This weekend, I had the pleasure of being part of the following:
1) A 400+ pound patient who had an itch on her butt that she obviously could do nothing about since she can barely move. The itch was making her miserable, and she required assistance. To her husband, who looked like a VERY heavy Santa Claus, she says, "Sugar lips, I need you to scratch my butt." Then I had to help roll her over so he could access the itchy area. THEN, I had to listen to her moan with pleasure while her itch was being relieved. EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!
2) A patient was in the middle of a blood transfusion and was being taken care of by one of my favorite co-workers, K, who is black. The wife looks at K and says, "This better not be no monkey blood." K asked her what she meant and the woman explained, "I mean YOUR blood, YOU people's blood."
3) Yet another patient who is middle-aged but severely mentally retarded and was taken away from her mother because the mother had essentially been pimping her out her whole life. This abused baby requires a 24-hour sitter for safety, and she walks around the floor, day and night, in tears, crying for her mother, who sits in an insane asylum and is hopefully on her way to jail.
Sometimes my job is hard.
8.18.2008
Just another day at the office
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5 comments:
What was Kawanza's response to the patient?
To her credit, she simply walked out of the room without responding. She said if she had allowed herself to open her mouth, all hell would have broken loose. I'm sure Kawanza also knows that there is absolutely nothing to say to such a person that would make any difference at all.
thank you for reminding me it could always be worse. how can the same species that created ice cream and butterfly kisses at times be such balls of crap... Mundo Loco.
Well...The healthcare field is a service industry, open to and paid for by the public. The public is rarely truly civil, behind closed doors, especially not when scared or in pain, as many of the public are when they seek health care. They react in impulsive and often disrespectful ways that boggle the minds of onlookers at times. My wife and I both work in the healthcare field, she is black, I am white, and the $h!t we hear sometimes just blows us away. "Monkey blood" is pretty bad, yeah, but we've heard much worse, and then there's the stuff said that we don't hear...I try to remember, at those times, that "I'm here to serve" and that the offending idiot might genuinely wish to remove their foot from their mouth if they weren't so scared or in such pain...And if necessary, I, too, leave the room for a breather, like level-headed Kawanza did. Hats off to her, too.
~Uncle Booger
i am left speechless by all of this. yes, your job is hard!!
and on a lighter note, in case i ever become 400+ pounds remind me to carry a stick(or some other sort of implement) so that i can relieve such urges. double ick!
xx
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