Sleepy thoughts

Good morning, good morning ... Ahh, we get the extra luxury of being up early this morning. We would like to make good use of the time. Here’s where we say, "Hold on V! First we get to do our spluttering thing, then we will embark on the Great American Novel! Hehehe I just checked and it seems its been since Monday since we’ve allowed ourselves this ventilation. Never quite sure what is going to come out, but we like the process of our discussions. I’m not quite so sure if we’d remember all that happened over these last three to four days. I know that Vince was right in that if we concentrate on the writing that it would be easier to let go of the depression. Even after a couple of days, we’ve found this to be true. We weren’t depressed after we’d started.

Today is a Dr. M. Day so other things are bound to surface ... I know that after the last appointment, we got both sick and depressed. We stayed home and that seemed to help. After we went back to work on Tuesday, we’ve gone back to concentrating on our schedules. I remember long ago, when we were functioning as if we were almost on time. We’ve still got a lot of work to do, but we’re aiming at catching up. I remember that one of those days, I think Tuesday, the Center was out at a Christmas party, so there was good quiet time to get things done. We finished up the checking, purging of our client files and did some detail planning on getting the loose ends tied up. Yesterday, was kind of nice because the first client didn’t have so many Qnotes to do to catch him up. It then allowed us the extra time to get some form letters started. There were the last five clients to schedule for Annuals and then a whole batch of people who needed to get things in both medical, dental, or state Ids. And, there was processing work to be done on nine of the individuals in need of getting updated psychologicals. Well, anyway there was progress made.

There were a couple of upsets yesterday ... The first had to do with a memo I sent one of my peers requesting DSP Chronological reports to be submitted. She is eight weeks behind and I knew she was going to give me problems in getting caught up. But, it does affect the work I’m doing with the Qnotes. I had to leave two of them incomplete yesterday. At the peak of that battle, I’d gone up front to use the bathroom, then I was going out for a smoke. I walk past the office where she and Sr. Tess are and she’s yelling and screaming and motioning in the air. I heard, Ann this, Ann that and some other nasty stuff. When they had seen me in the office next to Sr.’s office, my peer stormed past me in a rage. I didn’t say anything, because I wasn’t addressed. That sort of thing stings. But, we’re learning we don’t need to take it personally. We know this peer always complains about everything she is asked to do and we’ve never gotten this report from her without her complaining, and yes the report does impact my work. So that is that!

The other thing we had trouble with ... was that there was a hot issue on the table with my client that has the most problems. A valued psychiatrist we’ve been working with wrote down a suggestion how to handle the problem. I thought it was a good idea, but I knew I didn’t have that kind of authority to make the final decision. So, that is what we wrote back to the Dr. And in the meantime we left the directive on Sr.’s desk. Sometime in the afternoon she had time to deal with it. She thought the idea was outrageous and was mad with me for not handling on my own. Her phrase was more "Cant’ you handle anything on your own." But, here is when we decided to toughen up. I said, "No, I couldn’t, because I disagree with your point of view." Man-o-man did the sparks fly then. She brought in a DSP who was being bullied also by Sr. Tess. She said, obviously you didn’t understand the DSP because she doesn’t agree. So we looked at the DSP and said, "what don’t you agree on?" She said one statement and then I followed with "so we don’t disagree, because that point you’ve misunderstood." Then we explained the point. The DSP didn’t say anything else the rest of the period.

We knew Sr. Tess was having a problem ... with believing any reasonable psychiatrist would have made such a suggestion, so before she got to that direct point, we pulled out the memo and read it to her which further outraged her. Then she took the point of view that we’d done enough work charting this clients behavior and I contradicted her again. My understanding from the State is now that any client with a psychiatric disability, we should be charting as part of a behavioral plan. She certainly didn’t want to here that. Thing is point by point I was matching her to the degree her arguments were getting down right silly. She left in a storm saying some remark that was meant to be conclusive that the parent involved would be running around the place. Even though her back was toward me at that point, we had one more thing to say. I said, "And, I don’t think the parent would run around our place." Thinking a 75 year old man here. That sure did make her angry, "She said, "I was just being facetious." Well, take that facetiousness right out of here with you, thank you very much! AHA This time I didn’t cower. I still don’t know what her decision will be, but at least one battle is over. And, I feel like I’m still standing. Of course now due to one account or the other, she’s not speaking to us again. But, I’m ok with that :) Used to it by now.

Soooo, one way or another ... we’re back to needing to stay on task today. We have those letters to get out AND we have to accomplish 9 more Qnotes today ... AND, be ready to leave at 4 pm for our doctor appointment. Oh ... one more thing. Chances are that we are going to have a staff training meeting today. I’ll have to do some planning for that. So, its going to be a busy day. Need to do some client follow up and some more work on those psychologicals too. Yep, yep a full day.

Been free flow thinking the last several moments ... I’ve got my coffee now, had something to eat, and filled our water container. It’s a process sort of like mine sweeping. Hmm, kitties sure do like that shoe string they swiped from granddaughter a month or so ago. Nice to see them up and active. Not suggesting of course, that it seems like some of us do a lot more napping than others!

We had a great night last night ... Our friend was at our center in the afternoon, so he decided to invite us out for Mexican food. We have our favorite restaurant and as it turned out last night was half price on Marguerites Yahoooooooo. Can’t beat that! We had a nice time to sit and chat, then he followed me home and stayed a little bit. Couldn’t have been too late, because he ended up tucking me in about 6:30 pm. I think he was assuring himself time to get home for West Wing. Hmm, how did all that go? I must have been tired, because I slept for about 3 hours before getting up and checking out the B2B group. That was kinda fun :) There goes the sum and substance of my day.

We’re still not having any outstanding new thoughts ... from which to govern our days. I think its like this most the time. You get up, do this, do that ... progress over there and with this other, go home, relax, play go to bed and get up again for another day. Maybe this IS the good stuff. Maybe, it is time we go play with that other writing project. Having a hard time thinking of it as a whole book, because its just a tiny brain spurt of some thoughts. We don’t have a grasp on the big picture yet, and absolutely no idea how these things come about. Not so sure I can go from one moment feeling creative, to the next where something is supposed to be happening. Hehe sometimes we’re of the opinion of, well that’s great, but we don’t want to do anything to wreck it! Brand new things are perfect, especially left half way in our sleepy brain. Hmm, would that then be lazy? Shoot, shoot ... ok, well let’s see what we can do :) Thanks for catching up with us!