Rebel with a Cause

For those of you who have been reading for a while, you know my dad ended up in the hospital last week (and read his drugged conversation transcript). Well, he's home now and doing great! However, getting him home was a problem. This hospital was not big in speediness and competency, in my opinion. The doctor told him the night before that he was going to discharge him...but somehow they didn't actually sign the orders and let him go until 4pm the next day. He spent that whole time just sitting around, nothing happening. I went up there to pick him up and got very frustrated with the lack of communication and action.

So, I decided to rebel against the system. (This is not like me.) His nurse would disappear for hours on end, never helping my dad with the shower he'd been trying to get ALL day. I innocently asked the aid (who was super helpful), "Does it create a lot of extra paperwork if I just take him home on my own?"

And wouldn't you know it, the head nurse was in our room within 5 minutes, and we were out the door and discharged within 20 minutes. hehe

FYI, leaving the hospital like that would have been called AMA (Against Medical Advice) but since he was already told he was being discharged, and it was just taking TOO LONG, I figured we could get away with it.

I was seriously ready to just whisk him out of there. There's nothing to pulling out an IV, right?

Disclaimer: No old or sick people were offended in the publishing of this post. My dad gave his persmission to share the photo, which was taken right before the Great Evacuation of 2008 begin (you don't want to know, trust me).

What was your first job?

When I was fifteen, I started working for the first time. This is not counting babysitting or getting paid by my parents to do stuff around the house, because I did lots of that. I was ready to start working the summer after I turned 15, but you had to be 16 to get a paying job in Texas, or something like that. So, I signed up to be a volunteer at the Children's Hospital in Austin, Texas.

I loved it! I had to wear a white button down shirt and white pants with a pink checked apron. I helped nurses out with patients and re-stocked items and answered phones. I enjoyed the atmosphere (although it is hard seeing sick kids) and it felt good to go somewhere and do something important. It was my first real experience working. I learned to wash my hands a lot and to sing "Yankee Doodle Dandee" slowly to make sure I had washed them long enough. Amazingly I knew the words to that song because I had to learn it when I took piano lessons. Now I think they recommend you sing "Happy Birthday" twice, which is better because everyone knows the words to that song.

Now, fast forward about 12 years or so, and I found myself once again volunteering at the Children's Hospital. This time I was a married 27 yr old college student with two kids. I had decided to go pre-med, and I wanted to be around medicine and make sure that's what I wanted to do. I worked in the pediatric ICU, and was mainly put to work answering phones. I spent free time studying flashcards for my medical terminology class at the University of Texas and just soaked up the medical talk around me. It was a very rewarding experience, even though I wasn't getting paid and I could only work for four hours, one day a week.

Two times volunteering, two different times in my life, and I'd do it again if I had the time.

What was your first job?