Today was supposed to be a suicide watch (not in the sense that i was going to watch someone commit suicide but in the sense that i was going to prevent them from doing so. Spose thats obvious, isnt it?), but the patient cancelled.
Although i was initially slightly nervous because i didnt want the girl to take advantage of me being naive, i was still very interested to see who this girl was and how she was going to act. Although i didnt get to see her i did get a good look around at the psych ward.
Now i am aware that we have made significant steps from the former asylum days, there are still situations and scenes that are shocking as all fuck.
The first of which was a man who was locked in a room and had nothing but a mattress and a window with which the nurses could look in (or he could look out of). It was literally a padded cell.
To be honest its one of those things you always imagine or see in movies but its still a shocker to see. Shit seems so brutal and unreasonable. Cant we just treat that mans insanity with a hug?
Well, needless to say the padded cell was getting alot of use by one gentleman who spent the majority (or what seemed to be the majority) of his time smashing something into the wall. The nurse then came over and tried to get him to lie on the mattress. Needless to say she wasnt stupid enough to open the door and ask him but she wrote it down on a piece of paper and placed it in the window while knocking on the door, so that he could hear and understand. Ya gotta wonder if that technique actually works. Even if he does lie on the mattress how do you know that he wont try and make a break for it or start smashing you against the wall (which is padded but im certain it would hurt none the less). Talk about a life of danger.
I was then sent to the seventh floor which is the cardiac surgery ward. Like any floor that has patients in semi stable/unstable conditions the nurses are total dolls. They call every patient love and are gentle as all hell with them.
The man i had had particularly cold hands and i wonder whether its a blood circulation thing. Im supposed to get an oxygen level from him on a regular basis. This has been particularly hard. I mentioned this too the nurse who told me not to worry about it. Needless to say it became a little problem for me later as my patient had to pee and the nurse motioned for me to put it on his dick.
I wasnt sure if she was serious i do know however that im not touching up some old man so i left it to her. She then offered to put the catheter in. The other nurse was loving it and laughing her ass off. The first nurse (we will now refer to her as the dick master, youll see why soon enough) continued to tell me about they recently had a stagette party for one of their fellow nurses. They had got this gorgeous black stripper who riled all the girls up. Later on in the cab home the dick master asked the bride to be whether she had a dildo handy for when she got home. Her friend told her no as she had hoped to use the dick masters. Gotta love these girls.
Oh yeah, the dick master was inserting the catheter throughout the story. It looked like the most painful fucking thing ive ever seen and i dont have a penis. Everything had to be sterile to prevent a urinary tract infection. You can only imagine how fucking foul and painful one of those could be. Thankfully they are supposed to be rare. The tube is inserted into his bird was prob about 30 cm long and i twas slightly difficult to get in which means he had problems with his prostrate. Theres also a bottle next to the bed which has 500ml at least of blood draining into it. Dont worry this is from a tube in his chest which he doesnt seem to notice much. Which is a bit surprising as id sure as fuck notice if a tube carrying blood came from my chest.
All of the patients in this ward that are fresh from surgery have these red pillows they are supposed to hold to their chest when they cough, from what i understand its so that they dont rip their incisions. Gross. Apparently there is a correlation (although no formal documentation) between diabetes* and heart problems. All of the patients in the room seem to be approximately the same age, 65-70, none of them are overwhelmingly overweight and 1 out of 4 used to smoke.
Fun facts!
I guess the highlight of the shift was when i got paid 7.25 to file my nails for 45 mins.
Living.
The.
Dream.
*so many other amazing videos involving that clip that i had to share em, that was the one that gave the most lulz tho. Here, here and here.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Wednesday, April 08, 2009
A slippery predicament
Forward:
I was about to announce a hiatus from this blog as I have recently been copying notes and stories from my sisters journals of when she too was working as a candy striper back in the summer of 2003. Her notes are great but I have to admit that it can be a bit difficult to find the inspiration to meld a good yarn out of it as they are all her notes and memories.
I more or less was gonna focus more on my smut which sadly has also stalled but not nearly as much as this blog.
However, whilst reading through my sisters notes i found one particular story that was of great amusement to all of us at the time (for the actual time line of these posts read the intro/first post for details). As a result I will definitely post this bit and perhaps inspiration will ensue.
-CeePee
Day 12-
I've worked in the rehab hospital today with a woman who was about 45. She has 2 children (a son and a daughter). The first thing she said to me when i entered her room was "Hi, youre wearing something scented"*. I asked her if it bugged her and she said yes and asked what it was. I said it must be my 'do. She later again asked what it was. Obviously at this point i got a bit suspicious.
It turns out that 2 years ago she had a stroke, heart failure and a double by pass. Ouch.
Im not sure if she as altogether normal before that but now, as a result of all that shit, she has a fetish for Vaseline. Im not fucking kidding.
When i tell people this story (or my brother or his gf, who has also taken care of her) the never initially believe it and fair enough, it comes off like like one of those people on Maury that are scared of pickles or mustard or whatever.
Just seems like horseshit.
My brother always tells me about how he used to threaten a friend of his who was supposedly scared of fruit (i mean cmon guy) by saying he was going to hide oranges and bananas under his pillow. Yeah youre screaming but do you really mean it? Well this lady is totally fucking obsessed, in the nastiest way, with vaseline. And drinking water.
Mind you, its nothing sexual*1. She just needs to apply it to her lips.
For about 15 minutes. Usually before she smokes. Which she does constantly.
Also in her nose. She likes to take a cue tip and put a huge gob in there which she then sniffs.
She also likes to use eye drops really frequently.
Id also like to state that her sense of fashion seems to have taken a hit as well. Granted this is the east coast of Canada which is not renowned for being a hub for the avant garde fashion scene so we cant necessarily attribute this to her unfortunate circumstances. She likes to wear two pairs of pants (joggers, or sweatpants for you laymen) in which she likes to tuck her sweater and her jacket into. Oh yeah, she also wears an ascot.
I was instructed as we went out for her to have a cigarette to assemble a lawnchair and an umbrella as it was going to storm outside. It was sunny and the middle of June.
When she smokes, she lights up the cigarette everytime she inhales, much like a crackhead. She smokes about 2 cigarettes every 15 minutes then we go upstairs where she will claim that she has to vomit and goes through the whole vaseline/eyedrop process again.
She is also quite opinionated which although particularly cold of me, always seemed to be amusing for a person under such duress and in such a situation to be nit picky.
She likes The Pressgang and redwine BUT not in excessive amounts. Ah her conservatism still shines through. She loves chocolate but claims not to be a chocoholic. She hates people who drink and drive (not sure how this came up or what the connection was, outside of the 'olic') and openly tells people who are overweight that they need to join weightwatchers. She also thinks her son is gay, hes about 16, not that theres anything wrong with that. She hates the nurses and doesnt really like men unless they are particularly good looking. She loves crosswords. Oddly enough I suspect she'd be really good on jeopardy. She is from Montreal but loves the US of A and thinks that people from Nova Scotia are snobby. Not sure how that came about, people havent got enough money to be snobby here. She also knows which elevators are 'the quickets' and has amazing greeny/blue eyes.
I did feel terrible for her as she told me her son has only been to visit twice in 18 months. To be honest I cant blame him. Who would want to see their mother like this? Shes still young but nowhere near what you want/need/wish your mother would be. Its gotta be crushing for the family, let alone the children. I hope to god the kids have a decent father, shes never mentioned anyone and you get the idea that he might be out of the scene or they just dont get on. She continued to talk about menopause and how she had alot of blood loss and cramps. Makes me scared to grow older as a woman.
I think i could see where she had a piece of her brain removed as there seems to be a slight groove in her skull/head on her right side.
I definitely want to work with her again, Sweet Sweet D.
*Side note: For the record we were to never wear anything scented like deodorant or perfume etc which makes sense cuz what kind of sick fuck gets dolled up to work around sick and dying people? What you wanna remind them of what they are missing? Youre just twisted.
*1 Apparently This statement was debateable as i later talked to my brothers girlfriend who told me that she had spoken to some other candy striper and apparently the lady liked to put it on her vag as well. Apparently this happened everytime she went to the bathroom. A fucking mess. A nasty fucking mess.
I was about to announce a hiatus from this blog as I have recently been copying notes and stories from my sisters journals of when she too was working as a candy striper back in the summer of 2003. Her notes are great but I have to admit that it can be a bit difficult to find the inspiration to meld a good yarn out of it as they are all her notes and memories.
I more or less was gonna focus more on my smut which sadly has also stalled but not nearly as much as this blog.
However, whilst reading through my sisters notes i found one particular story that was of great amusement to all of us at the time (for the actual time line of these posts read the intro/first post for details). As a result I will definitely post this bit and perhaps inspiration will ensue.
-CeePee
Day 12-
I've worked in the rehab hospital today with a woman who was about 45. She has 2 children (a son and a daughter). The first thing she said to me when i entered her room was "Hi, youre wearing something scented"*. I asked her if it bugged her and she said yes and asked what it was. I said it must be my 'do. She later again asked what it was. Obviously at this point i got a bit suspicious.
It turns out that 2 years ago she had a stroke, heart failure and a double by pass. Ouch.
Im not sure if she as altogether normal before that but now, as a result of all that shit, she has a fetish for Vaseline. Im not fucking kidding.
When i tell people this story (or my brother or his gf, who has also taken care of her) the never initially believe it and fair enough, it comes off like like one of those people on Maury that are scared of pickles or mustard or whatever.
Just seems like horseshit.
My brother always tells me about how he used to threaten a friend of his who was supposedly scared of fruit (i mean cmon guy) by saying he was going to hide oranges and bananas under his pillow. Yeah youre screaming but do you really mean it? Well this lady is totally fucking obsessed, in the nastiest way, with vaseline. And drinking water.
Mind you, its nothing sexual*1. She just needs to apply it to her lips.
For about 15 minutes. Usually before she smokes. Which she does constantly.
Also in her nose. She likes to take a cue tip and put a huge gob in there which she then sniffs.
She also likes to use eye drops really frequently.
Id also like to state that her sense of fashion seems to have taken a hit as well. Granted this is the east coast of Canada which is not renowned for being a hub for the avant garde fashion scene so we cant necessarily attribute this to her unfortunate circumstances. She likes to wear two pairs of pants (joggers, or sweatpants for you laymen) in which she likes to tuck her sweater and her jacket into. Oh yeah, she also wears an ascot.
I was instructed as we went out for her to have a cigarette to assemble a lawnchair and an umbrella as it was going to storm outside. It was sunny and the middle of June.
When she smokes, she lights up the cigarette everytime she inhales, much like a crackhead. She smokes about 2 cigarettes every 15 minutes then we go upstairs where she will claim that she has to vomit and goes through the whole vaseline/eyedrop process again.
She is also quite opinionated which although particularly cold of me, always seemed to be amusing for a person under such duress and in such a situation to be nit picky.
She likes The Pressgang and redwine BUT not in excessive amounts. Ah her conservatism still shines through. She loves chocolate but claims not to be a chocoholic. She hates people who drink and drive (not sure how this came up or what the connection was, outside of the 'olic') and openly tells people who are overweight that they need to join weightwatchers. She also thinks her son is gay, hes about 16, not that theres anything wrong with that. She hates the nurses and doesnt really like men unless they are particularly good looking. She loves crosswords. Oddly enough I suspect she'd be really good on jeopardy. She is from Montreal but loves the US of A and thinks that people from Nova Scotia are snobby. Not sure how that came about, people havent got enough money to be snobby here. She also knows which elevators are 'the quickets' and has amazing greeny/blue eyes.
I did feel terrible for her as she told me her son has only been to visit twice in 18 months. To be honest I cant blame him. Who would want to see their mother like this? Shes still young but nowhere near what you want/need/wish your mother would be. Its gotta be crushing for the family, let alone the children. I hope to god the kids have a decent father, shes never mentioned anyone and you get the idea that he might be out of the scene or they just dont get on. She continued to talk about menopause and how she had alot of blood loss and cramps. Makes me scared to grow older as a woman.
I think i could see where she had a piece of her brain removed as there seems to be a slight groove in her skull/head on her right side.
I definitely want to work with her again, Sweet Sweet D.
*Side note: For the record we were to never wear anything scented like deodorant or perfume etc which makes sense cuz what kind of sick fuck gets dolled up to work around sick and dying people? What you wanna remind them of what they are missing? Youre just twisted.
*1 Apparently This statement was debateable as i later talked to my brothers girlfriend who told me that she had spoken to some other candy striper and apparently the lady liked to put it on her vag as well. Apparently this happened everytime she went to the bathroom. A fucking mess. A nasty fucking mess.
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