A glimspe of what is to come

This week I finished the first semester of classes.  With only 7 more to go it is easy to lose sight of the end goal which is eventually being an occupational therapist.  Friday I walked a few blocks to spend the morning with some of the OTs at a therapy care unit.  The original idea was to strengthen my application to get into an OT program.  The added benefit was to be reminded of the joys and challenges therapists face on a daily basis.

It was a packed three hours and the therapists graciously explained a lot of what they were doing and why.  Robin told me that if you take an extra two minutes to do little things for the patients they will worker harder for you.  One of the women she was working with was just about ready to go home after back surgery.  Robin's role that day was to make sure she could handle taking a shower by herself.  The little extra was putting lotion on her back and legs.  Another woman, a stroke-victim, hadn't been a good patient from the beginning.  She had made things tough on all the staff and refused to work with the therapists at first.  Now she is willing to work with Robin.  I think that is because Robin reminded her of her options: lay in bed for the rest of your days, or get up and get dressed and work so you can handle a motorized wheelchair and go outside by spring.  It's not surprising that this woman in her 50s decided it would be better to work.  And having a therapist who would get her to sit forward in her chair and scratch her back for a few minutes while she worked those core muscles helped the process along as well.  The time I spent with her was doing some testing to make sure she had the necessary strength and reaction time to try out a motorized wheelchair next week.

I watched another therapist work with a young man who had brain damage due to carbon monoxide poisoning.  The sounds and activity in the therapy room overwhelmed him so he was wheeled down the hall to a sitting area where he could see outside.  There it was easier for him to focus and the task was just to get him to follow an object with his eyes and turn his head.  One side was a whole lot easier than the other.  She also worked with one of his arms trying to get the tense muscles to relax.  Afterward, the therapist explained some of the family dynamics I had observed during that half hour.   Some family members stay completely in the background and others get involved - and getting involved isn't usually helpful.  I would have liked to have seen this young man without the "help" of his family to see the difference.