A pretty good day….about to finish up Week 3

My OT supervisor found my blog! Hi OT Supervisor!

Today I did one treatment today for almost an hour, all by myself (she kindly peeked in to check) – it was a VERY VERY VERY tall man with a hip replacement – I showed him how to use the hip kit to do his underwear, pants, socks, and shoes, so that he would be following his hip precautions. He was a very kind, polite, man, and a good learner…then I saw several other patients with help from the great COTA and then she did a few as the primary person. ahahaha. I can only tolerate so much challenge within a day before I feel like I've hit my “I'm going to explode”, PLUS I only want to see patients by myself if I feel 100% sure I can handle that person safely and that I am trained enough on the particular intervention as to not be completely worthless when I get into the room. I always have to kind of have a mental self pow-wow before I walk into the room to kind of go over my plan as I don't think well on my feet.

I'm struggling with anxiety – I'm kind of at this new baseline where I feel over-caffeinated almost all of the time (only I'm not on any caffeine) – which is somewhat typical of how I feel in the fall, and this fall is especially difficult because it coincides with my phys dys rotation which in all honesty I have dreaded ever since I started OT school. I used to have nightmares about it. Now that I'm actually on the rotation, I really like my supervisor and the colleagues, and it's not as scary or rocket sciency as it seems, but I can't seem to conquer the anxiety with exercise, herbal supplements, blah blah blah – so I'm going to try to get back on a medication to help. I know some friends who read this will be like too much info Karen, the world doesn't need to know this and that's private informatoin- but to me it's important to share because I like to reflect on my student journey and my level of anxiety is strongly affecting that journey! And it's not private in my opinion, I could care less if the world knows I'm a little psycho. 🙂 Anybody who has been reading this for the last year and a half or so, knows I am high-strung! Luckily in person I do not appear nearly as nervous as I actually feel, so most people don't realize how anxious I am…which is obviously a good thing in a professional setting. But no fun to always feel on edge and it affects my abilities as a fieldwork student because I have a much lower tolerance for challenge. But again I know I am too hard on myself and I'm doing FINE overall in terms of meeting goals and being where I should be at this point.

Today was really not too bad overall – I felt pretty okay about how the day went at fieldwork and thought it was pretty cool my supervisor had read my blog – especially because it meant she discovered my level of anxiety was higher than she realized and she has reassured me I am doing fine  – and then I went to the gym after work (we got done somewhat early) and then was at a special dinner event lol – so got home just a while ago. Going to go to bed soon.

Oh! The assisted living facility I volunteer at at times, is close to my fieldwork…and it's such a trip when we open up the Impending evaluations sheet and it's a name I recognize from there! When I hear the particilar person talked about at Bingo or something, as in “Person X is at the hospital”, I have to be so mindful of HIPAA to not say anything about the fact I *saw* that person!

Tomorrow I am hopefully going to follow one particular patient in all 3 disciplines (PT, OT, speech), do at least one eval by myself, probably do a treatment or two by myself, and follow the COTA in general…the level I fieldwork student is with the OT supervisor this week…and my goals continue to be to speak loudly, slowly, clearly…to be more confident…ideas for new goals?! I think those are pretty big goals so I'm okay with them. Baby steps!

Oct 16, 2008 | Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none