Flying

Soooo….. I hate plane rides… wait… I HATE PLANE RIDES!!! Much better :) 

There is something about a plane that is just unnatural.  I mean, OK maybeeee it’s just one HUGE jump across the country… but still weird.  The worst part about flying is the way the air smells… the best word I can think of to describe it is… fake.  You know what I mean?  Who knows how long this air has been circulating… and where it came from…. I once did a microbiology report on that… eww. So here I am, uneasy in this stupid plane going from stupid Denver, Colorado to stupid BWI and hating knowing that I’m going to be in this stupid seat for 4 hours.  

It had been maybe been 5 minutes and I was already board… so I turned to the older gentleman setting next to me and said nervously, “Have you ever watched the series LOST?”  I could tell he was already regretting choosing the seat next to me.  HAHA!  His face was priceless… who is this girl? … and is she going to want to talk the whole time??? BAHAHAHA, but he decided to be polite and turned to me “why would you bring that up???”  I explained how I had just watched 6 hours of LOST (thanks to my roommate Cris) the day before and couldn’t get it out of my mind.  He just chuckled to himself and said “well I don’t think there are any islands between here and Maryland… unless of course we land somewhere in the Mississippi,” then gave me a wink. 

As the plane started to ascend and the seats started rattling and the engine sound stared humming louder, and the fake air started coming out faster and my body was forced back in my seat and my water bottle started rolling back and … well you get the point, the older gentleman turned to me and whispered “if we crash, you know it’s your fault right?” … you may laugh now, but this guy’s face was SERIOUS.  Afterwards, he reaches to grab one of those emergency pamphlets out of the pouch in front of him and hands it to me without saying ANYTHING … NO JOKE.  Let’s just say that I started freaking out… on the inside.  I just looked at him a giggled, but in my mind I was wishing I would have paid a little closer attention to the air flight attendants while they were explaining what to do in an emergency situation. After the assent I closed my eyes… WITH the emergency pamphlet in my hand, pretending to sleep… but who could ever sleep after such an incident??? That whole flight I opened my eyes for a total of four times: once to order my drink, once to grab my drink, once to grab my snack, and once while the older gentleman went to the restroom to look the emergency pamphlet over.  I have never had a photographic memory… but I played those stupid pamphlet pictures over and over again in my mind.  These were the kind of thoughts I was having… Ok, if I’m sitting here and the emergency exit is there, I need to grab my seat cover grab my back pack…. wait grab my back pack, then the seat cover… go to the back for the food, jump across these seats…

Yep, this guy had won… he officially freaked me out and I was the one regretting MY seat choice in the end… let’s just say, I am NOT looking forward to the flight back to Las Vegas.

Back to School

School

What do you think of when you see this word?  For my little brother and sisters this can sometimes be a synonym for jail.  However, for a child in Africa this word is often a dream.  While I was on my clinical rotation I came into contact with many undergrad students working as techs for the clinic.  They all had such a desire to be accepted into physical therapy school and couldn’t wait until they were in my place.  Sometimes I can get so busy and frustrated with school that I forget what a privilege it is. 

Physical Therapy School

Before I was accepted into school this word was so glorified in my mind... what happened to that?  Over the past three weeks I have found myself dreading going to school in the morning and making it through the day by thoughts like: “a year and a half and I’ll be out.”  

In life, we are responsible for our own attitudes and actions.  No one or no situation can put you in a bad mood unless you let it.  So you got a B on a test instead of an A… or that teacher was so rude when you went to talk to her… SO WHAT!

School or people around you can never define who you are as a person.  Grades cannot define who you are, nor will they ever project what type of a therapist I will be. 

I feel the easy part of becoming a physical therapist is what is taught in school.  How to take blood pressure, positioning, ROM testing… and yes even neurology.  Anyone can learn these things if they put their mind to it…

What I argue is this: People who change the world do not settle for head knowledge… they strive for what is not taught in school: morals, ethics, and values.  Life suddenly is not about them but about others.  They do not define success by the nice car or house… but how many lives they were able to change.

What if there is more?  What if it wasn’t about where you get in life? 

What if life is not about me?

My First Clinical Rotation

When I was younger I wanted to become a physical therapist so I could “help” people… but after this first clinical rotation, I soon learned that this would not be the case.  It is going to be about people “helping” me… healing me, teaching me, growing me and giving me more than I could ever give them. 

During this first clinical rotation there were many people placed in my life.  Many of these people I will probably never see again.  Funny how that works, right?  I have known these people for a total of one month amounting to the most of 12 visits…. accounting for a little under 12 hours and they have made a larger impact on me than some of the people I have known all my life.  

Many of the patients that made an impact on my life were affected by a stroke.  Before I came into the clinic, I had read about the anatomy of a stroke, types of strokes, how the stroke impacted a person… name it, I had read about it.  However… all this reading was about the stroke itself, it failed to take into account the patient.  If patients were to define themselves by a disease… yes, this would look like a book patient… a “case study” defined by words on paper, with all the right symptoms and no personality… simply put… a paper full of facts.  Does this ever happen, will I ever encounter a “book patient” with no feelings, no personality?  There has not been one patient I have met that has chosen to define themselves by their condition.  At first, I was confused.  I found myself referring to the book, thinking… “Wait, if you have this condition… you can’t do that… you can move your arm like that if this is torn… wait…STOP… that’s breaking the rules!”    

Humans are messy.  Our bodies, minds, and souls are connected in such a way that we will never be a clean-cut “case study.”   When I think about it… I can’t believe that I thought every patient was going to be the same… as if cut out of a “Rotator cuff” or “Lacunar stroke” cookie cutter.  This thought reminds me of Psalm 139:14 :)

This past month, through these patients, I was shown what it truly is to have trust … to the point of tears, gratefulness … for even the bad days, perseverance… when life around you seems stagnant and to have peace… when worrying seems so much more attractive.