My Swinging Lifestyle

Two months ago, I started doing one of the things I've always wanted to do -- learn to dance. I tried a couple of different types (salsa, waltz), and finally settled on West Coast Swing.

Swing is a partner dance. It's energetic, fast and fun, and you can inject a lot of your own personal style into the moves. It's really kind of a show-off, look-at-me dance.

Everyone learns the same essential moves, but because it can be so individualistic, you have to dance with lots of partners to really be good at it. My Swing Club has practice dances after all the lessons, with a mix of students from beginners to dance champions...and I make it a point to dance with all of 'em.

I have my favorites...there's the young muscley blond guy with the shy smile who has a great lead; the stylish gay guy with the fancy footwork; the enthusiastic older guy with thinning hair who never, ever gets tired and never says no; the tall skinny middle-aged guy with the handlebar mustache who seems as happy to dance as I am, even though he's slow to catch on; and the little short guy who is so breathtakingly GOOD that he makes all his partners look great.

Not only are we a mix of experience, we are a mix of ages and lifestyles and races, and dancing is our common ground.

None of it matters, only the dancing. The music and movement give me something that I just can't get anywhere else.

And...after 8 weeks in the beginner class, I passed the dance test to move up to advanced beginner...and the notoriously uncomplimentary test giver even told me that I'm light on my feet!

Anyone Home?

Gee, it's kind of dark and echo-y. It's been a long time. There are cobwebs in the corners.

Things have changed a lot, but at the same time, in many ways things haven't changed at all.

I miss this place. I miss the people who used to sometimes meet me here. I'm not quite sure why I stayed away so long, and I'm not quite sure that I won't disappear again.

But I think it's time to write a bit more.

HUHO -- Traps for Fruit Flies & Fleas, No Poison Necessary!

Lauren at Faux Real has started a carnival of Help Us Help Ourselves, for those of us who have struggled through life and found some nontraditional and cheap solutions for our problems.

As a pet owner and banana lover, I've had the occasion to rid the house of fruit flies and fleas at various times, and have managed to do so without poisons or exterminators. Sure, it takes a little longer, but these solutions are practically free and even better, they work.

First the fruit flies:

Materials needed:
Clear glass jar or drinking glass that you don't mind throwing away
Sheet of paper
Lots of clear tape
A few banana or apple slices, the riper the better

Curl the paper into a cone with a tiny hole at the bottom and tape the side, leaving the hole open.

Put the fruit slices into the bottom of the glass (I am currently out of bananas so my picture doesn't show any fruit in there).

Put it point down into your clear glass receptacle but don't allow the paper to touch the bottom or the fruit.


Use lots of tape to fix in place and completely shut off any way out of the receptacle except for that tiny hole (if you don't have the wider tape, plastic wrap can be used in a pinch).

Set it out on your counter. The fruit flies will be attracted to the fruit, they'll fly in through the tiny hole and then try to get out through the clear glass sides.

When you don't see any fruit flies outside the glass, put the glass in your trash outside. If you want to keep the glass, you can open it up -- but make sure you do it outside.

Now the fleas:

Materials you will need:

Small sturdy lamp or nightlight with a bulb of at least 20w (use the nightlight if you think your pets will knock over a lamp)
Large bowl or Rubbermaid type container
Soap
Water

Fill the bowl with soapy water. Turn on the light and position it over the bowl (if you are using a nightlight, then position the bowl under the nightlight). Put one of these in every room in which you have fleas.

The fleas will be attracted to the warmth of the light. They will jump to it and then fall into the bowl. The soapy water keeps the surface tension high enough to prevent them jumping or swimming out.

This takes a week or so but works very well with very little mess. Just be sure to put out plenty of clean water so your pets won't be tempted to drink the soapy stuff.

50th Birthday Blues

Now, most people would think that title means that being 50 is hard, and that I don't like getting older.

On the contrary, as a dear friend used to say, "Every day above ground is a good one!" I was excited about this birthday, a watermark day, a half a century achieved, happy with myself and my life. I've been practicing for 50 since I was 45 (you know, you tell people you're 50, and by the time you get there, it's old hat. In another couple of years, I'll be practicing for 60).

On my 40th birthday, when I woke up I wished for something different. I was not happy. I did get my something different; I got a divorce (look in the archives if you're curious; I have a better divorce story than anyone else I know), I enrolled in nursing school while working full time (and graduated, and passed the NCLEX in 30 minutes), I had full responsibility for two preteen kids, dated a lot, and finally moved back to Oklahoma. It was a roller coaster ride of a decade.

I am still happy. But I am also very sad.

When I got my divorce, my ex-in-laws told me that I would forever remain an honorary member of the family, and even if I wanted to leave, it was NOT allowed. Instead of in-laws, I have out-laws, and one of them, Deborah, even loaned me the money to divorce her brother.

So yes, I love them, and my life remains entwined with them to some degree, but I am most fond of Deborah; she even considers herself my daughter's second mother.

Deborah's husband Robert went to the doctor the Wednesday before Thanksgiving with headaches.

The doc was smart enough to order an MRI, which revealed a brain mass, and surgery was scheduled for the Friday after Thanksgiving.

It was a malignant tumor, and they took it out.

After the surgery, he was on my sister's ICU unit and when I asked her, she fixed it so Deborah could stay with him instead of only staying for visiting hours. Such a small thing, but the only thing I could do.

By Sunday, he was in a coma and on life support. By Thursday, he had died; 36 years old, leaving behind a wife who adored him and two small children. He was the funniest and most open minded of all my out-laws and I will miss him.

My 50th birthday was Wednesday. Yes indeed, every day above ground IS a good one. Every day is a gift and a treasure. I only wish Robert could have many more of them.

Share the Wealth

Last week, one of the MDs I work with said, "I wish I had your zest for life."

It's a gift, this joy, and I think I was given that to balance the sorrow that an extremely tender heart often gives me.

Things that seem small to others -- birds chirping, blue skies, a friendly face -- make my heart sing; while that's a trite way to put it, that's exactly how it feels.

At the same time, other things which people seem to manage to avoid thinking about -- a squashed squirrel, a sad face, an obituary of a stranger -- these leave an ache. When I can help, I don't hurt; but when I can't help, it hurts.

My children are the same way; when they were younger, even though we all knew the animal on the side of the road was dead, we'd all reassure each other with, "It's resting. Just resting. Fast asleep." It was our conspiracy of kindness for each other, helping us protect our emotions...and in helping each other, the original hurt we couldn't help was soothed for us.

Sometimes I think I should have helped my children learn to be emotionally tougher, except that I'm not sure how I would have done that...or that I would have been happy with that result in the long run. I have to admit that it gives me great delight to see my son rescue drowning earthworms, or to hear about my daughter coaxing a scared lost dog from the highway into her car and then finding it a home.

Learning to understand my sadness was my key to finding joy.

So Doc, I hope you can find your zest for life; I've talked with you enough to know you have the sadness down. Perhaps you need your own conspiracy of kindness, and find your delights in the world around you. They're here -- open your eyes and look.

Rate Your Pain

Pain is the 5th vital sign (after BP, pulse, respirations, and temp), according to what I was told in nursing school. Pain is an indicator of things gone wrong, and it's also ethically wrong to leave a patient in pain if it can be avoided.

At one of my jobs (head and neck), pain is taken very seriously, and strong drugs are prescribed on a fairly regular basis, because a lot of what we treat is cancer, which is very painful. At my other job, however, pain is often ignored, because some (not all) psych patients desperately want the high that pain meds can give.

Last night, we happened to have a patient with compartment syndrome. Of the four of us working, none of us knew what this was, so we looked it up. Compartment syndrome is a condition in which an area of the leg will be injured (possibly by having circulation cut off), and this results in chronic, long-term pain which is much worse than the condition seems to warrant...yet the psychiatrist had only prescribed Tylenol, and nothing stronger, so I had to make a middle of the night call to get her a stronger medication.

So we nurses started talking about pain, and pain ratings. Normally, we ask patients to rate pain on a scale of 0-10, with 0 being "none" and 10 being the "worst imaginable".

Most cancer patients rarely rate their pain as high as 10. Most psych patients rarely rate their pain as less than 10, perhaps because they are afraid they will not be taken seriously...or perhaps because they are desperate for the brief relief from reality that enough morphine or demerol will give them. And many psych nurses have no patience with people displaying med-seeking behaviors (and sometimes, they are mistaken, like with the compartment syndrome lady).

One of the long-time psych nurses said, "When they rate their pain as a 10, I always want to say, 'if someone stuck a dagger in your heart, would that hurt worse? Yes? Then it's not a 10, IS IT?'" While none of us would ever say this, even to a patient who appeared to be drug seeking, it struck us as very funny. Of course, at 4:30am, with my 3 coworkers each nearing the end of a double shift, everything is funny.

When I came home, Gavin happened to be awake, savoring the last of his weekend and already dreading Monday.

Gavin, groaning: "Oh, Mom, it's school tomorrow. Monday is like Tuesday, only it's evil. It's awful. Mondays HURT."

So, I asked him to rate his pain on a scale of 0-10, and when he rated it as 10, I asked, "If someone stuck a dagger in your heart, would that hurt worse?"

Gavin: "If someone stuck a dagger in my heart, I wouldn't have to go to school! I could join the circus and be the 'Dagger in the Heart Boy' and everyone would pay to see me! And no school again, ever!"

Why is it that my conversations with Gavin always seem to veer off into weirdness? (I have to admit, though, I take a lot of joy in it...)

Crime and Punishment

My children are spoiled rotten. And it's all their own fault.

Early on, both kids realized the futility of screaming, having fits, arguing, or any of those other negative ways to achieve desires.

I can hold out against those things forever; they only make me more firm in whatever decision I have made.

What I can't resist, though, are Puppy Eyes.

I think Alex was 6 or 7 before she discovered this -- in some mysterious way, her eyes would grow twice as big and slightly glassy (as though tear filled), her lips turn ever so slightly down, eyebrows slightly raised, head tilted to the side, chin tilted down, and her brow furrowed...and she'd gaze up at me as though her last hope had just disappeared.

It was a look that would break the hardest heart. It turned me to mush in an instant, and after that, "No" became "Maybe" and finally, "Yes".

After that, any discipline I was able to muster swiftly dissipated with each glimpse of Puppy Eyes.

And then Gavin learned the secret too, and I was lost.

Luckily, they have never abused their power. They've learned to use Puppy Eyes for Good instead of Evil.

It's funny, though, to have a 6 foot tall, scraggly-bearded, 17-year-old boy on the cusp of manhood make Puppy Eyes at me. How can he be taller than me and STILL manage to be gazing up at me while we're both standing?

It's all part of the Puppy Eyes magic. And it means I'm bringing home pizza after work.

Freaks

I joined Netflix a couple of months ago, and Gavin and I have been indulging ourselves once a week or so with the classic, old, or strange movies that we could never find at Blockbuster. Gavin's a fan of the noir genre (partly because of the ultra cool hats), and I've always liked old films, so we have a good time with it.

We saw a movie I've wanted to see for a long time -- Freaks -- and it was even darker than I thought it would be. If you've never seen this movie, it's about a circus in which there are two distinct groups: the "normal" people and the "sideshow" people and the interactions between the two groups. There are no special effects; the sideshow folks play themselves.

Since this is a pre-PC movie, I feared it would be belittling or sensational (especially since it also involves an attempted murder), but it wasn't. The physical differences are portrayed in a matter-of-fact way, and by the end of the movie, it's plain that the "freaks" are those so-called "normal" people who have emotional and ethical handicaps.

I've noticed, over the past few years, my increasing invisibility as I age. Stranger's eyes slide over and past me without stopping; most don't talk unless I talk first. In fact, the people who most usually interact with me spontaneously are other women my age.

I am not quite sure I can put down in words the elusive thoughts that connect my feelings of invisibility to the movie. The connections are there, tied up in societal definitions of beauty and our current narrow definition of it. I know so few women who are truly happy with their bodies, truly comfortable within their own skin..."I have to lose a few pounds"..."look at this fat roll"..."my nose is too big"..."I can't stand this cellulite".

I look at my friends, though, and they are gorgeous. *We* are gorgeous. We've earned every one of our years, sometimes at high cost, and we've persevered. We're the survivors of our generation and we have much to share with the world around us.

When I look at women's magazines, the "beauty tips" are all about "this year's face" or "this year's look". Do we really all have to look the same to be attractive? Because that's the thing about older women: we look lived in. Who and what we are is written on our faces and our bodies. There's no "this year's look" for us; we have each found our own way to look, and our own style, and sometimes I wonder if that's why society doesn't want to deal with us. Like the "freaks" in the movie, we're individuals. As young adults, we could try on different personas, different ways to look, and we could blend in with the crowd if we wished. As we get older, though, our individuality becomes too great to hide behind similar makeup and similar fashions. Our life experiences have marked us. We don't all fit in the same tidy package...and most of us don't want to anymore.

Or maybe it's just me, and I'm doomed to become the crazy cat lady down the block.

Define "Boring"

Gavin: Mom, would you buy me a copy of Dante's Inferno?

Me: Sure. Do you need it for school?

Gavin: No, but my psychology class is really boring...and if I hide it inside my textbook, then Mrs. Harris won't realize I'm actually reading something else.
Besides, I've always wanted to read it.

------

Gavin has the most surprising choices of reading material (the last thing he asked me to buy was the Tao Te Ching)...and yes, I bought it. If he wants to read The Inferno instead of listening to the high school psychology teacher expound on telekinesis (yes, that was one of their units), then I'm all for that.

Curiosity Didn't Kill the Nurse -- but it was close...

I had to have a "procedure" yesterday, nothing difficult, just a same day surgery to make life a little easier and maybe get the whole menopause thing to kick into a higher gear. I didn't even tell my daughter until the night before because it just wasn't that important.

Although I've felt better, I don't feel all that bad today...although I would have taken today off work if I didn't have a cart full of charts and a deadline in which to review them.

I wouldn't even have blogged about it, if it weren't for the mystery.

Who sent me flowers? 10 red and white roses, to be specific. Delivered to my desk in my department this afternoon and signed only, "Thinking of You".

They're not from Roger. I called the florist, and they can only tell me that someone from out of town sent them. My daughter didn't send them (although she says if she'd thought of it, she would have). Mom would have signed the card "Love, Mom". My brother would have signed it "ooga-booga" or "The Greatest Steve the World Has Ever Known". Robyn would have sent me something she made (she makes incredibly cool stuff). Gavin lives here (and has no money and wouldn't know how to go about ordering flowers). My sister lives here. My nieces don't have a clue where I work. A vendor or pharma company would surely have put something different on the card. My exhusband won't even send me his half of Gavin's dental bills, much less flowers. It's unlikely that any of my other friends from out of town know that I work in this department...so who the heck sent them?

Curiosity makes me crazy. All my life, I've understood just how the proverbial cat felt.

Even so, someone's apparently random act of kindness sure made my day (and has the whole department talking -- and it's fun to be the object of office envy for a day). So, Mysterious Person, thank you!

Extreme Volunteering

I spent most of the day Saturday working with a pet rescue group, getting ready for OKC's Giant Charity Garage Sale.

Instead of working directly with pets (which I've found to be dangerous -- more on that later), I get to work with people's castoff stuff...unloading, pricing, packing and stacking...in another couple of weeks, we'll move all of it out to the fairgrounds and then spend some very long days wheeling and dealing and amassing money by nickels and dimes for homeless animals.

This is a great thing to do in the springtime, in warm sunshine and balmy breezes, with a crew of similarly minded folks (pet rescue people tend to be a lot of fun). We work out of a storage unit facility, so there's no heating and no air conditioning, and little protection from the elements when the doors are open.

This Saturday it was 38 degrees and pouring rain. Most of the crew didn't show up (probably wimped out like my friend Bev), so those of us who did worked like...like...well, not any dogs I know. My dogs tend to spend a lot of time lazing on pillows, even acknowledging my return home with a couple of tail thumps and perhaps an ear perk if they're feeling particularly lively. I suppose I could say that we worked like nurses...

Surprisingly, though, the bad weather brought out the donors in record numbers. Maybe it just seemed like record numbers because there were so few of us to get the work done, or maybe because the rain made for lots of extra work because the Oklahoma winds drove it sideways and right into our faces; we had to work so far back in the storage unit that it was hard to move around.

One couple dropped off 10 to 12 big, heavy boxes of stuff. When we opened them, they all turned out to be trash -- empty plastic bottles, burned out electrical equipment, broken pots. I can't figure out why they did this, unless they wanted a tax receipt without actually donating anything.

Most people, though, brought stuff that should be fairly easy to sell -- furniture, working small electrics, toys, craft stuff, clothes, shoes, dishes, pots, decorative and holiday stuff, even an English saddle...which someone marked $20 until I made them remark it. That riding stuff is expensive.

If you've gotten this far, you are probably wondering why I find it dangerous to work with the shelter animals.

Every time I do, I take one home. I just can't stand the thought of homeless dogs and cats. And since I'm down to two dogs and a lizard, I feel somewhat guilty that I haven't taken in another pet...all it would take would be pleading brown eyes looking into mine, or a hairy body leaning on my leg.

Brothers -- Davin and Jeron.

The Second Oldest Profession

My friend Bev likes to say that nursing is the second oldest profession. She's probably right.

Saturday night, I worked adult psych, 11-7. The unit's lost a couple of full time nurses, so instead of working child psych these days, I usually wind up with the grownups.

The moon was full, or almost full, and while research studies seem to indicate that the full moon has nothing to do with weirdness, I'm not sure I believe it.

We had a lot of people who couldn't sleep, who were up and down and pacing and talking. Nice group, though; everyone was polite and friendly.

Mary, the nurse I worked with, is an attractive older lady, late 50s, elegantly (if casually) dressed (if you work psych, you can wear street clothes if you want), with lovely jewelry, manicured nails, nicely coiffed hair...and like me, she has a "fluffy" body shape (as in, we used to have hourglass figures but they sunk to the bottom). She has a kind and caring grandmotherly air about her, and most of the patients love her.

So here we are, sitting in the day room, working on our paperwork, every now and then redirecting someone who's up and a little loud, when a very psychotic female patient touches a male patient (whom she had just met that day) VERY inappropriately. When Mary redirected her, the patient said, "You hussy! If you'd just quit your nude dancing, my husband here would come home to me!"

She sent both patients off to their (own) beds, then sat down and looked at me with a mischievous air.

"You do know that I'd probably make a lot more money nude dancing, don't you?" she asked.

I think, O-KAY! It IS a full moon...

And then she continued, grinning, "Because they'd pay a lot of money to see me keep my clothes ON!"

If Your Opportunity Alarm Clock is Ringing, Don't Hit the Snooze Button!

"Does the Pope have more than one hat? If the Pope tells a monk to do pushups, does the monk have to do it? When the Pope dies, what happens to his hat? Does the Pope have a mechanic whose only job is to service the Popemobile? When the Popemobile is worn out, can someone buy the old one? If the Pope wanted to sing karaoke, could he?

"My history teacher says Walmart is run by Satan!"

"I bet if Harriet Meiers gets to be a Supreme Court Justice, she probably won't get invited to all the cool Supreme Court parties, just the boring ones, probably because she won't know how to hold the gavel, so all the other Justices will make fun of her."

There was more, much more...

Gavin spent the day listening to a motivational speaker at school (because of his schedule, he had to listen to it TWICE), and when I got home he started off by telling me how bad the speaker was (see title example) and then giving me examples of how he could do it better, complete with hand motions, body language, inane examples, and special voice effects.

Then, once he'd got started talking, he couldn't stop; probably because he hasn't had much to say for awhile. Between his school-work and my work-work, we've been pretty quiet here for a few weeks.

I've been working on an IND for a new study that one of the docs wrote. An IND, or "Investigational New Drug" is what has to be approved by the FDA everytime a new drug (or a new use for an old drug) is studied.

When I do a pharmaceutical trial, all this is done by the pharma company. But when I do this for the doc, I get to do all that lovely (ugh) paperwork, which is written in government speak. I think I wound up with 150 pages, and my brain feels soggy. Plus now I have to make up some data capture forms and make sure the doc and the residents fill them out each time, because when an IND is done by a site, then the investigator is ultimately responsible for EVERYTHING connected with it. So I have to make sure all our ducks are in a row...and then there's another study (written by the same guy, if he ever leaves I won't have anything to do) that I have to see if I can get donations of 7 different products (enough for 100 people), write a questionnaire covering all the data the doc wants to know, write a budget (with things like 800 spray bottles), and I had to have it all done, along with applications to 3 different on-campus entities, at 5 o'clock today...I did it with 5 minutes to spare...

I've worked late every night for 3 weeks and I feel like my brain has run a marathon.

So tonight was a treat. And yeah, I hope the Pope DOES get to sing karaoke if he wants.

She Wore a Raspberry....Guillotine?

Why are adolescents so crazy-making to their parents?

Gavin and I just came off a week and half of the silent treatment...all because Evil Overlord Mom insisted that the lawn had to be mowed, and when it wasn't, draconian measures were instituted (gasp! no computer games for a week! oh, the horror of it all!).

Anyway, on the drive to school this morning, glaciers thawed, and Gavin informed me that one of his friends feels compelled to write the complete history of Candyland.

Candyland (for those of you who have successfully avoided or blocked out any memory or connection to toddlers) is a very simple board game which has been around for at least 40 years. Players roll dice and draw cards and move a gingerbread-man-shaped token through various kingdoms of candy, ruled over by monarchs such as Mr. Mint, King Kandy, and Queen Frostine.

Both my kids were fascinated by Candyland until they were about four. I finally got smart and started stacking the deck so that a) the child could win the game quickly (but not too quickly, otherwise we'd have to play again) and b) so that I wouldn't draw either Queen Frostine or Princess Lolly too early in the game, because either of those is pretty much a guaranteed win...and an early win is OK if it's the KID winning; if it's the parent's early win, then you may have to play it 2 or 3 MORE times.

OK, I thought; so he's interested in the history of board games and that one's been around awhile.

But no. No, this is a history of CANDYLAND, in which civil war erupts between Princess Lolly and Queen Frostine, Lord Licorice attempts to infiltrate King Kandy's domain by employing Mr. Mint as a spy, Grandma Nutt is consumed by Gloppy, the Chocolate Swamp Monster, and then the peasants revolt, kill all the heads of state with the Raspberry Guillotine...and eventually Candyland is subsumed into the Hapsburg Empire, sometime around 1600.

Maybe "The Candyman" was their national anthem?

I have to admit, it makes those seemingly endless games of Candyland much better in retrospect...

Tuesday Self Portrait -- Gemini

Robyn and I have been friends since the 5th grade. Although she's lived in California for a very long time (while I'm here in Oklahoma), whenever we get to see each other, it's as though no time has passed inbetween. We considered each other's parents our own, never bothered to knock when entering the other's house, and traded clothes, notes, books, letters, and artwork. She's the most creative and artistic person I think I've ever met; especially when it comes to fabric arts (Rog comes close, though, and has the upper hand when it comes to pencil portraits).

We are twins of the heart.

I got to spend a few days with her when I went to Dana Point for the research meeting; I took her a suitcase loaded with fabric, and she took me to the beach.

Back in junior high, in the 70s, we were tan fanatics. This time, while sitting in the sand side by side, I was thinking about all the times we'd lie in the sun in our bikinis...that wonderful sensation as the sunshine lies heavy on your body and you just exist and soak up the rays...and she looked at my legs and said, "Jodie! Your legs are so white!" I think, OK, I know I look like a zombie, but do you have to rub it in? And then Robyn continues, "They are SOOOO BEAUTIFUL! I wish my legs were that white!"

You can know someone for all your life, and they can STILL surprise you.

Nurse: Superhero, Villain...or Vampire?

Yesterday evening, after putting in a full day at my research job, I had to go to CAPE class for my second (psych) job.

Like many caregiver classes offered through the hospital, it was mandatory so we all get paid to take it, which is a good thing since it ate up six hours of my limited free time.

CAPE, or "Creating a Positive Environment", is more or less a method for deflating aggression, and if that doesn't work, using some skills to A) escape from a violent patient or B) help someone else escape from a violent patient. Unfortunately, it doesn't involve anything cool like kung fu moves or 007 style equipment.

First we got to practice using all the restraints in our arsenal, from the 5 point leathers (wrists, ankles, and waist) to the fabric restraints which are really more to help very old, ill, or confused patients from falling out of bed or a chair, to the restraints which are considered to be "medical immobilization" (such as restraining an arm for a minute or so while you put in an IV). The big difference between "restraints" and "medical immobilization" is that the nurse has to have an MD's order for a restraint, it has to be charted on frequently (depending on the type), and the patient has to be checked continuously for some and frequently for the others...while for a "medical immobilization", none of that has to occur.

We had to practice tying each other up in this stuff and then undoing it. Since you have to assume your patient doesn't want to have restraints, you have to realize you'll be trying to put these unwieldy things onto someone who's flailing and angry, so practice is good. It was a little spooky when my partner put leathers on me and I realized that even though the wrist restraint was on the smallest hole, I could STILL pull my hand out...which means a patient could, too. And we got to hear all the horror stories about patients who were put into the fabric restraints the wrong way and managed to suffocate themselves, which was NOT a cheery experience.

Then we got to practice our moves...what to do if someone grabs your arm, your clothes, your hair, bites you, grabs you in a bearhug, tries to choke you, puts you in a full nelson, tries to hit you with something, how to block a punch or a kick, how to hold a patient so they can't hurt you, how to trade off with another caregiver when you get tired, and how to hold someone really large with multiple staff members...and how to do all those things with the least harm to yourself or the patient.

We have to learn all this, but in the 15 years I've worked in mental health, I've never had to use it; and really, I've only had two patients who had difficult moments when I thought there might be trouble, but there wasn't. So I suppose I'm either lucky or doing something right.

Anyway when I got home, I was pretty tired. Gavin asked me how CAPE training went...and then asked "What level did you make, Mom?"

"Level?" I asked.

"Yeah, you know, like Superhero!" And he expansively waved his arms to indicate a graceful billowing cape as he leaped across the room while singing "Here I come to save the day!"...

...only to turn, his nose in the crook of his elbow, imaginary cape swirling around his feet, and his eyes narrowed, staring piercingly..."Or Vampire!" and immediately switching to a heavy Transylvanian accent, "I don't drink....vine..."

...then, in a half crouch, still with his nose in the crook of his arm, imaginary cape hiding half his face, twirling an imaginary handlebar mustache, with shifty gaze and deep commanding voice, "Or Villain! I'll tie you to the railroad tracks if you don't pay your rent, BWAA HAA HAA!!"

I'd MUCH rather have done that kind of "CAPE" training...and who knows, some of the patients might prefer that, too.

The Flying Zlorbian

After being shanghaied by pirate ninjas (or was it ninja pirates?) for two weeks (one of which the villains stood over me and MADE ME GET ALL MY WORK DONE, made me wrap and ship 30-some-odd Ebay packages, and clean my house because my Mom was coming to stay with Gavin...and even pirate/ninjas respect the fact that the house MUST be clean for Mom. Especially since I have yet to live down the incident years ago of the moldy bread that somehow got pushed to the back of the cabinet...which Mom found, of course...I don't think penicillin factories have any more mold. At least it was still in the wrapper. Green fuzzy bread, anyone?). I left for California on Sunday after working 11-7 Saturday, arrived home on Friday and worked ANOTHER 11-7. I'm "too pooped to pop" as Dad always said. I still don't know what that means, but I love to say it.

I have a lot to say about my time in California (Hi Dave & Dorian, Alex, and Robyn!!!) but right now I want to talk about last night.

I worked Adult Psych, which is a whole different world than child psych. And adult psych at night can be even stranger...and a night with a full moon...well...

Now, I know that there have been studies (or so I have been told; I haven't read 'em) that purport to debunk the full moon weirdness factor. However, in this instance, Nurse Lore trumps PhD studies (especially as it is backed up by Police Lore, EMT Lore, ER Lore, and Night Convenience Store Clerk Lore), and besides, we all know that PhD really means "Pizza Hut Delivery". (Remember, this is NOT a slam at PhDs. I expect my brother to be one any time now, and I have to keep up, don't I?)

Anyway, Nurse Lore states that people and situations get stranger during the full moon, and it's not just psych.

Evening shift report indicated that everyone had had a good day, which is a tremendously wonderful thing on a psych unit, so the Charge Nurse (I've never had this term explained to me; while I assume it means "In Charge" maybe it really involves credit cards and Nordstrom's sales after one gets off work...wow, did she have nice clothes) and I hoped for the best and started our paperwork.

We had a steady procession all night of agreeable, pleasant, and polite, but extraordinarily psychotic patients who "just couldn't sleep" -- more than half of them were awake at one time or another. Of course, this had nothing to do with the loud buzzing noise the air conditioner made every time it went on, and nothing to do with the extremely loud and deep voice of our Mental Health Tech who has a BA in psychology and wanted to "do therapy" with the patients and kept cornering them; Charge and I kept redirecting him AND the patients in an effort to get everyone (well, everyone except us) some sleep. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing sometimes.

When I got back in this morning, Gavin asked me about my night. He's been fascinated by psychoses ever since I had a patient who'd found out my number and would call me EVERY NIGHT at 10 pm and tell me (or whoever answered, sometimes one of the kids) what the "angels" had said to her that day (almost always something bright and happy). I told him one patient told me he was possessed by aliens (I have to be careful about what I say because I cannot give out any identifying information...and trust me, this is a very, very small part of this patient's delusionary system).

Gavin immediately assumed this meant "alien ghosts" since possession must be a supernatural phenomenon...and aliens probably would be natural, not supernatural...except that Gavin was not allowing for the lack of reasoning ability in someone who is acutely psychotic. Since it wasn't alien ghosts, he decided that the patient must be possessed by some alien thing which skirts the realm of the natural and the supernatural...like the Flying Dutchman...Yes! It must be the Flying Zlorbian, forced to wander the universe and possess the minds of unwitting humans...

Oh dear. I don't know whether to worry about him or tell him to write a book.

For anyone who wants to send a care package to an evacuee, the address here in Oklahoma is:

Any Evacuee c/o Camp Gruber
100 Highway 10
Braggs, OK 74423

I'm thinking about things to help stay busy, cards, games, craft kits, stamps, envelopes, paper, notebooks, writing utensils, small toys, books...as well as things people have to be asking for all the time...toiletries, treats, makeup, hair bands...I know there are some other things, I just can't think of them offhand. If you can think of anything I left off, please post in the comments!

I've sent them to soldiers and now I'll send them to evacuees, too. I'm sending at least one on Tuesday.

I just can't IMAGINE having everything swept away and having to rely totally on strangers.

Disaster Planning

Last night I worked phone banks for 5 hours as a part of my state's medical reserve corps, which started after the Murrah Building bombing. I and my telefellows took calls from medical professionals who were interested in working with disaster victims.

The calls were interesting; we had a sprinkling of medical personnel, every type from embalmers and medical examiners to urologists and respiratory therapists, with the majority being nurses. These folks mostly stated they were ready to go with an hour's notice, and go where ever needed, in state or out of state, and at their own expense if necessary.

We also had a number of calls of people who had loaded vans ready to go to Mississippi or Louisiana and were calling us for what? The blessing of the state, I suppose, but bureaucracies don't tend to condone that sort of thing.

I enjoyed being a part of the process and seeing plans made and discarded and remade; frantic searches for safe places for large numbers of people to stay; calls from various city and state officials; calls to hospital administrators to find open hospital beds; and even the beginnings of long term planning.

With all the action, though, there were stretches where we waited, and then we talked.

It was surprising, the amount of "blame the victim" that went on. "I don't understand why everyone didn't leave." "I'd never let my kids go hungry." "Looters should all be shot. And we'll have to have people guarded while they're here because a lot of them will be looters."

I understand WHY people blame the victims -- it's fear. They cannot acknowledge the fear that bad things can happen to anyone. So "those people" must be different; not too bright, not able to solve problems, criminals, junkies...when the truth is that we could easily be in their shoes if something tremendous and horrible had happened here.