad part is that factory is the only real source of decent employment in the area. You either work there or at the local hospital or waitress. If not you collect unemployment and food stamps. I came here from a city that was full of urban poverty. Now I see rural poverty. Poor is poor. The only difference that I can discern is that because so many people here are related and the community is so close knit, there isn't such a feeling of aloneness. I see more hope and families helping families. The big cities like Baltimore, Detroit, New York, Philly etc..you are on your own. That self preservation instinct is starting to trickle down here. You won't see people panhandling here. It isn't proper and people frown on begging. I just hope that the pulp mill keeps billowing and belching out paychecks.

One little question?

When you wake up in the early am. and flick the light on and encounter the mirror, what do you see?

Red Tape, Scotch Tape/Duct Tape

The mazes I have found myself in through-out this last month would make a lab rat insane. It's that famous red tape. Well I am nothing but a studious gal and was raised that the squeaky wheel does indeed get the oil. I found some rather large scissors yesterday via the phone and cut that infamous red tape. The only thing holding my loved one from getting their radiation started is getting them transported back to the original facility to fix the fancy pacemaker they installed. It is infected. It needs to be irrigated and whatnot. For two days they have been putting off transport. Radiation is all set up, home nursing is all set up for when I am at work and they are slowing my game plan on allowing this person to come back to the normal (well, somewhat)healthy human being before this mess happened. Through the honesty of a male nurse at the local hospital I found out that the bigger facility keeps putting them off. Basically, they installed all this hi-tech gadgetry and than didn't set up aftercare. Send ya home to a very rural area where the local hospital isn't equipped to clean up the mess. So the yankee in me raged on the phone with the original facility and now transport is set up for today. Radiation starts next week. The irony of all this? The ones that make the final decisions about care are the people who never come into contact with the actual patients. Maybe if they could see another human being aspirating mucus and flem and watch their oxygen level drop to 30% and meanwhile have a staph infection, their pens might write a little differently. I just hope that if I ever get sick, someone will fight the good fight for me. It made my heart feel good to know that I accomplished what was necessary. Don't accept the word no, when in your gut you feel yes can be an option.

Tentative Goal

Just for today, I will not slice and dice anyone verbally.
Just for today, I will not show my lack of knowledge by thinking I know everything.
Just for today, I will have the awareness to know that coffee and Xanax do not consitute breakfast.
Just for today, I will keep that snobbish, juvenile part of me quiet. (Big One)
Just for today, I will have the astutness to realize that only I can ruin my inner peace.
Just for today, I will try this again tomorrow.

Do you remember how simple these times were?

What the hell happened?

Too much medical knowledge

Canulas, aspirators, yonkers (sp)peg tubes, inner canulas, oxygen levels. These are words that I now know and understand. Running a central line was a new one I learned yesterday. Being the caretaker for a sick person is very scary to me. Went through a bought of respiratory failure yesterday, oxygen levels scarily low. Than found out that that said person is totally infected from every orfice in their body. Down to their urine. The drippings from the trach traveled a path to the freshly stitched pacemaker all the way down to the stomach feeding tube. So back to the hospital I go. A person cannot receive radiation treatment when they are this sick and weak. I hate the sterile, totally unique smell of hospitals. They all smell the same. Hospitals remind me of jail for sick people. Than there is the paper work. Numerous forms to be filled and signed. Everyone so polite but firm. There have been a few nurses, male and female that I have found to possess that special gift of comforting a paitent. Other's take temperatures as though they are checking to see if the roast in the oven is ready for dinner. I hate blogging about the medical crisis in my home. Presently this is an outlet. I haven't even had time to blog. I am constantly listening for unusual breathing, seeing if aspiration of the trach is needed. All this for a tumor the size of a quarter. The most fucked up thing of all is my efforts to quit smoking are not going so well. I am wearing the patches. I have cut down. After seeing and living this you would think I would bury and curse any cigarettes. So weak. I sneak outside for an early am smoke. I smoke with shame. There are many worse vices that I could have opted for, so I am letting it be. On a positive note Mother's Day was a huge success. I was bone tired, but made a rather nice deposit in the bank from work this weekend. I am blessed to work three days a week and meet my bills. That is one of the reasons we are living here. Auggie, my ever loyal dog, I do believe is keeping me sane. I break out the Ipod early in the am and off we go, walking around the lake, silent except for the beat in my earphones. That is when my head clears and I get mental focus. No gunshots here, except those of deer/boar hunters. The police blotter reads like something from The Andy Griffith Show. I wait on all the Andy and Barney Fife's doing their jobs with a diligence. I sometimes forget to lock my door and don't really care. I am keeping my eye on the prize. One little localized tumor that will be gone within 6-8 weeks. Than maybe the lake will be a tad more beautiful. Thanks for letting me vent.