As I wrapped up my last day at prac at AAWA yesterday, I couldn’t help but feel rather forlorn. After yesterday, I’ve got another 8 weeks and 1 day before I officially finish my 4 year degree. I’ve been in Perth for 5 years, which isn’t a short amount of time. But 5 years have flown by so quickly. I still remember the rather orientation day at Taylors College Perth 5 years ago, I couldn’t sleep the night before so I had something like 5 hours of sleep. I remember that was 29th January 2004 and that the was day I first met my course mates.
As I count down the days to my family coming to Perth, my heart soars. I haven’t seen them in nearly 2 years, which is probably one of the hardest things to do, being away from them. But as each second ticks away, it also means that I’m nearer to the end of my course. Which I will bid goodbye to assignments, lectures and portfolios. I guess I’m torn about the what to feel. I’m happy that its almost complete, only 8 weeks and 1 day stand between me and the finish date of my course. But that also means closing a chapter in my life, my student days. Undoubtedly I’m also sad, not being able to have 3 month summer holidays, not hanging out with friends between lectures and tutorials but instead going to work and put into practice what I’ve been taught over the past 4 years.
After the next 8 weeks and 1 day, I’m opening a new chapter in life and closing an old one. I’m a sentimental person and like to remember things the way they were. When my friends ask me if I am looking forward to starting my next prac, my answer is both yes and no. Yes because that means I’m nearer to being an OT, and no because I’m going to finish my undergraduate degree. After that, I’m becoming a research assistant and investigating the use of doll therapy for people with dementia. I guess you can say I’m very excited to start but also dreading finishing.
Yesterday I attended the Creative Approaches Workshop run by DBMAS which had the Research and Consultancy Manager speaking about assistive technology, the speech pathologist speaking about communication strategies, the dietician speaking about nutrition strategies, and Louise my supervisor speaking about sensory based activities. At the end of it, it was she was so sweet. She introduced me and what I did for DBMAS during my placement and gave me a present in front of everyone. I was so touched by her generosity and what they thought about me. It made me think that I am in fact good at something and being recognised for it.
So my 4 years of slogging it away has paid off. I now have a job and am in a position for using that as leverage to apply for OT positions. I could not have asked for a better outcome for things. I have a job while waiting for my PR to be approved and I get flexible hours doing what I do best. I guess my future is looking a lot brighter now 
It has been a rather hit and miss week, quite literally as well as metaphorically. The week started with me being so sick that I was out of action in Sunday after church and on Monday, where I did not make it to work but instead slept most of the day away. I made it to work on Tuesday but got sent home after half a day due to my constant coughing and sneezing. Made it to work yesterday and gained back a bit of my appetite. I can say with glee that my clothes are now a bit looser and that the pair of shorts that I wore yesterday can be pulled down without being unbuttoned or unzipped. Though I would ask that nobody try to do that please, I prefer to be walking around with clothes ON thank you.
I was still feeling rather sick yesterday, my sore throat and sore nose from tissue burn didn’t help either. There was Found on last night and I was on the border of not going cause I thought I should be resting a bit more so I can recover quicker but I still pushed on and went, it was the first worship experience night we had and I felt like going. So I got there, I parked at my usual spot outside Amanda’s house on the sandy verge and went in. It was a great night last night, I admit I wasn’t really into it at first but it was after that I started doing a lot of thinking, about what each person had said last night. I could relate to what Sam was saying, there are many times where I try and grasp the concept that God is by faith and although I cannot physically see Him, He definitely exists and plays a huge part of my life. Sometimes I feel like God can’t hear me but when that happens, I see this chain of events that prove me wrong. Yesterday was just one concrete example of that.
As I said just now, I just wasn’t feeling up to going, but I thought I should go for support of the women’s ministry. So I went and I parked at my usual place, even though previously I’ve scraped the bottom my front bumper slightly while reversing I though it would be the same thing again. Not. As I left to go home after Found, I scraped my bumper, quite badly this time. As I reversed, I heard a snap and my heart dropped when I did. So I pulled over and saw that the left side of my front bumper had come out and was jutting out about 1 cm. Which is still 1 cm too much for comfort. So I drove home, contemplating my options, wondering why had I even parked at that spot, wondering where I could get it fixed for cheap.
I had a fitful sleep last night, I wasn’t too happy with myself, with what I had done to my beloved car, so disappointed that I ignored my own advice of not parking there anymore. So I got up extra early this morning and because I couldn’t find masking tape anywhere, I resorted to cutting up pieces of contact into strips and stuck it on my bumper to keep it in place for the trip to work. Unfortunately, I didn’t take a picture of it just cause I was so distraught that I had damaged my Blue Lightning once again. I rushed out of the house, trying to beat the traffic and create less stress on my car and me and managed to forget my cough syrup and honey and lemon drink in the morning. I made it to work in one piece and managed to drive to my final evaluation appointment which was over at the other AAWA site. Had my final evaluation with Sue and I passed with flying colours! The team were very impressed with my work on the life history book sample I created as well as the sensory boxes and cataloguing of the resources and creating how to sheets for them. They even got Joel to take a picture of me with the stuff I had put together there on my placement and that will go in the November staff newsletter Jess said she will send me a copy when they get it, so it will be rather odd seeing my face with all the things I did over the past 7 weeks there.
Louise and Deb took me out to Floreat Forum and we went crazy at the Bali Beach shop over there, with me looking for items for the sensory rummage boxes that were seriously cheap, and Deb and Louise shopping for house decorations. Louise treated me to lunch at Gloria Jean’s, which was really kind of her. I’ve got some goodies for them at the office that I’ll be giving them tomorrow. As we sat eating lunch, Louise and Deb offered me a paid job over the summer as a research assistant for a research project they are interested in. I was stoked! I think I froze and they gave me the details of it and it was great! It fit in perfectly with my summer plans and I get paid and I have the flexibility to do things. It was a dream come true! Little need to say, I accepted it right away, I wasn’t going to let this get out of my reach. As I’m goins to be applying for PR and need something to keep me occupied before I get a real job and it looks great on my CV. I couldn’t have asked for a better job! All this while, I still had the thought of fixing my car, nagging at the back of my mind. I couldn’t exactly drive around on my next prac with a lose bumper.
I rang the Proton smash repairers early in the morning and they said that they could try fixing it, or if it is bad they have to replace the bumper, which will cost 500-600 bucks, but will be covered by insurance. So I wrapped up things at prac earlier and got off at 3pm and raced to Proton to get the bumper fixed. Got there at about 3.20pm and had a discussion with the mechanic (he’s brilliant! I would highly recommend him) about my options and even though he had a full workshop, he fit me in and got my car fixed in 15 minutes. While he took my car off me to bring round to the workshop and I was waiting in the waiting room, contemplating how much I would have to pay for all that, he walks in 5 minutes later telling me that I was lucky that I brought it in today. They found a nail in my rear right tyre and by the looks of it, it had been there for a while. He said it was lucky they caught it now, cause it would have meant that any day now my tyre would have gone kaput if it wasn’t fixed. He even recommended me a place down the road that could do it for cheap. So off to Richard’s Tyrepower on Scarborough Beach Road I went, in search of a puncture fixer. No wonder for the past week or so I have heard a tick tick sound everytime I drive, turned out to be the blooming nail in the tyre.
I got there and managed to get them to squeeze me in, even though that meant I had to wait an hour, I would wait. I think today was just great, I managed to get my car fixed at 2 places where both workshops were full and I got it down for cheap and quite fast as well. I got the bumper fixed for $25 and the tyre fixed for $30. I drove home in good spirits and was just thinking about the day. Then I looked at the bigger picture of things, that if I had never rocked up to Found yesterday, I wouldn’t have snapped my bumper, then the mechanic wouldn’t have found the nail in my tyre and I would have had a punctured tyre at a later date and a lot more expensive repair as well as a lot more hassles. God definitely had my back and always had my back all this time however stupid I might have felt or however useless I feel. This might probably sound stupid but I’m not ashamed of it, I prayed while driving back today, thanked Him for all His blessings and everything He has given me so unconditionally. That I now can see it is His hands in every facet of my life, even without me knowing, carrying me all the way, consoling me and egging me on the times I feel like giving up. So I was crying while I was driving and I must have looked like a downright idiot, but you know I don’t care anymore. What I do care about is what God means to me and I’m glad I have a God that is so loving and full of grace
So all in all it has been an awesome day! I got a job offer, I got my car fixed and my supervisors at prac were highly impressed with me. God is great Even when I thought this was such a horrible week, I’m glad that with Christ in the vessel, I can smile in the storm.
I’m still sick and I’m tired of coughing and blowing my nose. I’ve slept almost the whole day and I don’t know whether to be tired or awake. I don’t know if I’m meant to be feeling hot or cold, fret not I don’t have a fever. Just the cough that really is bugging me. I think I need to get some fresh air.
Went over to Amanda’s place last night for movie night after work, I think I need a break from work and assignments. I’ve partially lost my voice with my violent fits of coughing and my throat feels like its on fire after coughing so much. According to Michelle and Marc, I sound like a “goat and duck” respectively. Nice to know that if my voice fails I eke out a living by talking like animals 
I came home straight after church today and slept till about 5pm, while tossing and turning cause I think I had a fever after church.
Anyway, we watched Made of Honor and The Bank Job yesterday. After watching Made of Honor, we were going to watch Tropic Thunder but after watching the first few minutes whereby a guy gets shot and blood comes spurting out of his head and another guy gets knifed in the guts and her starts holding his guts, we decided it was a bit too late at night for these kind of gory things. So we settled on The Bank Job, which was sort of something like The Italian Job.
It was definitely a good night, I forgot all about my assignments and portfolio and work to do and just had good quality time with Amanda. It’s very rare for us to both drop everything and spend time doing leisurely things. I vote we make it a tradition Saturday nights are now movie nights.
As I’m typing this, I’m coughing like nobody’s business. I haven’t eaten properly in a while, just scarfed down rice with soup, which I didn’t finish cause I felt too full. I doubt I can sleep tonight but I have to try since I’ve got to go to work tomorrow 
Strepsils is going to be on my shopping list, either that or dig out the Strepsils I have cause I can’t seem to find my stash. I think I should go and get stuff done while I’m up, seeing that I slept so much today.
I woke up this morning with a massive sore throat and a yucky cough. I had caught the cough yesterday cause there was only the 3 of us in the office as the rest of the AAWA staff were off at a strategic planning day. I got really sick of hearing the poor temp receptionist answering the phones and saying, “Can I take a message? There is nobody here in the office as everyone is off at a team building day”. I was there from 8.30am till 4pm and that was most of the conversation that took place in the office. I was equipped with my iPod to try and keep me entertained while I do the life history book.
So now my nose is like a leaky tap, my sore throat is still here but getting better, my cough is still around and now I’m coughing up phlegm. I feel like lying in bed but don’t think that is really productive to do for my day off but my body is just not cooperating. I’ve pretty much slept till noon today with a 1 hour nap just prior to this. I think I’ll last for the rest of the day while I continue on reading up on the stupid leadership and management assignments.
I’m still going for the steamboat tonight, I’ll see how that one goes, I’m still standing but with the leaky nose and phlegm spewing out I’m beginning to think the bed is the best place for me.
I’ve been doing prac/work at AAWA for the past 6 weeks and I’m beginning to slip into a routine now: Get up, change, drive to work, sit in front of computer, go out for facility visits if lucky, more computer work, drive home, do work, sleep, repeat routine. At the end of next week I once again change ‘jobs’, I switch prac places. Trying to switch jobs once a year is bad enough but switching 3 times is just very tiring. I’m beginning to fatigue from it, beginning to hate the 7 weeks cause once I begin getting used to the routine, I get uprooted again to be placed somewhere else.
I’ve been reflecting on life a bit of late, thinking about cell and my future. For those who don’t know, I’m in the midst of completing a 7 week placement, doing a group assignment, managing my migration application and applying for registration as an OT. Amongst other things I am doing 3 projects for work, which involves me bringing home the company computer to work on it and try and finish 2 projects in 1 day. The other project is an ongoing one which I will have to finish by the end of next week. I have a whole heap of paper work to fill out to apply for permanent residency here in Australia and I’ve got to get that done as I go alone so I have enough time to submit the papers before my visa runs out.
Recently I’ve been thinking about what jobs I will apply for as an OT and found out yesterday that if you are a health professional working outside the health department, the pay is less than if you worked for the health department. I was thoroughly surprised at that, seeing as how government servants aren’t really highly paid. So that pretty much set me on a path to apply for work at one of the public hospitals, preferably Charlies cause I’m already quite familiar with the system there and I know the OTs there. I looked up jobs on Seek there are quite a few, though one of the conditions was that you need to have a right to work in Australia, so I would have to lodge my migration application first before everything. I’m anticipating a very busy Christmas period, filling out forms and making dozens on phone calls and submitting documents. I’ll be going down South for a while when my family comes so I’ve got quite a bit of paper work to bring down South Working holiday. Actually, I can’t even remember the last holiday I had. This is bad. It’s high time for a holiday huh?
I think I’m probably addicted to being busy. I feel rather useless when I’ve got a block of time that I can’t schedule for say doing some Bible study to shopping for groceries. I think my diary speaks for itself. It’s full of all sorts of reminders as well as appointments and peoples’ birthdays. I think a hospital job would be good for me, I actually like carrying around pagers Feels important. Hahaha….So I had never used a pager before, so forgive me if I like prodding the buttons and being paged
I’m currently on my laptop typing this entry up, with the work computer next to me and I’m doing things on both computers at once. Talk about really multi tasking. I’m also sitting on a fit ball just so I get the exercise while doing work. Haha. I got off work early today, there was nothing going on in the office and my supervisor let me off at 1.30pm and I skipped out of the office, well walked out since I was carrying 2 laptops and 2 other bags and waltzed to Ange’s house. It was 27 degrees today and it was a beautiful spring day! Though it was a lot hotter than I expected
Anyways, here’s a picture of my current work station at home with the 2 computers.
I guess the only reason I have the two on is cause the left one is the mine and the work one has the programs I need and space to save the stuff to bring back to the office. Speaking of which, I need to lug the computer to work tomorrow while on public transport. I hate to admit this, but I’m a bit spoiled already cause I have a car but oh well, just one day won’t kill me I’m off to go get some work done before the night ends. Toodles!
Nic, you’ll be proud of me. I managed to cut across 5 lanes on the Mitchell Freeway in less than 500m at 9am. Haha….Though I probably won’t be doing that any time again in the immediate future
Today was probably the day where I could honestly say that some idiot was tailgating me on the way home. Stupid idiot was driving so close to me. Didn’t quite manage to get his number plate (yes, he was THAT close to me) but I was determined to make sure I publicise this idiot’s car plates that I went slightly above speed limit and peek at my rear view mirror to get his plates.
He was driving a dark blue Ford, think it was an XR6, only got a look of the front. I caught part of his number plate, which is CPE 543 (I think). It was some specialised plate and its hard trying to drive and make sense of stuff in the rear view mirror without colliding with the car in front of me. But if you see such a car, just beware. The idiot literally stops inches away from your car and tails you at 60 km/h about a foot away. I was lucky he had good reflexes cause the car in front of me had to brake suddenly and which forced me to brake too. I was looking rather worriedly at my rearview mirror to find the idiot inches away from me.
It started all the way on Riverside Drive where there was a traffic jam from about Plain Street onwards. Said idiot kept stopping inches away from me, and I was just so annoyed at him that I kept inching forward cause I just didn’t like the idea that someone was just too close behind me for my comfort. Stupid idiot continues to inch closer. I turned behind to give him the evils a few times but noooooooooooooo, just completely ignores me and keeps coming forward. I was so tempted to so an emergency brake and see if he crashes into me. But then again, that would mean that my poor car would be damaged. No thank you.
I managed to get away from this idiot cause he got caught at the lights at Shepperton Road and I beat the yellow light and went ahead of him. Good riddance stupid idiot. I think you probably cut my life by a few years cause I was stressing that you would crash into me.
Sunday was quite a good day. Woke up early and went to church, where PJ spoke about becoming a somebody from a nobody. He was quite amusing, he peppered his sermon with loads of lame jokes and stories, even more so than usual. Then again, maybe that was cause most of the couples in church went down for the couple’s retreat over the long weekend and he was speaking to mostly the J-Life crowd. I had to give a little blurb (that’s a short speech, for all you who don’t know) about Found, the Women’s Ministry running in church.
Gen had asked me to speak when I swung over to her place on Friday night after cell. So then I gave it a bit of thought and then I SMSed her the next day saying that I won’t do it, just cause I didn’t know what to say. So Amanda SMSed me back encouraging me to do it. So by then I remembered that Amanda was with Gen cause they had worship practice that morning. Then Amanda rang me up and encouraged me to do it, saying that I could send her a draft and she’d review it that night. In the end, I wrote up what I was going to say and sent it off.
I can say honestly that I was not nervous about speaking in front of church. I was excited maybe, but wasn’t scared. Because it was a J-Life led service Joe was the MC and when he introduced me to come about and speak he was so amusing! Part of his intro was,
I really like this particular group but unfortunately I can’t be part of it. As much as I want to, I just can’t but I do support this group the fullest
By this time, the congregation must have been wondering what group he is talking about that he cannot be a a part of. So he introduced me and I spoke about Found. What I said:
When Found was started about 5-6 months ago, it was envisioned to be a place where the young women of J-Life could come and gather to discuss issues that are pertinent to our walk with God as women. I look back during the past 6 months and I asked myself, what have I learnt by attending Found?
I sat and I gave it quite a bit of thought. See, I’m not a person who does things for no reason so if I go every fortnight to Found, there must be reasons why I go. I look back and see Found as a place where I have found rest, acceptance and love the person I am. Once I realised God loves me unconditionally as His daughter, only then did things begin to click.
Found is a place where it empowered me to grow as a woman of God, to find my purpose as His daughter. The culture we are trying to cultivate is one which celebrates each other as God’s daughters. There was a time where Gen shared about the women that God used and honoured. There were many women of all sorts of characters, but God used them all the same. That brought home a powerful lesson for me: Never underestimate what God can do in your life.
It is these life’s truths that keep me coming back to Found. Each time I attend, there are new lessons to be learned. So I encourage all the young women of J-Life to come along to this week’s meeting. We will be talking about Queen Esther and who knows, you might learn something about yourself that you have never known! Found is on this Wednesday at 7.30pm at Pastor Jason’s house in Monash Avenue. Hope to see you there!
Towards the last part my cheeks were heating up but I was happy with what I had said. What I had written came from the heart and I think that nothing can beat what comes from the heart.
It was PJ’s birthday last Tuesday and Evan’s birthday yesterday. Some smart person decided bring cream and smear it all over them. That was probably the worst creaming I’ve ever seen, was such a crack on Sunday.
PJ looking to get Evan right after someone creamed him
Evan sneaks a chance to cream PJ
Proper picture of the birthday boys
We went out for lunch at Penang after that and Amanda drove us up to Orchard Glory to say hello to the kids who were at the couples’ retreat with their parents. It was quite a bit of fun. We got there in time to help transform the hall into a restaurant, set with a centrepiece on each table as well as arranging the cutlery to restaurant standards, with 2 sets of cutlery. They even had the kids waitressing for them, cause they were having a dance session during dinner. Unfortunately we didn’t get a peek into the session cause we went over to see how the kids were doing. Glorz and Cel had to leave cause they had uni the next day so Amanda and I went to lend a helping hand to Kristin to take care of the kids.
Now I would say that I am patient and am not too bad with kids, but I think after my encounter with a whole bunch of girls under the age of 7, I’m scared. We managed to leave at 8pm after getting the kids to play games civilly, between the boys and girls. I never went through the stage where I thought boys had cooties so I definitely did not experience wanting to lock the boys out from the room. I was thoroughly amused by all the girls’ antics in regards to the boys invading the chalet. Let’s put it this way: I won’t have more than 2 kids. And Nic, if you are reading this, your sister thinks I’m a jelly bean. And she is parsley. Very long story :P). Had some really good chats with Amanda during the trip, managed to dig up our childhood meanderings. I remembered that I used to write so much when I was younger, though most of the time the stories I wrote about were fan fiction about *N Sync, there is my embarrassing fact for the day. Though I did and still do plan on writing lots of stuff when I get time, I think that will be my next project: To write short stories or at least chronicle my life in a bit more detail. It was great having time to spend with her, its not often we get to spend something like 3 hours in the car together, just talking about things and thinking about lots of stuff.
Got home at 10pm and promptly showered and climbed into bed and crashed. It was a really great day but I had lots of things planned for Monday. I had finished summarising my bank statements for my tax, just waiting for my PAYG so I can finally submit my tax and get it over and done with. Its really frustrating to not be able to claim my money back and the deadline is creeping up day by day. It is October tomorrow, which means I have 30 days to do my tax. Instead of having 4 months, my tax window has been narrowed down to roughly 3 weeks. It’s terribly annoying and I think that is partly why I’m so short tempered these days. I don’t like feeling out of control like this.
Yesterday was a public holiday in Perth, Queen’s Birthday so I had the day off prac/work. So I put it to good use by cleaning up my room. It was in a very errr…interesting state prior to this, but suffice to say that it is looking the best it has ever been Having the spare mattress out of my room made the whole space look bigger. It feels rather weird having so much space now Anyway, room cleaning aside, it was Evan’s birthday yesterday so there was a party over at Gen’s place. Oh boy was it an interesting party. We had a smorgasbord of food that was lovingly cooked by the various talented chefs. I am not included in the list of course
Unfortunately I didn’t get as many pictures as I would have liked but I was too busy being involved in “Operation Evan”. The mission was to throw Evan into the pool. Joe came up with the idea and ran it past Gen, who gave the green light and then proceeded to get his mobile off him. So Cheryl, Cel, Michelle and I manhandled Evan to the outside area where the pool was and it took the rest of the party to lock the door and took what seemed like eternity to drag him outside. He managed to give us the slip a few times but we promptly jumped and got him to hand over his wallet, watch and mobile. I was prepared to go into the water just in case so I got my mobile out as well. I was quite close to actually falling into the water by mistake but managed to dodge it. Since Joe was the instigator of this, he had to lend a helping hand to throw Evan into the pool. Then everything went a bit off plan.
Evan grabbed Joe around the waist and tried to pull him into the pool while 4 of us girls tried to push him in. Somehow or rather, Evan grabbed Joe’s jacket and Joe tried to wriggle out of it and next thing we know Joe was shirtless and Evan had Joe’s shirt AND jacket. Poor Joe had to get his shirt back while us girls tried to chuck Evan in the pool. After that, I think he gave up and just dived into the pool himself. I doubt Joe would have thought that he’d be stripped of his clothes while trying to get Evan into the pool. Pictures:
Michelle and John. Michelle, you’re hiding the brownie there!
Michelle and I. Oh goodness me, I can see the brownie remnants in the corners of your mouth…haha
Renee and I. I look way too happy there
I’m looking at that and just wondering if that was from the epic battle. It was quite a fight to get Evan into the pool. But it was worth it
The bow from my shoe, victim of the epic battle.
It was a great long weekend. I really needed that day off to straighten things out before diving into my busy days again. I must say, the party was a great way to start the week.
Went to prac/work today and while driving on Mounts Bay I had a feeling that there would be a camera and lo and behold there was one. I was really grateful that I slowed down just prior to that cause I was doing 70 km/h just before that bend and that would have been a fine and demerit points. So far my driving track record has been great, so I didn’t want to mar it. It alternated between warm and sunny, and cold and windy today. It was such strange weather, was really nice and warm when I got out of the house this morning and then next thing I know I was driving through the rain.
It was a day full of dramas, being already short staffed at work, there were only 4 of us in today, including the manager. Then the manager had a presentation, which left 3. Then my supervisor had a dizzy spell and fell so we had to send her home, which left 2 of us still standing. While we dropped her off home, there was literally nobody in our department. We had to forward the phone to the mobile and take that along with us. Definitely not a day to be going out.
I think I’ve written a whole heap of stuff today, finding it a bit hard to get back into the swing of things after a holiday I’ve gotta read the book of Esther and get ready for the meetings and trips tomorrow and I’ve got to get a bit more sleep so I can function well tomorrow. That’s all from me tonight! Feel free to comment!
I have been out of the house since 7.45am this morning and got back at 7.45pm today. I woke up to a very rainy and grey day. I’ve gone and delivered a mattress to my aunty’s house, along with a suitcase and some angku kuih. I must admit, I think carrying a mattress like that in my car (front passenger seat folded down and back seats folded down as well) wasn’t the safest thing to do, since the mattress blocked the view of my left blind spot. Luckily the route to her place does not involve looking much into that blind spot.
Next I rushed off to work, since I had spent quite a bit of time playing with the baby over at my aunty’s place (he is sooooo adorable!!!) and inevidently forgot all about the time. Did that and had a go at finishing my strategy sheet for the clients I’m going to see tomorrow as well as fixing the resource sheets I’m doing up for all the resources at work. so far it looks spiffy and I’m beginning to see the results of my labour
Went off to lunch after that and off to my Design for Dementia course. So far I’ve only gotten placements in aged care but I think this is probably the area that I want to work in. I guess you could say that I’m knowledgeable in this area or feel for the people in nursing homes or hostels that are left to their own devices most of the day cause there just aren’t enough staff to give them optimal care unless they pay exorbitant prices for care. We all deserve a reasonable amount of care and meaningful activity in our daily lives and sometimes it takes someone to tell care staff to do things a bit differently to enable a person to take part in a meaningful activity or just to provide the person an interaction and thus decrease all the behaviours such as wandering, agitation and anxiety. Sometimes it takes maybe a little extra in terms or time and effort to save a lot more in the long run.
We just did an education session with a facility about sensory based activity and the need for the person to engage in meaningful activity that is sensory based as the dementia progresses. The disease robs the person of the ability to plan, to sequence and to make sense of their environment. Often, the person uses their basic senses such as touch, smell and sight to make sense of what is going on around them. I guess I could go on and on about how what is meaningful to us can be torture to another person. A good example of this was to give a person a fidget item like a Tangle or a Flexiball. For me, I could spend hours and hours just going about it, fiddling with it and just sitting there, left to my own devices with these things. On the other end of the spectrum, it can drive someone up the wall just cause of its endless possibilities. I don’t have much time tonight to write about the sensory needs of a person with dementia tonight but after today’s course I’m riled up to write something from what I’ve gained from this placement.
If you had asked me 6 months earlier, I would have said I was not a people person. I would have preferred an office environment, set me up in front of the computer with statistics and Excel worksheets to write and I’d occupy myself for hours. After 2 weeks at this placement, I realised I really crave the human contact and the need to interact with people, to feel like I’m making myself useful to them. I feel like when I do assessments with them I’m making an impact on their lives, an impact that I can see with my own eyes and feels ‘real’ in a sense. I’m not saying what I’m doing at this placement is useless, but I don’t really feel comfortable with providing strategies to people and expecting them to carry it out. Sometimes it doesn’t happen due to many barriers such as funding or lack of staff. Sometimes I just want to take all these people from the nursing homes and start up my own nursing home to provide the optimal care that they need. I sure as hell don’t want to be put in some of the facilities I visit, when I grow older and am unable to care for myself. Most places I see have not many staff and leave most of the residents that are not independent in mobility, to watch TV for hours on end. I would definitely not want that. Heck, I think if you did that to me, I’d go crazy after a while.
Like I once told my supervisor, to drive me mad all you need to do is put me in a barren room, take away my sunshine, take away activity and I’d be crawling mad. I need to be occupied with things, same with any other person. Speaking of which, after that course I spent some time over at aunty’s place again, just playing with the baby and attempting to feed him. I tell you, it ain’t easy but we now know that I can feed a baby even if I can’t cook to save my life Dinner was vege pie, meatballs and roasted veges. Was superb food! I was craving meatballs for a while and those were the best chicken meatballs I’ve ever tasted! *drools*
Anyhow, I think I’ve ranted enough for tonight. My bed is a-calling since I have a long day again tomorrow.