The Computer Beast

Paul's CERNER drawing

So yesterday was our first day of computer charting at the hospital.  We have been told that this new type of charting is going to make our lives easier, and we will be joining other health care professionals in the 21st century.  I however, am old school.  I did NOT want this at all.
When I was in high school, my dear mother, doll lady,  MADE me take typing.  I was not at all happy with the fact that I was going to have to give up one of my electives to take this class.  And besides, why in the world did I need typing? I was not going to be a secretary for a living.  Nevertheless, I enrolled for the class in my  junior year.  We learned on "old school" typewriters.  The kind that ding when you get to the end of the page, and need to stop and move the bar thingy to the next line.  There was no such thing as spell check, grammar check, or backspace that erased your last letter.  You had to use your little bottle of liquid paper, and place it over your mistake, then wait and blow on it until it dried.  It was rather annoying, but I have to say, we learned to be precise typists and make little errors.
My senior year I went on to take Word Processing.  It was my computer literacy course.  You see, back in those days, not everyone owned a computer, and computer literacy courses were out there to make sure high school graduates were getting some type of computer exposure.  My word processing class was on a computer that was a black screen with a little flashing green light.  We learned things like "open apple C and closed apple U."  These type of things like pressing the open apple key and the U key would underline the text.  There were hundreds of commands that had to be memorized in order to be able to use the system.  It took the entire year, two semesters, to learn the system.
Two months ago, we got trained for two days on this new computer system for work.  I know I am not the oldest that was in the class, but I sure do feel very computer stupid compared to my other co-workers, who could not imagine having the computer background I have.  The intranet was not even around when I was in high school, or at least we never had access to it.  Floppy disks really WERE floppy.  So sitting in the training, I sat there trying to keep up, and feeling like, "holy cow, what in the world am I going to do in two months when this system goes LIVE?"  We finished the class after two days, and all I could think was, "they did not teach us enough!"  So, I have had a little count down going on in my head since February dreading the days until we changed to the computer system.  I specifically asked for the first day of launch, to be OFF from work.  Wouldn't you know that not only did they change the date that it would start, but now, not only was I working, I was also in charge!  I thought I was going to cry when I was getting report in the morning.  I hate feeling out of control in situations and feeling like I don't have a clue what is going on.  What is worse, I hate feeling stupid in front of other people, especially doctors.  At least yesterday, I was not the only one feeling that way.  I looked around, and even the most computer savvy of my friends, my precious "BFF the NP", had that "deer in the headlights" look.  I thought, "oh, if BFF the NP is lost, I am going to be REALLY lost."  But it was comforting that I was not the only one feeling like the bottom had just dropped out beneath us.
So there I was, starring at it, THE COMPUTER BEAST!  And yes, a beast it is!  I didn't even like the way the cart it was sitting on looked.  It seemed to be laughing at me as I was trying to figure out how to manuvuer my way around the system.  User friendly it was none the such.  Of course the person who designed the system could NOT have been a nurse.  They made it far too difficult.  Click here, but you have to right click here, and this tab doesn't do what you think it should, and things are hidden, and the help tab is just a joke!  I did my best, managed to keep from crying several times durning the day, and finished thinking, "oh I hope I didn't miss anything."  The important thing was, all my patients were taken care of, safe and sound, all alive, and there for the next shift.
My nemesis the BEAST will be there next time I know.  And I guess I will have to give him the points for winning the first battle.  But as my hubby would say in the funniest creole voice, "you live to fight another day."

Big Yellow Butterflies

So Judy Lynn used to love love love butterflies.  Honey Bunny used to give her a hard time when she would admire them and ladybugs, and would tell her, "that's a bug."  She HATED bugs and was NOT happy with daddy when he would call her precious ladybug or butterfly a bug.  She would quickly tell him, "that's not a BUG daddy."  We would laugh and play back and forth with her.  After she passed away, it was very important to us to make sure they put a butterfly on her headstone, along with a cross, a dove, and a flower design.  The butterfly story had just begun as we would come to find out.  On the day of the funeral, we were in a completely different place.  I am only able to remember bits and pieces of the funeral, and for parts of it, I almost feel like I was on auto pilot.  It was a hot and sunny day and we sat under a tarp they had placed to shade us.  Our friends and family had turned out to the cemetery in huge numbers and even released pink balloons into the air at the end, which we had no idea they were planning on doing.  A couple of months after the funeral, I started to hear "butterfly stories."
My good friend the "red-headed sister" said the day of the funeral, there was a huge yellow butterfly with black on it that sat on the top of the tarp we were sitting under during the entire service.  She said at the end, the butterfly flew off as it had finished its participation in the event.  When she arrived to her car to leave, she was feeling terrible and very sad.  The huge yellow butterfly was sitting on the top of her SUV upon her arrival, and flew off happily after she left.
The yellow butterfly returned months later when she was getting ready for her daughter's first birthday party.  She had told me she tried desperately to take pictures of it before it flew off, but was unable to capture a picture.  Her home is miles and miles away from the cemetery.
When we had decided that we were going to convert Judy's room, into Spiderman's room, we pondered what we would do with all her stuff.  Many of her items would be given to friends and family members, and we planned to keep a bunch of things.  Her princess toddler set was far too big and bulky to keep, and we no longer had room or use for it.  The idea to give it to red-headed's daughter seemed like a perfect idea.  Red-headed was thrilled that "big eyes" would be the receipient of Judy's princess furniture.  She came by one afternoon with big eyes, and we cried, we laughed, and we loaded everything into her SUV.  She drove home and big eyes was asleep.  She decided to leave her in the car and unload the furniture.  She had brought the toddler bed to her front door and set it outside.  She went inside bringing in the bench and toy box.  When she went back outside, a HUGE yellow butterfly, just like the one she had seen before was sitting on top of the toddler bed.  She stood there and smiled and cried thinking of Judy.
My cousin, "sweetest nail lady" has two precious girls, one only a year apart from Judy, and a few months after Judy had died, the girls were in the backyard playing and thinking, and talking about Judy.  Sweetest nail lady had told me that they saw the most beautiful HUGE yellow butterfly outside flying around with the girls.  Little "curly" even commented that the butterfly made her think of Judy.
One day Wonderboy and I went out to the cemetery to replace her flowers.  I was pregnant at the time and it has always been so hard to go out to the cemetery.  Wonderboy said, "look mom!"  A HUGE yellow butterfly was flying around me as I was kneeling down changing the flowers.  Wonderboy went on to tell me that it had landed on my leg first.
The day that we went to Ruidoso to get away, we saw a HUGE yellow butterfly flying around the site on the one year anniversary of her death.  I could go on and on telling the stories of butterfly encounters, and perhaps I will tell more stories in future blogs.
We decided to plant a butterfly garden this year.  Planting the garden has been bitter sweet.  On one hand, it has been fun finding flowers to plant and working together as a family to prepare the space.  On the other hand, it has made us so sad that Judy Lynn has not been here to enjoy the garden and the flowers with us.  She absolutely loved being outside, and flowers would have been the icing on the cake.  We have been hoping that our garden will attract thousands of butterflies this spring and summer, and that we will be able to look outside and enjoy them for months.
So today, honey bunny went outside to water and check the progress of the seeds and bulbs.  He came in so excited talking about, guess what,...........a HUGE yellow butterfly that showed up this morning flying around.  He said that it almost looked like it was going to land on his leg.  Of course he did not have his camera or phone to capture a picture.  I immediately looked outside to try to catch a glimpse of the butterfly he had described, but it was gone.  I know we will see it again soon.
I feel like God gives us little things to help make us feel like our loved ones are around and ok

Just Like His Brother

So our baby Spiderman has been such a joy.  Our journey to him coming into this world was a bit rough I must say.  The pregnancy was tough to put it lightly.  I struggled with extreme nausea, and back pain that would not let up.  We had a couple of scares with him too, that were always so fun.  I managed to work the entire pregnancy and actually went into labor during the middle of my shift.  My stubbornness refused to allow myself to believe I was truly in labor.  When my boss asked me at lunch if I was "really" ok, I told her, "uh YES, why does everyone keep asking me that?"  She said she did not like the way I looked and was breathing.  After loosing my entire lunch in the restroom a few minutes later, I finally admitted, well, I guess I may be in labor, and yes those pains I am feeling are probably contractions.  I refused to let them take me to L&D right down the hall until my hubby arrived, and yep I had my c-section the next day.

My precious boys

The c-section was fun in itself, lasting over an hour.  Three doctors were present, including my beloved "mexican Santa Clause" Dr. C.  Spiderman went to the nursery and was not released to me for over 6 hours.  I got to keep him in our room just a bit.  Long enough for him to decide to stop breathing, and turn dusky.  We had a terrible scare that night, and he went straight to NICU for a week.  He continued to be naughty after he went home, continuing with his breathing issues, buying us another stay in the hospital, this time in my own unit, PICU.  So after 4 days, we went home with Spidey and a machine to alarm when he stopped breathing.  We had medicine for breathing and meds for reflux.  Everyone kept asking me, "oh, is he a GOOD baby?"  I would say, "uh, not so much. But we sure do love him."
So now that we are about to hit a year with our precious Spidey, it is a completely different place we are in now.  He is such a joy, and has been the perfect completion to our little family.  I find myself watching him constantly starring at his big brother.  He wants to be just like Wonderboy, and is completely entertained by his every move.  I absolutely cannot picture our lives without him, and always think about what Judy Lynn would say to him, and how she would interact with him.

I have often wondered if she got a chance to meet him in heaven before we ever knew him.  Sometimes I see him looking up into space, and just smiling and laughing almost.  I wonder if he can see her, and picture her entertaining him.  Our biggest joys now can be difficult because we are reminded of her absence.  So we are here our little family with our baby Spidey growing bigger everyday, just like his brother.

The "Principal's Office"

Wonderboy

So the stigma of going to the principals office does not disappear once you grow up.  As children, the idea of being told we have to go talk to the principal was absolutely terrifying! So when Wonderboy's teacher called and said we had to schedule a meeting to discuss his behavior, a huge lump developed in my throat.  So we set a date for 4 days later, and the worrying was to start immediately.  Wonderboy had been accused of starting a "rumor" about another two students, and their parents were upset and wanted consequences for his actions.  So of course we had to find out what the source of the "rumor" was, and after a short discussion, it was very clear that Wonderboy was the scapegoat for the other kids who originally gave him the information.  He was just repeating what he had heard from them.  Autism can be a funny thing when it comes to social settings.  We knew before the meeting that the consequences for his actions needed to be minimal because of the circumstances.  However, the anticipation of the meeting was terrible.  The meeting went well, and much better than I ever could have expected.  Wonderboy was called into the office later, and the fear was palpable on his face.  Love my little guy, and his heart is so big.  He wants to be good, and he wants to please.  So I found myself counting my blessings even after leaving a stressful situation that my family is the best on the planet.