And then she walked out never to return

The subject kind of says it all….in an impossibly vague way.  What I mean is that the nurse they hired to replace me (you know, the one they went through 2 rounds of interviews and landed upon because she was the ONLY one that showed up after NO ONE showed up to the first round) has quit.  By all accounts she managed to make it through a few days of orientation and then 2 days in the clinic in Vancouver and then decided to move with her boyfriend to another state.  This begs the question, why bother applying for a job when you are planning a move?   Why burn that possible bridge?  I think it highly unlikely that the move was a surprise, as moves like that often are not.  It also remains a possibility that she was just not terribly interested in clinic work.  All pure speculation of course; the salient point still being that they now have no one to fill the job. 

What does that mean for me and for this clinic?   Well, much of the same as now I guess, with the exception of being able to use me EVERY day of the week to attend to patients.  I will be here Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday for, at minimum, the next 6 weeks and likely at least marginally longer.   They are opting to repost the position rather than working with my patchwork solution because, though I can cover all days but 2 a month between myself and some other staff, they feel uncomfortable with this because two other staff members are ‘iffy’ at the moment (one has a sick mother and the other has a bad history of absenteeism and appears headed for a leave of absence if not termination).  Though these staff members are not involved at all with this clinic, their likely extended absences will mean the people I could use would be covering for them instead (welcome to the bottom of the food chain).  I have been charged with trying to keep the schedule ‘light’ on the days that I am not here meaning that the intention is once again to have me run the ‘full time’ clinic on a part time basis.  Frustrating for sure, but beats the hell out of the commute to the Park.  I foresee many problems, but I will just do my best with it.  After all, even if we upset the providers by limiting service even more severely than we already do, there isn't a manager to complain to. 

Tia’s last day with Quinn at home today.  I am sure it will be bittersweet.  I know she would much prefer to have the opportunity to have gone back part time a month ago and eased more slowly into it while still getting a lot of time with Quinn, but they couldn’t make that work at her job and still allow her the full benefits.  I know she would also prefer to work 3 days a week instead of four, but that also ran into benefit issues.  At the same time, I know she is itching to get back to her career and to have some break from full time baby duty.    

Speaking of baby duty, Monday will be the first day I am with Quinn all by my lonesome.  Wish me luck.  I am sure that it will not be easy. 

    

Glitter paint

I am sure I will continue to fail at this task, but I am adamant about trying to keep up with this blog.  My hope was that I will have more time to do so when I am home with Quinn two days a week, but based on Tia’s experience and my own, this seems very unlikely.  It actually seems like I will have LESS time, not more to pursue such nonessential exploits.  Oh well, how much can you really write about baby spit-up and diapering anyway? 

Lets start with the aforementioned Mr. Quinn.  He is actually doing better.  Or at least was.  It seems like he is hitting another growth spurt complete with ramped up feeding frequency and seemingly ending grousing.  Thankfully, these are generally short lived.  Regretfully, I suspect this will be a constantly repeated cycle.  But, for all the grousing, he is doing very well.  I am sure it will be good fun when he becomes more interactive.  At least he is throwing out some smiles now. 

As for work, the end of full time is nigh.  This is the last Wednesday that I will be here.  The last week that this is ‘my’ clinic.  It is truly bittersweet.  I really wish something could have been worked out to keep me here in my current role, but there was no compromise available and it is much more important to me that I have time to spend with Quinn and that he doesn’t have to spend the majority of his week in the care of strangers.  I can only hope it mostly goes well.  I know it will be a learning curve. 

The new girl won’t start here for another week +, that is assuming she has started at all.  I have heard nothing and likely won’t.  I won’t meet her until the first day we are scheduled together on the 9^th.    I certainly hope it works out well, though there will always be a part of me that hopes it doesn’t work out too well.  At some point, it is still my goal to return to this hospital and this clinic after all.    

As for the Park, it still seems like I will be elsewhere as often as there.  This doesn’t bother me in the least.  The Park is actually the furthest from me of all our sites.  I told the charges as much.  I would have just taken a float job except that: A. It guarantees you no hours, B. You are always first flexed out, and C. No benefits.  I am kind of going into this job with the mindset that I will pretty much operate as a float, only with a set number of hours and days.  They are also opening up some kind of hybrid position for anyone wanting to pick up shifts on the weekends.  It would be a 5 hour gig (8-1) doing rounds/starts at GSH.  Picking up a shift every couple of weekends could mean a few thousand a year extra….assuming they keep that going.  Of course, as with everything else here, instability is the only kind of stability we know. 

Other than the usual goings on, there is little else to report on at the moment of note other than:

-          We (nurses) get a raise in October of 4.5%.  Awesome!

-          I met a patient the other day (and I meet some doozies) that supposedly injected glitter paint into themselves.   It just reminds me that people have an endless capacity to do themselves harm and that, no matter how long you are in the profession, there is always something that shocks you.  

Daddy's Day Off

On Monday after work I lost my car keys.  I had them, obviously, when I got home.  I changed out of my scrubs and into some athletic shorts and went out to wash my car.  Afterwards I took Quinn for a bit and, since it was during his witching hours I watered the lawn, hung out in the hammock, the rocker, the bed, and pretty much anywhere I could take him that I thought would quiet him for a bit.  Somewhere during this period of time the keys went missing.  That night, I went through the entire house twice, checked behind every couch cushion (I found my cell phone there not to long ago), and under every surface.  I even took a flashlight through the front and back yards to no avail.  I went through the same thing in the morning, with the same outcome.  I knew they were somewhere nearby, just not where that might be.  Right as I was leaving for work after grabbing the spare set I went to put my work shoes on and.....there they were in the left shoe.  I have no recollection of putting them in the shoe, but either I did that or they fell out of my pocket and into them somehow.  This is the result of trying to do a full time job on a part time basis and doing so with chronic headaches from stress and lack of sleep.  That was how my week began.  

By Tuesday I had reached my limit.  So, today I called in sick.  I never feel great about calling in sick, even when I am actually sick.  I still do it when I am well from time to time though because, well, sometimes I just NEED to.  This might be the first time I have done so for spite however.  

I won't belabor the point, but I am not supposed to be working 5 days a week.  I am doing so to 'help' out while they evidently sit on their hands.  As a 'compromise' they allow me to come in only when I have patients instead of the entire day.  This evidently means that they are not obligated to do a GD thing about the clinic in the hours I am not there.  Most of the time this would be fine.  This week it most assuredly is not.

I have 7 unfunded patients currently.  2 of those patients require weekly dressing changes only.  The other 5 need daily infusions.  All have sketchy and largely illicit reasons why they need to do this.  The company that does home infusions refuses to see these patients because they cannot pay.  Our clinics have no choice in the matter.  Since I am only in the clinic in the afternoons (save Wednesdays when I have typically been there the entire day), I have to either find a way to squeeze them all in a relatively compact time frame or send them elsewhere.  However, all the clinics are presently inundated with much the same so there is nowhere to send them.  On Tuesday I had already scheduled 9 patients to come in Wednesday.  Too much for just me to deal with.  I then had to turn away no less than 3 paying patients (a blood transfusion and 2 hydrations) because there was literally nowhere I could put them without displacing someone else.  Were I running it like a business, I would just tell the nonfunded patients, "sorry, your spot has been taken," but obviously that isn't how we run it.

Normally I would ask for help from my manager.  However, if you have been following along, we don't have one of those.  Perhaps I could ask my charge?  Nope, she isn't back until Thursday.  So, I asked the 'charge du jour' if we could contact Candy who wants extra shifts and has clinic experience. She instead opted to ask Brandie, an on-call, who told her 'I will think about it.'  On Tuesday I followed up and was told they hadn't yet heard but that 'I shouldn't worry because surely someone from the floor would be available.'  Which means it would be wholly dependent on them being fully staffed and not being overly busy and, oh by the way, that I shouldn't expect anyone with clinical experience whatsoever.  I opted instead to screw them over.  I could not be more pleased about this.  I am so entirely, completely, and fully done with that place.  I can't wait until they are forced to move me into the position I accepted and was moved to nearly 2 months ago.

And, thankfully, it turned out to be a pretty pleasant day.  Quinn was, until his usual 6-8 foulness, quite good.  We even made it out to McMenemin's Mommy Matinee to see Ted and have some food and a drink.  It was lovely.  Quinn slept through most of the film.  We also managed to get a few other items ticked off our collective 'to do' lists and even fit in a short nap.

In the end, I don't necessarily feel good about putting the rest of the crew in a bad position, but I don't much like being put in one all the time either.  I am already doing a job that NO ONE in my department wants to do, and doing it without any support whatsoever.  I also have a few new orders for patients that I have no idea how to even go about scheduling since I know full well that the only way they can be seen is if I choose to come in early to see them and I am no longer willing to do that.  If only there was anyone in charge to ask.  If only.  

All about Q

We were discussing some friends the other night who swore up and down that they would not be like everyone else and only talk about their baby.  Then, of course, they did.  Their excuse was a valid one however; they pretty much did nothing else.  I am using the same excuse for my own myopic focus.  God knows there isn’t much else going on. 

My mom got to come out to see Quinn.  I was really happy she did, because it will be hard to travel between here and Florida often for any of us.  Hopefully that changes and Quinn becomes more, not less, portable.   But at this moment, the thought of putting him on a plane terrifies me because I can only envision him unleashing his spine shivering scream for hours on end (and I should note here that I also HATE flying…..it is so tight and uncomfortable and unpleasant.  Still, it isn’t like you are going to drive instead).  The hope is that we can return the favor at some point this winter when we are climbing the walls trying to get out of the grey gloom.   Time will tell.

We had our first successful outing in awhile last night.  We made it through both a lunch and a dinner without Quinn melting down.  It takes some cajoling and some work, but it is nice to see that it can, Quinn permitting, happen.  As for sleeping at night, it is happening in fits and starts.  Since he goes through many ‘growth spurts’ we don’t (and generally I mean Tia doesn’t) get a whole lot of stretches longer than 2 hours.  It is definitely one of the toughest parts of being a parent.  Dealing with a newborn is hard.  Dealing with work is hard.  Dealing with life is hard.  Dealing with them all on contracted amounts of sleep sometimes feels damn near impossible.  It is a tough balance to strike, and it will be harder still when Tia goes back to work on the 1^st (just a few weeks from now).   Thankfully Tia is an excellent partner and can pick up my slack. 

Work remains a confusing mess.  They finally hired someone to fill my full time position here (after dismissing every attempt I made to work out something).  My understanding is that she was the only one to show up for the second round of interviews.  I have no idea how she will like the gig, but since she is coming from an ER background; I think she will find it tedious and dull.  There are questions being raised if it isn’t just a step back into the system, but at this point they don’t care overmuch, preferring to have someone rather than no one.  I am, of course, a bit out of sorts that they didn’t ask me to take part in the interviews (or at least fashion some questions).  They didn’t ask anyone from the other clinics either.  So, the two people performing the interview have (had?) almost no clinical knowledge and absolutely no clinical experience.  So, the chances they hired the right person seems rather slim.

Of course, even that hasn’t exactly been well planned out.  She is starting on the 24^th and then spending the next 2 weeks training at busier sites before, ostensibly, I will train her here for 2 weeks.  This isn’t a bad idea, since the 2 clinics she will visit will afford her more varied experiences.  However, I officially will not be able to be here full time starting on October 1^st.  This is something that I have made very well known.  In fact, they knew I was going to part time (or wanted to) around Tia’s 4^th or 5^th month and knew the EXACT day I would need to go to part time since mid-July.  Oh, and I have been transferred all but physically since August 13^th.  My supervisor’s response was”, ‘Oh, that won’t work.’  I love it when a plan comes together!  

Speaking of coming together, we evidently are soon to have a manager.  Just 6 months after the last one was let go.  Also, they still have no found a replacement for the full time charge here who left on the 3^rd of August.  So, most days of the week, we have a charge du jour making planning ahead a near impossibility.  It is truly astounding that we haven’t imploded.  

Not much else of interest going on of late.  After all, it is all about Q at the moment.