Browse Category: *grr*

Anyone know a rain dance?

This is ridiculous.  It’s already November and there’s no rain in sight.  No rain means no snow.  Today is Mammoth’s opening day and unfortunately all they have is man-made snow on one run with a base of 6 inches.  I hope all the people who decided to try it out are wearing their helmets.  It’s gonna be a rough ride down the mountain.  I keep checking the 10-day weather forecast every hour as if all of a sudden there will be a chance of showers tomorrow.  One can only dream and hope.

Make the pounding stop!

studying_03.jpgI’m in super-detox mode and it sucks. I decided to lay off the morning cup of coffee and I’m certainly paying for it. I didn’t think that I drank enough to get withdrawal symptoms but I’m in the trenches at this point.

It started yesterday when I woke up at 9 am and didn’t have my usual cup of coffee. I had a tingling, unpleasant ache above my left eyebrow and it slowly spread to the forehead and top of my head. I decided to ride it out and see if I could beat this thing. Unfortunately, it didn’t go away and I had to drop the dogs off at Pacific Whey at Crystal Cove. Patty invited me for brunch there so I sat and ate half of the salad she ordered for me. After 20 minutes of trying to hang tight, I had to leave because of an awful nauseating feeling that came over me. I drove home as carefully as possible and ended up sleeping from 2:00 pm until this morning at 7:00 am.

I felt a little better this morning but as the day progressed my head got worse. I thought, “Pop a pill? No, those have caffeine in them.” So, I’m sitting here about 60 hours away from my last cup of coffee and still dying. This sucks but people have told me that that it’s better for my health to kick the caffeine habit. I’m crossing my fingers for my head to stop pounding by tomorrow morning or I’m calling in sick.

There’s nothing like a good beat down…

on a Friday morning. As if my week wasn’t hard enough but this morning at 8 am I had a meeting that topped it all off. I walked in thinking it was going to be rather easy-going but it quickly turned sour. The first inkling of a beat-down was when the mom said something like, “When he starts his new school we’re going to get a real OT…a really good one.” Awesome. This can’t be good.

When it was my turn to speak, before I could get into my report, the mom said, “You don’t need to go through this I already disagree with your recommendation.” She had flipped to the end of the report to see that I was recommending that we discontinue services. Double-awesome.
THEN!! She says to me, “I know you don’t like me and I’ve never liked you so I guess it’s mutual. But it’s not fair to take it out on a child.” WHAM! Beat down! I was pretty speechless. When I finally caught my breath, I calmly replied with, “Wow. (pause) I’ve never had any negative feelings about you.” She then quickly replied with, “Well, then me too!” Huh?

Anyway, I didn’t finish my report and said to the administrator, “I don’t have anything else to say. It’s all in my report.” After the meeting, the teacher, who was sitting next to the mom, said to me, “I had to do everything in my power not to reach over and sock her in the face. That wouldn’t have been very professional of me.” Aw, *sniff* how sweet. So that was how I spent my Friday morning. I hope all of you had a better Friday.

Lack of Trust

I’m so frustrated. Lately, I’ve been receiving some pretty deadly phone calls from parents who are either questioning my recommendations or asking for more services. *sigh* I don’t get it. Never in my four and a half years as an OT have I been challenged so frequently and so aggressively. I may not have the wrinkles to show for 10+ years of experience but I can confidently say that I know my sh*t. (excuse me) I can’t stand it when parents ask me, “Do you have ANY experience in sensory integration?” or “Did you just graduate?” Grr…I feel like I need to post my resume on my forehead at parent meetings or give a Powerpoint presentation of my expertise in this area. Perhaps this is why my head has been hurting all week. I need to go skiing.

so mean…

Y’know…you think you’re doing a good job at work and then someone has to come along and crush you. I’m still talking about the family that “beat me up” last week. The reason I’m still hung up on this is because last night I received an evil email from who I will now call “Evil Mom”. What a way to start my weekend. It made my heart sink and gave me a twinge of nausea. Ironically, I just finished a 2-day course that may directly impact “Evil Mom’s” little girl who happens to be, in fact, a very sweet girl. If I ever become a psycho parent like that, someone needs to slap me. I give you permission.
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By the way, for the new moms reading this…if your little girl or boy is having any picky eating issues or if you just want to know what the typical developmental stages are for feeding, let me know. My brain is fresh with information right now and I have nifty little handouts for you. 🙂

I need a new purpose.

Ugh…I had the most horrible meeting yesterday. It was with the same family that beat me up last year. Without going into details, I basically said, “Your kid is fine at school. She doesn’t need my services anymore.” Boy oh boy did I get it after that. The mom started to cry and grandfather threatened to go to Due Process and bring in an attorney. This was all so that I would hang out with their kid 30 mins per week because it makes them feel better. Anyway, after that, it made me re-evaluate my purpose as a therapist. I thought I went to school to learn how to help people. Instead, I’ve paid an absurd amount of money (tuition and books) to end up with a sucky-paying job that causes me angst and doubt in my judgement. I’m not a babysitter and I’m certainly not a miracle worker who can “fix” their broken kids. Americans are so spoiled. I don’t know if this is making any sense but this just makes me want to move far away to somewhere that really needs me and start a non-profit therapy center. Who’s with me?!