my MIFA (generic meals on wheels experience)….elderly.

This is serving double duty as my journal entry for my MIFA “generic-Meals on Wheels” experience and my blog entry, woot.

My first MIFA meals experience was really interesting. I was nervous because of some horror stories I heard from other students. Allison and I showed up and found a few other OTS there, who informed us that the lower the route number, the worse the area. So when we got inside and were given a route number under 10 (out of like 50), it was scary to us. The main lady, Helen, explained how it worked to us, and we nervously set off. The first house we went to was not bad. A very tiny old woman slowly answered, talked to us about how some people just practically threw the food down, and told us repeatedly, God bless. She touched my arm several times and was adorable. The second house we went to had a poorly homemade wheelchair ramp. We walked up and delivered the meal through the crack he opened up to us, and then headed back down that ramp. It was rainy and the ramp was much slippier than I realized, because my feet slipped out from underneath me and I fell on my bottom, arms outstretched in classic Colles fracture pose. It was painful, shocking, and embarassing. My wrists stung and my bottom was sore and SOAKED. Allison and I both laughed about it since I was okay overall. Actually my forearm muscles are somewhat painful but oh well. Only 12 more houses to go! I put a jacket on my carseat and we moved on. It was very easy to find each house and the cold rain was actually helpful in the sense that it meant there weren’t a lot of people loitering outside. Almost all of them opened their door only a crack for us to hand them food. I think we were allowed access to one or two houses. Those houses were INSANELY warm, dark, and cluttered. It was somewhat depressing and also scary to contemplate their lifestyles. All of them seemed to have miniature porches with rusty, depilatled (sp?), chairs on it.

At another point, I commented on how this wasn’t so bad, and then a giant tree branch fell off a tree right next to me because of the stormy weather. It was pretty funny. Allison commented at one point that she was glad we were doing this together because we always seem to end up having fun adventures. (i just outed allison – she only PRETENDS to hate me)…jk

Allison and I went to each house together with the items, and some places it appeared the person was standing at the door, waiting for us. I was wondering if they literally sit there until it comes or what. We were told that if we were worried about safety we could just move on, but that it meant that person wasn’t fed. Talk about a guilt trip.

When we got to the final house, we did actually start to get scared. The street was a little odd and it looked for a minute like we’d end up on this really bad street, and I was like I AM NOT GETTING ON that street because it is famous for being bad. It ended up working out but it was the scariest house we had seen, and we were both uncomfortable. A one-legged man in a wheelchair let us in and was kind. Getting back to the headquarters was actually an ordeal, as they had us go through nasty parts of downtown instead of turning us around and letting us go through the nicer area to get back (I didn’t fully have my bearings to realize this until it was too late.).

Overall it was an overwhelming experience in the sense that I could not believe how they could coordinate so many neighborhoods and routes and keep up with all it. I was surprised so many elderly people volunteered considering it was kind of hard to twist around in the car to put the meals together. I could see it being beneficial from a social standpoint though.

I always got nervous about someone not coming to the door and then us skipping them when in reality they were there and just too slow. Luckily everyone eventually showed up at the door. I kind of look forward to our next two experiences, as long as we aren’t sent to neighborhoods worse than the ones we were in. I guess my first experience was a little odd considering it started with a fall and I had to spend the next two hours in cold wet pants, but I thought it was rewarding to hand people food and know it would hopefully provide them with some easy nourishment. If I did not already have so many other things on my plate volunteer-wise, I would have considered making it my volunteer work! It kind of reminded me how blessed I am, and also how “simple” a simple meal can help someone. A smile and gentle touch is the dessert to that meal, for those that were receptive to it.

Rubber band and garbanzo beans = OT? Yep.

Today's class involved a rubber band and three garbanzo beans. Guess what the topic was?

Rheumatoid arthritis….

I'll let you ponder that one for a while. I have several projects due Friday that I need to keep working on. I also have a bunch of reader e-mails with questions – Annie, Nivea, etc – will get back to you this weekend I hope once I've finished up my projects. 🙂

On my blog goal list:
MIFA details
Rheumatoid arthritis details
Chronic pain
Nivea's article
Etc

Vote in my voting poll

I put the following poll on my sidebar a while back and there are only 7 days left to vote in it. It's regarding voting in the ASD Steering Committee elections (Go vote for me and Brooke). Anyway, here are the 31 results so far…

Do you wish from the bottom of your heart that you could vote for me?

I'm an AOTA Student Member and I totally will – 25%
   
You are my favoritest; I would if I could – 29%
   
I like giraffes…oh yeah I would vote for you…22%
   
Never, well maybe, so your feelings aren't hurt – 3%
   
I want to vote for you AND marry you – 19%

Breaking News Update: Dog gang terrorizing my neighborhood – OTS to the rescue

My landlord and his adorable golden doodle puppy which is black, go figure), were going to go for their walk, and invited me along. I declined and then saw three giant dogs run past the house (we were within the confines of a gated area). I said oh no!! Watch out for those strays. Well that dog gang proceeded to terrorize the neighborhood and taunt the golden doodle and it was really sad. My landlord thought maybe he would put the doggie in the truck and go elsewhere, but that would also require going out of the gate and risk terror. Then Karen, OTS, came to the rescue and said: NEVER FEAR! Back your truck up to the gate to minimize terrorage! It will all be okay! My landlord said: That's a good idea! I nodded as I wrapped my cloak around myself and flew into the sky, searching for my next consumer. It's a craft…it's a mod….it's SUPER OTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(This is where, if I were a clever drawer, I'd have well, a clever drawing)

Just thought y'all would appreciate this breaking news update. Chow.

Meals on Wheels!

Well, I did a few hours of Meals on Wheels today (required for one of our courses on the elderly), in various somewhat bad parts of town, with OTS Allison. The highlights were when I slipped and fell on a homemade wheelchair ramp, landing on my bottom with hands outstretched, and got soaked. And my wrists didn't love the sensation. lol. On the 2nd of 14 houses. The other highlight was having tree branches crash off the tree about two inches from my head as we walked across the street in yucky weather. Otherwise fun. I will flesh this out with more details later on tonight!

Stroll down Occupational Therapy Memory Lane…

Emily gazes thoughtfully. An OT Month (last April) presentation.
Goniometry, how I despise you….(measurement of joint angles)
Working on palpation of individual muscles…

Learning to make splints…

I don’t have anything new and exciting to share so I figured I’d take a stroll down memory lane. This is all first semester stuff and I’m in my 3rd and final semester now. WOW.

Tonight I have a TON of work to do so I better get started…grr

You know you've been in OT school too long when…episode #7923748392

OTS Brooke: “I used to not really think about it when I saw a bunch of cows crammed together in like a cattle truck. But now when I see that I think “Cows have nerve endings too!”…

Random reader tidbits I've been saving up!! Thanks!!

Many of these readers didn't have a way for me to contact them directly so I am doing it this way….

Chuchai – thanks for your comment! My first Japanese reader 🙂 Glad you love OT so much!!

Natan – thanks for checking OT Practice out and letting me know! You were the first to e-mail me!

Puppybraille  – thank you for your kind comments. I haven't studied chronic pain in OT in detail, but we certainly do work with people who have chronic pain. Typically OT might help with figuring out ways to lessen pain or at least help get through the pain through relaxation techniques, energy conservation methods, biofeedback in some cases, helping you figure out if there are triggers that flare the pain up and if so how to avoid them, ways to make your chores/life easier, etc. That's just off the top of my head and maybe I'm a little wrong since I'm just a student – I'll try to look in one of my textbooks soon and see what else is mentioned and post on chronic pain sometime soon  Enjoy your journey to becoming a social worker!!!

klmeq282  – THANK YOU for your kind words and for voting for me in AOTA!! I wish you'd e-mail me! Hope you do/did well on your first peds exam!!

KT  – PLEASE remember to give yourself some breaks!!! A balance of occupation is no joke!! Learn a little yoga or meditation or go walk around the block. Clear your brain. Have some fun. You'll get even MORE done if you aren't so stressed and busy and you give your brain/body a break occasionally. I'm flattered your mom liked it too!!

Keith – thanks for all your wonderful insights.

Cookie Gimp – thanks for keeping me laughing, and mostly keeping me humble …lol

Annie – I am really flattered you spent so much time reading up on my posts. I think you will have a great time in OT school, congratulations on getting in!! Read all the blogs on my sidebar, the students and OT clinicians and OT professors all have great standpoints!

Nivea  – congrats on getting into OT school!! Glad you and your friend Erin will be together!!!

Mean person who said I didn't do my OTPF post right: I wasn't doing history on PURPOSE and my words were paraphrased so I didn't make anything up, so nyah nyah boo boo, please try not to deliberately try and hurt people's feelings in the future!!!

Everyone else who comments and/or loves me, including my awesome OT classmates and their moms (lol): I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH ::cries with joy:: Just kidding….well I mean, on the crying part. And the love is like, a non-intense, sweet kinda love, not a freaky weird kinda love. That's all.

Read below for some cool OT-related posts!

A post on how OT can help chronic pain as well as how anxious OT students can cope, coming up soon. And of course random other stuff because I am quite possibly the most rambly OTS poster in the entire world.

Visitability, Legos, Sexuality, and ACOTE…can it get any better in one OT post?

Keith, a blog reader/now friend/ of mine, who has arthrogryposis, recently sent me this e-mail. Edited slightly with his permission as I am always fascinated by his thoughts. By the way, I finally, finally, way too late, looked the disorder up, so I could tell y’all what it is – it is a non-progressive disease… a rare congenital disorder that causes joint contractures and is characterized by muscle weakness and fibrosis. (Basically a direct quote from Wikipedia). Ok here is his e-mail.

Traumatic brain injury survivor becomes master's level rehab counselor – a 2nd chance to live

Craig J. Phillips MRC, BA is a TBI survivor (traumatic brain injury) and a master’s level rehab counselor. He sent me this information and I do think it could be helpful and/or inspiring for people who have TBIs, or know someone with a TBI. The text below is all copy/pasted from his e-mail.

I am interested in providing encouragement to our veterans and the soldiers who have been wounded while protecting our great country. Additionally, I am interested in providing practical information and insight to assist their families. My name is Craig J. Phillips. I am an alumnus of Oral Robert’s University Class of 1985, an alumnus of the University of Kentucky, graduate program in Rehabilitation Counseling Class of 1990, and a traumatic brain injury survivor. I sustained an open skull fracture with right frontal lobe damage and remained in a coma for 3 weeks at the age of 10 in August of 1967. I underwent brain and skull surgery after waking from the coma. Follow-up cognitive and psyche / social testing revealed that I would not be able to succeed academically beyond high school. In 1967 Neurological Rehabilitation was not available to me, so I had to teach myself how to walk, talk, read, write and speak in complete sentences. I completed high school on time and went on to obtain both my undergraduate and graduate degrees. For an in depth view of my process please read my post,

http://secondchancetolive.wordpress.com/2007/02/18/my-journey-thus-far/

Through out my lifetime I developed strategies to overcome many obstacles and in so doing I have achieved far beyond all reasonable expectations. On February 6, 2007 at the encouragement of a friend I created Second Chance to Live. Second Chance to Live, which is located at

http://secondchancetolive.wordpress.com presents topics in such a way to encourage, motivate and empower the reader to live life on life’s terms. I believe our circumstances are not meant to keep us down, but to build us up. As a traumatic brain injury survivor, I speak from my experience, strength and hope. As a professional, I provide information to encourage, motivate and empower both disabled and non-disabled individuals to not give up on their process. Please read my post, http://secondchancetolive.wordpress.com/2007/04/18/the-power-of-identification/ My interest is to provide encouragement, hope, motivation and empowerment to survivors and their families.