Assessing Good, Buttwiping Bad

I've just not felt like I'm really alive in quite some time. Kind of feel like the walking dead. Start finding myself wanting to snap at these people I work with too. Its not their fault that they're old and falling apart and that if I ever get that old and falling apart I'm going to walk in front of a fucking train! They want you to make everything better but you can't because fuck, woman, or man (I deal with more women because they live longer, I suppose) I didn't make you 97 years old and with everything malfunctioning and hurting and I'm not God so I can't reverse it for you! And I suppose if he wanted to reverse it for you he'd have done it already! Sometimes I get really tired of dealing with the old and the infirm and people in general and want to go work somewhere with plants or something that won't get bitchy with me because I can't really help them, all I can do is make sure they dont' fall on their aged, infirm ass while they're walking to the bathroom! Forgive me, I'm just mentally and physically exhausted.

I like it when I get to do what I was hired to do--answer emergency calls. I'm actually pretty good at assessing when something's wrong with a person and when it can wait till they can see their doctor. I've heard "good call" more than once when I've sent a person out. I'll be hearing it after this recent emergency. The lady had right shoulder pain and shortness of breath. She has a pacemaker, just had a new stent put in on Monday. Blood pressure 100/70 (brought down by the nitro would be my guess) Tachycardia with pulse ranging between 115 and 125. 89% o2 saturation. Time to go to the hospital!

So why don't I work on an ambulance? My back is shot and the pay is lower than what I make here. Why don't I work in a hospital? My age and the fact that I've worked in nursing homes for so long are against me. So I was getting to use my license looking out for these folks, answering when they called. Sometimes they'd fallen but weren't hurt and if I could get them up by myself I did, otherwise I called Lift Assist to help. Sometimes they'd fallen and were hurt, so I called 911. Sometimes its a medical emergency like this one. But I always felt like I was using my EMT license in some capacity most of the time when people called.

That was before Alvin N. Chipmunkk decided it was time to turn this department into Toilet Assistance Central. That's why I'm frustrated as hell. And that's why I need to bitch about the fact that EMT'S AND FIREFIGHTERS DON'T MAKE JACK SHIT! From what I hear, cops don't either. What kind of joke is it to pay an entry level EMT $8.50 per hour, a firefighter $11 per hour and a cop $30,000 per year. But if you're a thug on the basketball court you're pulling millions. Something is really fucked with our priorities in this world.

I might feel better if I kick Alvin N. Chipmunkk's nuts. He has a big jar of them on his desk. I'm thinking if I boot them out the window it will relieve some stress!

It's Not Funny Anymore

I usually have a light-hearted approach when I write about my frustrations on this job here, but right now I'm feeling pretty heavy handed. I am so tired of the administrative short-sighted "bottom line" approach that Alvin N. Chipmunkk has and his half sister, Squirrelette, parrots. The guidelines state that people living in the independent residences have to maintain a modicum of independent abilities and if they are unable to do certain things due to physical or cognitive impairment, then they must either hire a caregiver or move to Assisted Living or Healthcare, depending on the degree of their impairment. The assistants in this department are supposed to provide EMERGENCY care and do things such as dispense medications or provide TEMPORARY support assistance for someone who has returned from the hospital. We are not supposed to be performing lifts and transfers. We are not supposed to be dealing with ongoing incontinence issues or people who are serious fall risks on a longterm basis. We also provide support which necessitates very high levels of medical training, such as doing laundry and making beds. ;-) What we are NOT supposed to be doing, according to the manual, is providing services which people are generally supposed to be able to take care of themselves, such as going to the bathroom or changing their own incontinence briefs in the event that they are incontinent. If someone sometimes has to call because they've had an "accident," so be it. But not every night!

We are now going to have to start providing SHOWERS to a woman who has just returned from Health Care (where she should actually be residing due to her deteriorating spine.) And also bathroom assists. We already have "Joanne," to whom we give three bathroom assists every night. And "Frank," who has terrible sinus problems and is getting more and more confused and calls every night to ask if we have "anything else" we can give him. He doesn't remember that he's been told that we can't give OTC meds without a doctor's order. However, Frank is charged for each time we are called to his room. Get it? No wonder Alvin doesn't want to suggest that Frank might fare better in another setting.

Wednesday nights are promising to be the Cluster Fuck From Hell with the shower for "Anika," the extra ironing for "Marie," plus the usual stuff. We have had to send ten people to the hospital over the past three days for severe vomiting and diarrhea which always also involves an increase in blood pressure. This is actually the sort of thing that I'm SUPPOSED to be dealing with. But in the midst of dealing with the emergency, I have to be worrying that I missed getting up to Joanne's room at 2 a.m. to walk her to the bathroom.

Joanne is a very nice woman, but it irritates me that if she has a problem with the way we do something, rather than telling us directly, she goes to the nurse. Maybe she feels bad about criticizing people to their face. But I'd rather that she tell me when she has a problem with the way I do something rather than going to Squirrellette and making me look like a bozo.

Honestly, Folks, I am very sick of working in this kind of setting. I don't really want to be working in medicine at all any more. But as that's where my training is, I'm kinda stuck at this point. If I do end up moving back to the Southwest in a few years, I hope I can find another bartending job. I'm tired of people's butts and shitty attitudes.

Sick of it all right now.

The thought of shooting myself and getting it over with crossed my mind in a serious way. Then I thought about my son. He still needs me.

But I have to admit if lightning were to rip through the roof of this godforsaken joint right now, I'd be diving to get under the bolt, no shit!

And I would hope to go to a realm with no more ass.

But with my luck, Axe Man would just end up following me everywhere.

Nah. It's not worth it.

The (burned out, pissed off and miserable) Cheesemeister

Crack Smokin'

It's sad to see that Alvin N. Chipmunkk has apparently driven his cousin Chip, the activities director, to smoking crack. Part of my amazing job is to post the activities notices that Chip makes. Last night Chip handed me a stack. One of the notices was a duplicate, so I didn't post it. Tonight Chip left a new stack of notices, including the duplicate notice and wrote me a note which said:

"Please take down the other Meeting With Mr. Chipmunkk and Friends" notice. This new notice announces the changes. The speaker will be the same, but the date and topic are different."

I looked at the new notice. It said:

Meeting with Mr. Chipmunkk and Friends

Why Alvin N. Chipmunkk Is The Greatest Retirement Community Administrator

Crusty Crabb, Keynote Speaker

10:00 A.M.

Chipmunkk's Nest Lounge, Fifth Floor

I looked at the old notice. Care to take a guess what it said?

I was not envronmentally conscientious as I removed the old notices and replaced them with the duplicate new notices. Far be it from me to argue with that great a lack of logic!

Sorry, my telepathy is down

Alvin N. Chipmunkk's cousins, Chip and Dale, are our activities director and her assistant. They really are nice ladies, but recently they were the perpetrators of the kind of miscommunication that is rife around this place.

Part of my job involves going to the various bulletin boards in this vast facility during my shift and posting activities notices. There is also a podium in the dining room where they make announcements. All Chip ever told me is that I was to put the notices at the podium, where there is a notebook with dividers in it labeled Monday through Saturday. I was doing so, but was getting complaints that the announcements weren't making it to the podium. Well, it ain't my fault what happens to them once they're there, I figured. So if someone's been making off with them or accidentally throwing them out, that's Somebody Else's Problem!

What Chip had neglected to tell me was that I was to put a notice both on the day before and the day of the activity and that they only made announcements at lunch and dinner, so if you post a morning activity on the day of the activity, the activity will have already happened by the time it is announced.

Welll.....

It would have been nice if I had known this from the get-go!

Seriously, Chip does a great job. But this situation somewhat made me want to throttle her. My telepathy has been broken for some time now, you know!

I Must Have Been Truly Evil In Another Life...

To deserve to be smelling someone else's dumps every morning.

Ok, I am better off than I was when I was working in the health care center, because at least in this case the person can wipe their own toot-toot.

But still...

Whenever I go at 1:30-ish in the morning to assist this lady to the toilet, make sure she gets there without falling and breaking one of her fragile hips and helping her pull down her Depends, I know what I'm in for. Because 1:30-ish is the magic hour for her bowels to empty.

I know she's embarrassed about it, but what can ya do?

I go stand outside the door. Still, poop stink is stealthy. It migrates into the other room. And I say "God DAMN!" I stand there hiding the fact that I'm retching and gagging. Poor woman. It isn't her fault. I hope I die before I get old and decrepit enough to require someone to help my worn-out ass to the bathroom because one's bowels do not get better with age. I guar-on-tee that the poor fool who would have to assist me in this fashion would be lying on the floor vomiting like the victim of a poison gas attack, because that will be what they'd have been hit with, given the ancient bowels that don't digest properly and my proclivity for eating onions and garlic and other spicy foods that make your poop reek to high heaven.

Before I die I really, really, really want to be in a profession that doesn't involve butts and bowels and all the other smelly private functions. So everybody has to buy my book when it comes out. It will earn you good karma, I guar-on-tee!

Read The Poop Report for funny, disgusting poop tales!

Alzheimer's, Lies, and Fiber Supplements

Greetings from the Gerri Atrik Retirement Community! From the supposed "independent" section of our community, where less and less independent people are being allowed to maintain residence longer and longer without permanent help.

Keep in mind that I am supposed to be an emergency services person. I quit working in a total care setting because my back can't take it and I was mentally burned out on dealing with people who are completely confused and sometimes hostile.

"Pauline" was supposed to move to Assisted Living, but something held the family back. Probably the fact that Alvin N. Chipmunkk is so desirous of revenue that he decided to let Pauline stay so that we can continue to collect 6 Quatloos every time we go to her apartment.

The latest thing is that Pauline doesn't like to take her fiber. She doesn't like the taste. So she lies and says she's taken it. So we're supposed to go up and make it for her. Mix the teaspoon of fiber in four ounces of water. At eleven o clock at night, no less.

So, up I go. Pauline is sitting there watching television. She isn't wearing her oxygen, which she is supposed to be doing.

"Hi Pauline," I say. "I'm here to get you your fiber."

"I already took my fiber," says Pauline.

What am I supposed to do? Accuse the woman of being a liar? Mix up a glass of the fiber, pin her to the floor and pour it down her throat?
"You sure?" I say.
"Yes," she says, suddenly less friendly. Kind of the reaction I expected.

"Well, ok," I say. "How about if you put on your oxygen."

"I'll do it when I go to bed," she said slightly snappishly. "You don't have to worry about everything so much."

9 times out of 10 when I go up to check on Pauline at 2 in the morning, she is NOT wearing her oxygen and the concentrator is turned off. I wake her up and have her put on the oxygen.

This woman is either in the middle stages of Alzheimer's or has some other kind of dementia issue. She is not appropriate to an independent living situation without a personal aide.

I can't force her to take the damn fiber if she doesn't want to, and even if she is experiencing dementia, it isn't my place to be condescending to her and treat her like a bad child. I documented the experience, including everything she said. That's all I can do.

It's frustrating, but so is looking for a job. I just keep telling myself that everything changes. Hopefully not for the worse.

Working Sick

Thankfully I don't have to help Albert tonight, because I really feel like hell. I'm having stomach cramps on top of menstrual misery, and you really wanted to know that, and I don't care.

For some reason, during the three days that I was gone, this addled man discovered that he should push his emergency alert every time he needs to pee, and he was needing to pee a lot. My co-worker complained (and rightfully) that it is very time consuming to have to go to his apartment every 45 minutes to an hour. So finally the family got enough of a clue to hire a night caregiver--at least for tonight and Sunday night. I'm not sure why Saturday night is cursed, and I'm not sure what it's going to take for the administration, the family, or both to get a clue. Probably this man falling and hitting his head on something.

Every time we visit a person's room for a bathroom assist, they are charged $18. I am sure that the department wants to collect that revenue. But come now. The guidelines specifically state that a person be able to help themselves, and if they can no longer help themselves, that they hire a private caregiver or move to the assisted living area.

This is never enforced until the situation becomes impossible.

And this is what happens when individuals such as Alvin N. Chipmunkk are left in charge. They are completely clueless as to the realities of the situation. They are MBA's who have never worked "in the trenches." They try to do what looks good on paper. And Heaven forbid they should ask the "grunts" what the score is. We have to complain vehemently and often to get anything done.

No surprises there.

But Doesn't Independent Mean You Can Do It Yourself??

The department in which I work is called "Independent Care." I am supposed to be here for emergency situations and to take care of paperwork and sundry tasks. So how the hell come I've been doing scheduled bathroom assists for one resident for three months now and for another one for the past two weeks??

Methinks its because Alvin N. Chipmunkk and his cronies like the extra Quatloos they get for our providing this service. We charge the resident 180,000 Quatloos (Thats $18 U.S. Currency) for making sure they get on and off the can without falling on their can. So instead of insisting that residents such as "Albert" and "Joanna" either get a 24-hour caregiver or move to assisted living, they continue collecting this fee every time the Resident Assistant visits.

Albert and Joanna are neat people. I'm just tired.

Life Among The Ancients

The Cheesemeister has been feeling a little burned out in her job caring for the elderly these days. This is where I can carp about being a caregiver, remind myself of those things that are good about it, joke about Alvin N. Chipmunkk and the other administrative types, and nobody has to know except for you and me.