As usual, it is certainly bittersweet at the old Skilled Nursing Facility.
We have the decorations, the music, the visitors...it is colorful and warm, as well as being forty seven gallons of crazy.
We hung stockings (with care) up at the nurse's station with every staff member's name. Our residents like to sit up at the nursing station to watch the goings on, and carefully count the floor tiles. One of our residents with dementia kept looking at the stockings yesterday...she would just sit there and squint, turning her head side to side in curiousity. Finally she took one of the stockings down, and promptly put it on her foot.
We have several residents who are quite aggressive lately, and a higher than usual number of people who experience auditory and visual hallucinations as part of their symptoms...and so apparently we are killing kittens, attempting to poison our folks, taking residents into the basement to hose them off, serving puppies and kittens as our main course, and having airplanes land in our parking lot. We attempt to offer comfort while dodging the feet and fists of our more volatile residents. One of our residents likes to raid the nursing cart for health shakes, but she is a diabetic so we have to take them from her.
"Give that back to me, you heffer. You need a good ass whuppin', you son of a sea cook. (swing) You are lucky I can't stand up or I would kick your ass, but good."
Another resident likes to ram other wheelchairs with her own if anyone is too slow or in her way. Another guy likes to grab the aid's breasts as they bend over to assist him. Still another seems to enjoy "self stimulation" in the middle of the hallway, and needs to be reminded that not everyone wants to see that. We have a guy that wheels around giggling and mumbling to himself, wearing a giant cowboy hat. We have another guy who whistles contantly, and roams around with wrap around sunglasses like Bono would wear.
Sometimes I forget to look at things around me with the same perspective I had when I first started working there, because the odd has somehow become almost normal. When we have a care-conference for a new person, and the family comes in wide-eyed and concerned that they pass people having discussions with teddy bears and decorative plants...I remember how reality goes a bit sideways there...
Little C is with me Friday through Christmas. I am looking forward to that. We have planned a light tour around the city, a visit to Railroad Park's interactive light display and trail, decorating stockings, hot chocolate, watching Prancer and Prancer Returns, decorating the tree...it will be nice to just be with her at home. It has been a while...it will also be nice to have some time off...
"I love you."
