Betty
PS; The delivery fee was under $10, $7.95 to be exact. That's pretty cheap, to save your energy and time to spend with your family and friends and prevent some unnessisary pain and suffering. About the cost of two Latte's, I'd give up many cups of coffee for the energy and pain it cost.
Hi again Betty, I relate totally w/ your energy level; I've become very isolated over the past year. Partly because I am so angry @ many motorists' terrible driving skills; I was toaght how to drive by an LAPD Sgt (my father) my seatbelt is buckled befor the ignition & I have a perfect driving record, can drive as defensibly as possible but I have no control over others' driving (whenever I hear "drive carefully" from someone whose never been hit I think to myself this is akin to saying "don't get shot" when you have a gun to your head. It enrages me to see car commercials, all show the same thing; speeding, spin-outs, stopping on a dime in the snow w/ a little "professional driver, closed course" & people buy into this; it isn't legal or safe yet this is a selling point (CHP report listed the 5000 lb truck that hit me by applying the brakes in the snow as stating "I tried to turn but couldn't avoid the little car") To him I was just a little car & some front end damage to his truck. I do seem to be very angry as it nears the December anniversary of MVA. I have friends w/ FM & know from their experience how much fatigue goes along w/ the pain & I'm so accustomed to being a healthcare provider my focus was (& is) helping alleviate their pain, I've always been assertive w/ MDs who pass judgement on my patients (there are a lot of judgemental MDs/RNs who take it upon themselves to decide the patient doesn't know best; I remind new nurses that they are the patients advocate not the co-signer of the MDs attitudes. RNs who passed on report telling me so & so was just an addict never flew w/ me. I figured even if that were true I was not their Narcotics Anonomous sponsor & would treat pain for an addict as it not only wasn't my place to judge addicts can have pain as well. I tell new nurses who are intimidated by lousy MDs they are just bullys w/ a title as we work for the hospital not the MD & no nurse ever was called on the carpet for being a strong patient advocate. It only takes a moment to call the MD & the good MDs will increase the pain meds (I work in Oncolgy/ general medical & the medical patients are the ones w, FM, CF, Scikle cell.)
Fortunately I know all of the MDs so I could pick doctors I know are good; unfortunately
Diana
that is so strange, nurses should have good insurance. these are the very people that do most of the work caring for patients. I just think that is terrible. You would think that nurses should get their care for free from all the doctors patients they help. That makes no sense. they want you to commit your entire life caring for all their patients, but if you get sick or need some health care, don't call us??? That is sooooooo wrong!
I have told my doctor all along that for some reason, pain is exhausting! At first I really could not understand why? But I'm sure it's partly because, most of us have such difficulty sleeping for one thing. But just going through a whole days and nights that pain never lets up is just exausting.
I try constantly to reduce and salvage any energy that I have so I can use it on spending time with my husband and our son, when he's home from college.
My husband does our shopping, but I also help my elderly friend of 92 out and between my FM/chronic pain and her severe RA, she and I both have trouble doing her shopping. so I also want to preserve my energy so I can continue spending a coupld afternoons a week with her. She's never been married nor has any children, so she does not really have anyone to help her around the house with all her stuff, her emacular degeneration has gotten to a point that she is not able to pay her bills, balance her checkbook, make doctors apts, lay her meds out for the week, order prescriptions. just all that kind of stuff. So I take care of it for her. She and I have a nice time visiting and spending time together. We understand each others inabilities and both make concession for them. She is still able to take care of all her personal hygene and I order her new clothing and shoes off the internet too. The extra harder type work, I help her hire people to come in or take care of the yard and I pay them for her, it just works out really well for us both. I'm not able to work a normal job, and I can choose which ever afternoons that I'm feeling able to drive down to her house, it get me out of the house and keeps me from feeling comepletely worthless. I would encourage anyone to find an elderly person and help them around the house and visit with them. The rest of the week, I don't even leave my home and especially during the winter months, as the pain is just far worse than in the warmer summer time.
You have great credentials Diana and I cannot help but think that your talent with nursing could be used on an internet pain groups to give advise and extra medical comments to help others, there are paying postitions out there for educated nurses that I'm sure you could find a work from home and still work in your medial expertise. Have you thought about it?
I know it's not what you wanted to do and you may feel angry to think about it, but I'm just offering something for you to think about. You have a great deal to offering and I'm positive you are a wonderful nurse.
I had never paid much attention to others with illnesses and I believe that my own illness has made me a much more caring and compassionate person towards others with illness's and handicaps too.
Great to hear from you and we are all very blessed to have you here with us.
Betty
Hi Betty, many people are surprised by that RNs don't have very good insurance but health insurance comes down to private vs public sector & most nurses work in the private sector. Public sector employees (city, state or feds) have excellent insurance; postal workers, Cal-trans, law-enforcement, firefighters, teachers & let us not forget those who not only cut @ the bottom while enjoying the best insurance of call; congress the senate & every government official on up. I work in the private sector & have @ least 2 collegues who've had breast cancer; the only way they had a job-guarentee is if they returned to work w/in 6 months. I've considered the
jail system as I would be a city employee, not so physically demanding & mainly passing out psychiatric meds (I have a friend who used to work @ San Quentin but that was a tad more brutal...blood up to the tops of her shoes from suicides et al & the nurses start the IVs on death row. Even w/ the most horrid killers she didn't want to start the IVs & had a co-worker who loved it so if someones' appeals were up her co-worker started I.V.s if a death penaly inmates time came up. Thats' why I'd consider Jail only. There's case management but those nurses entire job is going through charts & calling MDs to find out how soon they can shove the patients out. I could'nt bring myself to do that. I have worked out-patient before (cancer is my specialty.) a few other areas use RNs such as Dialysis & teaching LVNs. Most Drs offices use a medical assistant; they use the term nurse but MDs only need one license in their office & the MD is license. The nurse who takes your vital signs etc..is the medical asst. Also, Pain management uses RNs as they do Epidurals & such but insurance is same; once the job ends the insurance ends (except maybe teaching or jails; I have a colleague who works @ jail & can ask her. My father was an LAPD Sgt, his monthly pension was more than my olleagues & I made working & his insurance was blue cross PPO for life. No deductables ( mine is $500) $10 co-pays for meds ( mine is $30) and if my job ends so does the insurance; believe me, I've paid $1,200 a month between jobs & would do it again (this was a while back but I'd pay any amount; I took a break & worked for a non-profit home Hospice & their PPO for 2 was $1,500 mo. for employees. I liked the work but I was shocked that insurance would leave 2 a $3oo/mo paycheck; I did get experience but I found out via my friend whose worked @ 2 other home Hospices that they all pay $3 to be on call meaning she can get a call anytime of night & drive @ worst neighborhoods @ 0300 am. Her husband worries @ her & so do I. They have Hospice back East where people are in home-like facilities. I wish we had them here, I'm good @ comfort care.
They had a beautiful hospice @ one hosptial; it closed. You don't find Hosipices in Hospitals because they lose mney, no procedures, no labs etc...not making enough on patients...that floor is office space now.
They do have a newer very nice floor that is @ a hospital in Paim Springs that was hospice for those dying of end-stage aids; the volunteers were all guys who were living w/ HIV. I loved working that floor. Volunteers & I got along well & the were very helpful. A lot of those in healthcare were quite judgemental. They made that into a medical overflow floor, more money in that. I've considered bringing myself up to speed with advanced cardio life support & trying my hand @ Dialysis nursing (I wouldn't do out-patient chemo again even though I know it well (lot of responsibility to mix the chemo; the nurses are the pharmacists & mixing chemo is complicated. I learned it but it scared me to death. actually, anyone who isn't afraid is more likely to make a mistake,) I am one internship away from alcohol & chemical dependency counseling but I wouldn't be hired @ many places as I take pain meds & there are some hard-nosed big-book thumpers out there (I've been sober for 17 years, the bg-book is the AA book & the big-book thumpers think Aspirin is suitable for a brken leg. They're a dying breed though as they're all getting older, too & ending up on pain meds. My friend with FM is on some very strong meds but she's still sober.) So Betty, I'll have to make a change eventually but as far as health insurance for nurses hospitals may not have great insurance but they provide the best. Theres' a county hospital but it's even longer than my hour commute (I'm guessing that a county facility has insurance via the county...I'll have to wait & see; I'm on LOA right now w/ a braced L hand, a dislocated R thumb & forefinger. There are some benefits to working in one hospital for 10 years; I know all of the MDs; I worked on Thanksgiving; my hand hurt so much I checked w/ operator & found out he was on call so I paged him to me. Gave me a prescription to get by & let me know I could come in Monday for an injection of steroids. It's nice to have my MDs so close A hand. Betty. your 92 y/o fiend is lucky to have you; since I live & work in Southern California I encounter a lot of patients in her situation. Some of the 90 y/olds have out lived their kid, others have kids 3000 miles away. So many of us had roomates when wer'e young I'm surprised that older people, mostly widows, never have roomates; it would help them financially, companship & allow people to stay in their own homes longer. It seems taboo to have a roomate beyond teenagers, young adulthood. Glad to hear from you :-)
Hello Diana
It's good to hear from you again.
It's really great for you to share your experience and expertise as a nurse, I think it's good for all of us to hear about nursing.
When you mentioned your work in hospice care, it reminded me a book that I'm reading right now. It's called "Midwife for Souls" by Kathy Kalina.
It helps to teach you about the needs of the family and the patient that is dieing. I hate to think about it, but since I'm the one that is with Helen (92yrfriend) Unless she is taken quickly, I'm expecting to be there with her when she is dying. So I thought maybe I would try to prepare myself for the time. My medical provider actually offers hospice type classes for free to members and I've also contemplated taking the class myself to further prepare me for the time too.
Helen is not the lucky one, it is I that is the one who's blessed. If I did not have Helen's needs to think about, I'd probably be homebound for a very long time. She gives me purpose and also makes me have to get dressed at least 2 days a week and drive to town. She has made me medical power of Attorney, so I go to all her doctors apts, and make sure she is taking her meds the proper way. I set them out, give her her embrel shot once a week and call the doctors and just take care of all that stuff for her. She and I have a very nice friendship and we really enjoy one another.
A few years back, a very wise priest taught me, that when your suffering and in pain, the best thing you can do is reach out and help someone else. So that has led me to helping Helen out. And it's been the best thing I've ever done.
I'm glad you were able to work some, have you always kept working since your accident? I guess I always think that everyone is like me and unable to be a regular work force person. It would be nice to have my pain be more stable, but I'm still in a world of instability and if I have one day with my Helen, then I have to take the next few days off and have a hard time controlling pain for a few days, but then as soon as I have a better day, I head to Helen's house to make sure she has food and meds and anything else she needs to keep her ability to be an independant woman.
Actually, she has had a female roommate for most of her adult life. Her first room mate died in the early 90's and Helen burried her with Helen;s family in our local cemetary, Helen will be burried right beside her. Then she had another roommate/caregiver for the next seveal years and that dear woman died three years ago from Brain cancer. So I knew Her from a vet hospital that I used to work in and also knew her family. Her nephew told her to give me a call and talk to me about helping her out, as I had mentioned it to him and his wife a few months earlier.
Helen is a California retired teacher, she taught at Eldorado HS in Placerville, CA. It sounds so funny, she retired in 1974. I bet they never knew she would still be drawing her pention this long.
She's great and I love her very much, I just want her to be able to stay in her home and not be forced into an elderly care facility, she's one of those independent women and she would just be miserable in a facility. If she needs to have someone stay with her, we've already talked about it and I will come down a stay a few nights a week and we've already interviewed someone to help me out too.
I'm happy you were able to work and even happier that you've come in and are active in our little corner of the net. We all need help and someone to talk about our pain with.
Take Care
Betty
Nurses give the shots, they do the work up to get the paiction ready for the visit. They handle the needles and sew up wounds. They have more contact with what ills us. I had a nurse who stick herself with a needle that she blood out of arm. I said are you afraid of that? She just reply "I know you have clean blood, it's check every time you come in here. If it had been someone else I would have been very afraid." That made me feel better but I could have had some kind of disease that she could have gotten that easy. This is why it is harder for nurses to get insurance. Paramedics, nurses have the greatest risk than anyone who helps us. Even police and firefighters they all run that risk of caring for people. I wish I could do more for them. I would love to say thank you to every one of them.
Thank you all for the blessing and care you give so with out regard to your own lives, to help us all.
Hi Susan, good to hear from you; the job is risky (it's also in the top 10 of workplace violence; especially in the ER.) I once had a family member try & corner me in a room; I backed out of room w/out taking my eyes off him; manager said he was lucky I wasn't inclined to call the cops; I told her I was inclined to call police & if he had taken one step further or laid a hand on me I would have. The last time I was exposed to a patients blood (through small cuts on my cuticles) the patient did have AIDs so I got the 4 week cocktail of AZT & 3TC. I was sick as a dog from the anti-virals & got tested for HIV every 6 weeks for a year; I came clean but it wasn't a needle stick, those are worse because of the patients blood inside the needle & gloves don't protect anyone from that; I had a needle stick years before but they tested the patient & she didn't have HIV; a needle stick from the other patient would have been different. I'm innocuted against Hepatitis B but there's no innoculation against Hep C. Actually, if the insurance companies everyone would have equally lousy insurance & high premiums; there are many more police than nurses who end up injured on the job, there number #1 injury & death is from auto accidents (people usually associate it w/ violence & forget how many hours a day they spend in a car. It really is private vs public; teachers who work in the most violent schools still get same insurance as those in safe schools. Same w/ cops who patrol most violent cities vs the safest. Most Paramedics were firefighters; their insurance is good but for every Paramedic there are 10 EMTs (emergency medical technitions.) their pay and insurance is pathetic as most ambulance rides don't require a paramedic (they have radio access, even lifeflight helicopters usually have a pilot, a flightnurse & a patient.) Health insurance companies aren't worried about something that is certain death (like a copter crash) what they don't like are chronic conditions where the patient lives on but costs them money, stuff like Diabetes, Psychiatric problems &, of course Chronic pain. I saw "sicko" not long ago; couldn't be closer to the truth especially the alphebetized list of 100s of pre-existing conditions. My father was a WW11 vet but he didn't have to rely on the V.A. as his LAPD insurance was worlds better. Thank you a bunch for your appreciation of nursing, Susan, in the 11 years I've been it's become so stressful (patients need to be half-dead before they're admitted.) I would've spent the 4 college yrs for a law degree.
in sacramento, we've got the safeway delivery service too. after i used it a few times and stopped for a few weeks, i got all kinds of "free delivery coupons!" i love free stuff!
the woman you're helping to take care of is very lucky to have you. i hope she appreciates you! i've recently been able to start helping a neighbor of mine and it's such a relief to be able to do SOMETHING for someone else. that's one thing that really does a number on my self esteem from this chronic pain. not being able to be useful to others. most people don't understand how being able to throw a load of laundry in for my mother-in-law makes me so excited!
good luck to you!
Hello backtolife911
It's great to meet you and I'm glad that you've come to visit with all of us.
I just got one of those free coupon things for delivery today in my e-mail. Last time the delivery driver told me that if you choose one of the the 4 hour time slots for the delivery time, that they will also take another 2$ off the delivery fee. That put's in down to $5 and I think we would spend more in gas to go our selves for that price.
My Helen is always calling me and thanking me for all kinds of things. When I bring her meals, she makes it sound like I'm a gourmet cook or somehting. I have to laugh, as I'm not a very good cook at all and my husband does most of our cooking, as I'm not even able to stand that long in the kitchen.
She really helps me to feel useful, even though I just help her with simple things. If I did not have her, I dont know what I'd do with myself. It would certainly make this empty nest feel a whole lot emptier.
Thank you for replying and it's great to meet you.
Betty
Featuring Content From:
By using this service, you accept our Terms of Use. Please read them. The consumer health information on is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice or treatment for any medical conditions. You should promptly seek professional medical care if you have any concern about your health, and you should always consult your physician before starting a fitness regimen. Copyright © 2012 Remedy Health Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hello Susan
I understand what you mean, I guess and haveheard that the home shopping network and may be some others have become a problems for some.
for me, they've just made my life a bit simplier, I'm also less likely to be a spontanious shoppper, as I have to think out every thing I purchase and I actually spend less if I stay at home and shop on the PC.
I normally just purchase my suppliments, bath and body products as my husband shops for us, I use the online grocery shopping for my elderly friend, I order then I make sure I'm at her house when they are delivered and put them away for her and clean her kitchen too. It allows me to save some very precious little energy and I'm able to spend more time visiting her.
Thanks
Betty