Sand tray therapy in abuse and trauma class

Studying and writing papers... Yes on my birthday but hey you gotta do what you gotta do!


this is my groups sand tray art from abuse and trauma class. Don't ask us what it means...


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Spring Pictures

 

Been a long time gone....

With grad school coming to a close faster then I can get papers written and procrastination being fresh on my to do list I figure it's only fitting that I post a blog. I mean it was getting close to the year mark. It has been an eventful year full of joys and sorrows. Here are some things of note:
My mom's sister, my aunt Suzie Tucker, passed away in the fall and then my grandpa Jay (my dad's dad) passed away over spring break. One positive thing about funerals is that it brings family in from all over. I feel blessed to have been able to visit with so many of my relatives in the past year.
I was...asked, coerced,...firmly nudged? not sure what the best word is here but at any rate I applied for a part time Medical Social Worker float position at Salem Health Acute Care Hospital right before the end of spring term. The "hints" and repeated queries about weather or not I had applied finally pushed through my concern about taking on a position before graduating. The manager came and asked me to set up an interview before I had actually turned in my online application. So I interviewed and was offered a benefited position. I started the position about two weeks ago and have been going through the training process. As I have been interning at the hospital for the past 9 months the training has not been too intense. I enjoy the team and it looks as though there is opportunity to grow into a full time position in the summer or sometime soon after. Right now I am spending most of my time on the cardiac ICU step down floor, the actual ICU, and the oncology floors. I continue to put in two days a week as a requirement for my internship as well but I am no longer permitted to assist with floor work because my internship and job roles have to be clearly differentiated. This distinction allows me to devote my Monday and Tuesday to more in depth counseling with the patient counselor. I work every other Wednesday and every Thursday and Friday and some Saturday's. I really enjoy working in the hospital and the social service staff is very supportive and a lot of fun. It's nice to have something set as I prepare to transition from school life back to work life.
I graduate June 12th! Crazy! Where does the time go? Of course I still have quite a few major assignments standing between me and graduation but it's still exciting. I plan to apply and begin the licensing process so that I could potentially be part of a group that is accepted by insurance. Unless you have your LCSW insurance will not reimburse counseling with a social worker. I am fortunate to be able to take some time off for my family reunions this summer but vacation time after that will likely be few and far between as I do not have seniority and the company policy gives preference to vacation requests of those higher up and hospital work being what it is holidays are pretty much no existent. So it's good I work close to family! At least I will be off in evenings to enjoy things like thanksgiving and Christmas.

I know I have seemed invisible pretty much the past year but I have been following blogs and facebook to keep in touch with everyone and I appreciate the opportunities I have had to talk with friends and family. I am looking forward to having my evenings free and some care free weekends!! The burdon of school is coming close to being behind me! On to the next adventure.

I will post some pictures of what I have been up to the past few months in the next post.

A little resolution on the internship front

I'm pleased to say my internship is almost offically stable! I interviewed with my new supervisor and task supervisor and hammered out the details. I feel like I'm actually ending up in a better situation with the move. My new supervisor is very approachable and eager to help. I will be splitting my time between oncology and patient counseling. They said their goal is to teach me the ropes of the medical world so I can be either hired on after graduation or marketable for a job elsewhere. Woot! That sounds good to me! I think it's going to be a good opportunity. Plus I won't be working Saturdays like I would have in the ER. I'm feeling good about it and I think I can now let the idea of pursuing the LDS social services opportunity rest...at least for the remainder of the school year:).

So that said they didn't waste any time in getting me going...after all I already have the ID, training, drug screaning, background check,web access, and parking pass situation squared away from my three weeks of interning in the ER. I start Thursday. It's going to be an adventure.

If you post it they will come....or something

So i have been chastised for not posting for such a long time. What can I say. I have an aversion to writing after a year of grad school. I lived life offline as much as possible over the summer and I'm sorry that I have been unable to stay in touch with everyone. I have been assured that people do actually still look at my blog though and that if I post something it will be read...so here it is friends! It is impossible to recap the jam packed goodness of my ultra exciting life (note the sarcasm please) but here are some fun things I have been up to in no particular order.

I spent three weeks of the summer with my parents at the beach house in Delaware. It was the best! Lots of opportunities to walk, bike, and swim. It felt good to be moving and relaxing in turn. Plus I love spending time with the Glasmann clan. It's always fun to be around the Taylor family and I really enjoyed all the fun and laughter. There was card games, complete with smack talk and ribbing, and more good food then I will probably see again for some time. I have to stock up on my cheese steak sandwiches while I'm back there! I got drenched in a thunderstorm while I was out attempting to walk 6 miles. I made it 3 and then was drenched in .2 seconds and rescued by my mother. It was also fun to have my cousin Paul and his family come for a quick visit. The trip ended with an insane drive made by me and my dad all the way from Delaware to Oregon. On the drive out we stopped somewhere every night and we had three drivers. On the drive back....we stopped in Sydney Nebraska and there were two drivers. It was fun though.

My cousin's got baptized in Utah at Brewer Camp. That was a really special experience. It was cool to have them baptized at a place rich with family history. The trip to Utah was fast but it was really nice to see so many friends and family members. I also really loved my cafe rio!! Ah I miss that place so much.







On the drive out to Delaware we drove through Rocky Mountain National Park. Holy Cow! Beautiful place. I loved the drive and would love to go back and do some hiking there sometime. It was so impressive to be driving up to the top of the Rockies. I recommend visiting the park!

Just before school started up I walked in the Newport Half Marathon. I walked with my aunt Karen and my brother in law Zach ran it. It was a lot of fun. I was surprised that I felt so good all the way up to mile 10. The last 3 miles were hard because they didn't have any water tables out. Next time I will walk with my water bottle! It was a beautiful course that went through trails in the mountains and then led us over to the beach. The course was 6.5 miles of beach walking. That was unexpected and took a little more effort but it was beautiful. I finished the 13.5 miles in 3 hours and 40 minutes. not shabby

I started my internship for the year at the Salem Hospital in the Emergency Department. I loved the 3 weeks I put in before school started....but it looks like that is all I get to love. My supervisor has had a family emergency and due to the stress and the need for erratic and possibly long periods of absence I am being reassigned to another supervisor. Initially it looked like I was going to be able to go back to the ED but now I have had word that if I choose to keep the hospital placement I will be permanently assigned to patient counseling and oncology. I have been struggling with this decision and I have my interview tomorrow. I plan to meet the supervisor and gather info and then make the final big decision. About the time everything went south with my internship I heard from a friend who did her internship at LDS family services last year that they were now looking for a student. Ironically when I wanted the placement last summer they didn't want a student! So I have been torn by the decision between two things I really want and not really having enough information to make a decision has made things interesting.

Alright well I think that brings you all up to speed on the things that have been on my mind lately.

I do still exist

I know it feels like I have fallen off the face of the universe but I do still exist. I had good intentions to update my blog a few weeks ago at the start of spring term but life happens and my blog didn't. Winter term just about did me in. Apparently winter term first year is the worst term in the masters of social work program. People told me this toward the begining of the term and I thought ok it has some tough assignments I will plan ahead. There was no room to plan ahead. I was always writing papers! I'm tempted to post my theory paper on ego psych just as a sample of the intensity of the papers I was cranking out last term. But I don't think anyone would really read it so why go to all the trouble. Sping Break was not much of a break for me either. By the time the last paper was in and I was done at my internship I had a few days to breath and then I started cooking to fulfill my calling for break the fast. I did enjoy spending time with my family and going over to the coast, but the reprive was short lived.
Spring term started and things looked a bit more managable. Then two weeks into the term there was an unexpected blow that knocked us down. My friend and classmate Paula died unexpectedly of heart failure. She had no history of heart problems and nothing to indicate trouble. She got a virus and told us she was sick as a dog and the next day she went to the doctor and ended up having heart failure in the doctors office. In the Portland State MSW program you have a generalist instructor and class of about 20 students who stay together for the whole first year of the program. So my generalist class is like a little support system of people all experience comiserating and relating to each other. We formed some strong bonds. Paula was also in a small group with me that started at the begining of winter term and our group formed an amazing friendship, in large part due to Paula's amazing warmth and big heart. Paula's death has been a struggle for our generalist class. It has been a unique experience dealing with death at the scholastic level. We basicaly had group therapy our first day back together, it was a unique and beautiful experience. Last week was an attempt at a transition back to classwork...but we didn't quite make it. I'm not sure how assignments for that class are going to go. The biggest project for this term was a group project and as my group involved Paula my group is the one most in limbo. So I feel like I'm playing catchup and trying to juggle and compartmentalize everything to manage. This too shall pass and soon I will be taking on a new internship and looking toward graduation. Spring term ends the first week of June and I'm looking forward to some time off. I plan to catch up on blogs and post some pictures and do fun stuff. Hopefully I will be able to pay a visit to Utah and see many dear friends. I am also really hoping for a family trip to Disneyland...hint hint (did that help mom?). I interview this weekend for my potential placement next year. I'm hoping to be placed at a hospital emergancy department! I'm excited about the opportunity and praying the interview goes well and I get the placement. Hope the sun has shined where ever you are. We had a brief bout of sunshine this last weekend and it was amazing. I will post pictures of my venture out at the tulip festival the next time I post.

I'm back!

Now where have I been you ask?...
~Started my Masters in Social Work program in the end of September. Class from 8am to 8:30pm Monday which mean I wake up at 6am and have to fight Portland traffic by 7:15 in order to make it to my class. It's pretty much non stop from then on!
~Internship! As part of the MSW program I have a year long internship where I am required to log 167 hours per term. That makes for 17 hours a week. So I am in class all Monday and then Wednesday and Thursday are full time internship days. Friday usually finds me at some kind of training meeting and Tuesday is my erron/ homework day. I haven't found much time to update my blog or spend time on the Internet.
~reading, reading, reading! Grad school involved more reading then I was expecting. I was often reminded of my days rooming with Jesse who was a English major...I have to read more then that. My usual weekly reading is about 150-200 pages per class. That adds up to about 500+ pages! I'm a slow reader too.
~writing papers. Jackie can attest to this. She said a few weeks ago "It seems like you are always writing a paper" and I am! I have turned in 7 or 8 papers between Sept 30 and Dec 1st. The average paper was 10 pages in length, the last one was 15! I was talking with a friend applying to grad school and he reminded me that in undergrad we would have one paper like that all term. Oh well you get used to it!
~being sick! I feel like as soon as the term started I was sick. I ended up with a very bad sinus infection. The only reason I got this taken care of pretty fast was because I live in Oregon and you can't buy anything besides Tylenol sinus or Theraflue over the counter. So Sudafed, Advil cold and sinus....all require a prescription here in Oregon! I called up to see if I could sweet talk the doctor into giving me some without me coming in....that didn't go over so well. I had to give the nurse all my symptoms so she could tell the doctor and the doctor insisted he needed to see me that my symptoms didn't sound good. So I went in, somewhat disgruntled as I had to leave my internship about 2 hours early and drive from Portland down to Corvallis, and when I said all I need is some drugs to hep clear up my sinuses the doc said....well bonus you get antibiotics too!
~being tired! As if grad school wasn't enough to make a person tired I found out on my impromptu doctors visit that my thyroid level has been way off for the last year. I have been on medication for hypothyroid since I was a sophomore in high school. This is the first time my level has been off so far that I required the highest level of thyroid hormone they make! Sweet! So that helped me not feel so sleepy all the time and run down.
~visiting family. I'm sure many of you have read their blogs and know the details. There has been the addition of a new baby to the family and a few complications with mom's health along with that. Birthdays, Halloween,and Thanksgiving and lots of fun in between.

Wish I had some pictures to share...but I don't. I will have to steel some from Jackie since most of the fun outings have involved her boys. School is all done now and I came to C* for the weekend and I may be staying longer because there is 4 inches of snow and the forecast is for it to stick around and maybe continue snowing!