Week 10, Day 5, of Pediatric Level II Fieldwork
Today it was me, my OT, and clinic director/speech therapist, doing several home visits + a stop at clinic to finalize eval paperwork with the early intervention coordinator due to a scheduling mishap a few days ago…the mom is depressed and kind of lost on what to do, but the young child seems sweet and relatively bright…while they did paperwork I played some with the kid, showing him to bounce a little ball off a big ball, how to set up bowling pins and knock them down, and then rolled him around on a giant ball, chased him with a rolling bolster, etc…..he would open his mouth wide with delight (kinda like Lester's silent meows) at all these new experiences….he loved it.
It was clear the kid will come a long way in a short period of time, as will the mom…for this family, without any doubt, OT/Speech will improve their lives dramatically, very quickly. Just needing some basic exposure and basic education.
We were almost an hour and a half late to our next appointment – the coordinator kept talking talking talking as did that mom. LOL. So next we saw two kids together at one home…I drove my OT's car so she could eat her lunch while driving there since she was starving early, and then on way back she drove to next house and I ate my lunch, so we traded off LOL…no stops for lunch on Friday so we can get done sooner!
The highlight of the day was a home visit to projects, with the mother slapping her 2-year-old child (we see the baby) really hard for something, then calling him the N word. We're used to seeing discipline we don't necessarily agree with, but it still is surprising to hear the N word. Ack.
As we were leaving that home, a local ST, early intervention coordinator, and special instructor, were showing up to do a speech eval on that 2-year old…he needs it bad. So there was six of us in their little living room…their living room light bulbs have been out for days so we''ve done our therapy this week by the dim light that shines through the window….and it doesn't even seem odd…lol. I've gotten so used to such things.
Then I quickly went with my supervisor to a daycare on way back (after we dropped off ST) to check it out for her daughter, she wanted my opinion/feedback…it was kinda cool seeing it from an OT perspective…then I picked up Taco Bell and ran to my little OT sib's house to lend her my pathology book and we ate tacos and gossipped…then I came home, napped a ridiculously long time, am still dead tired..going to bed very shortly. Just gonna do a little bit more paperwork first.
I have an absurd relationship with my alarm clocks…I always have sleepy dialogues with them in my dreams as I'm waking up…like alarm clocks are my friends in my dreams…Lester gets so tired of the one on his side of the bed!!! He's like STOP MESSING WITH ME MUMMY. I don't know why I decided to share that.
This weekend I have a lot of places I want to go, a lot of errands to run, and a lot of people to see,…but am going to try and get in as much rest as possible too. The next two weeks will be very busy….because I only have two weeks left of my first rotation – Week 11, Week 12 – but have a lot of work to do – beyond catching us up on evals, I need to get prints for staff/kid picture wall, plus write up text for an autism brochure as my student project, and then just really WANT to finish organizing the folders and stuff for my OT so that her life is a little easier once I'm gone.
Oh and the OT Practice editor sent me back the edited version of my article, it's def. shorter but I like what she did with it. Revisions due by next week. I spotted a few things that need to be changed but it's otherwise all ready – very minor changes 🙂
Good night.