Blood on the ground

I have been reading Flags of our Fathers about the infamous picture taken on Iwo Jima.  Tonight I read about the assault on the island, the whole part.  It was the most costly American campaign the whole war.  Death was inescapable, bodies were everywhere, and rest was hard to come by.

Yet when I laid down, I started thinking about the incident that got me fired, and the circumstances around it.  I found myself thinking of how I would have handled my questioning had the nerves not gotten the better of me.  Hind sight is 20/20 and after being delved into the Marine mindset, so many thoughts have gone through my head.

There are memories in my mind that fill me with angst.  Thinking of the hospital gets my heart racing.  I loved that place and gave it my all, it was my home.  I was trained there, and had many friends throughout the hospital. My mom died there, and the hospital screwed up and skipped her autopsy.  All I got was an apology.  I tried to let it go, make myself better because of it.  Still the ache of betrayal is in the back of my mind.  There is always pain associated with death, and to this day "her" room haunted me.  Knowing its where she died, I eyed its window often in passing.  I spent too many hours in that room.  I slept on the floor.

There were people that I worked with that hated me.  I don't know why, other than I got on their nerves.  People are threatened by me because-- I wish I knew. I think its because I have a confidence about myself that ticks them off. I could care less about how they look, but rather I care more about how they are. Some people were just looking to protect their own skin.  Some actually thrived on destroying others.  I didn't like the people that I could see through.  They were as deep as a kiddie pool, and their loyalties ebbed and flowed with the changing of the moon.  They were like the devil, a smile on their face and a knife in their hand behind their back. 

There were those that used me, those that were just other pawns, and those that were loyal tried and true.  Most everyone fell somewhere in between.  I knew I was a gossip item, and I tried to ignore it all.  My life after all begs to ask the question "where are the hidden cameras?" because you can't make up fiction this good here folks.

I was dedicated.  Sure, God and family came first, but after that was my career.  I was proud.  I was the best there was, when I wanted to be.  I could get any image if it could be gotten.  I had compassion for my patients such that I would cry either on shift or later at home for some of them.  I prayed for many that never knew it.  Each patient was family to me.

I sit here in the dark at 2am with tears rolling down my eyes.  My sister told me that being fired from a job is like a bad break up.  In retrospect, I saw it coming, but at the time I was blindsided.  The lady that complained about me worked with me and held up my lead apron to protect me because it fell down when I was pushing the imaging plate down.  We had camaraderie.  I hated her pain, I couldn't take it away.  I would bear it for her if I could.  I told her so.  My partner just stood there in silence like always.  Passive but willing to assist. 

Later he was too feared for his own job to testify to the unemployment referee as to my behavior in the room.  Things are bad I keep hearing from others.  I really don't hear too much.  I am almost afraid to.  Its like when you get out of an abusive relationship you don't want to go back.  Like I want to know how my ex is having a jolly good time without me, I don't.  I want to hear how miserable they are without me.  I was called once, and it was only out of respect for my supervisor I answered the question.  Anyone else would have told them to shove it.

So now I live in semi-denial.  I pretend that I don't ever have to take an x-ray again because right now the thought of it pains me so dearly.  In all reality, I don't.  I can resign myself to giving up my special power, and go on in the world as if the past 10+ years of my life was all a bad dream.  I'm damn good, perhaps too damn good.  The job prospects are horrible.  I don't want to work pm or midnights, and I want to stay out of the city.  I worked long enough to have a cush job in a clinic with no holidays, right?  Turns out there are no jobs.  Nothing with benefits, unless I go into the city.  The part time hours posted out there honestly suck so much I would rather work at McDonald's. Not that anyone ever calls anyway.  This ideal job came up in Nashville- and then the flooding happened and they never called me back. 

Its like I can go on with life now that the war is over.  Or can I?  Why am I lying awake when normally I can't stay up past midnight anymore?  Its like PTSD.  I am so traumatized, I must be drawing on this pain to relate to the Marines on Iwo Jima.  Not that it could ever come close to comparing, because it never will.  I feel like I lived a whole different life back then, and this is now, and its time to move on... so why does it still hurt me?

I don't know.  I do know that I just had to write about it.  Give me flack if you will, but I never mentioned anyone's names, not even the hospital's.  Its my life, and I ain't takin' this post down - so stick that in your pipe and smoke it.  See, I know that someone is going to complain, they always did... the infamous "they." 

So now its all just memories slowly fading out.  The pain of betrayal is likely the strongest thing that remains.  Not anyone in particular, just this entity which I loved and worked hard for, and in all honesty could care less about me.  I am just a number, someone who was paid too much and worked too many hours.  Someone they could easily hack off with the least resistance, like an unneeded mole.  Perhaps that is what truly hurts.  Knowing that you put some ointment on it, and a band aid, in a few weeks no one will even remember you were there.  Except me, the mole.  Shriveled up and dried out, cut off from what fed me.  Removed from the body that I enjoyed being a part of. 

What will fill this hole?  Another job? Forgiving myself, my former co-workers? Perhaps if that stump of a mole was really a seed.  Then when this seed gets planted, who knows what might sprout up? What fruit it will bear?  Perhaps then it will forget it was just an off-cast, when it is busy growing and producing fruit.  How does a cut off mole turn into a seed?  Well if it was your imagination, you could do with it what you wanted too.  This is all a giant metaphor.  No longer is the hurt useless, and while I was useless there, I will be useful, fruitful even, elsewhere.  Make sense now?

Will the tree bear the scars from battle?  Or will the body bear the scar from the mole removed?  Only time will tell.  Right now its all too fresh, too much blood still on the ground. 

Its beggining to look a lot like Christmas

So guess I gave in and we got a REAL LIVE tree! 

Ever since Thanksgiving week, I have been waking Jeramy up for school.  It has been very rewarding as I have been able to see him and be more involved in his life.  We are really starting to bond.  Just the other night he said he maybe wanted to be an x-ray tech when he grows up.  That just makes me grin from ear to ear.  Not that he wants to be an x-ray tech, but that he wants to be like me. =D

I have given so much of myself to bring him home, and although we are got going to have "Christmas" Day with Jeramy(he will be with his mom), I really am enjoying our first Christmas together.  I never knew that Christmas could be so wonderful, at least my adult self never did. 

I truly look forward to opening gifts and singing carols and decking the halls and all that.  I assure you that no one has slipped anything in my drink!  I think perhaps that my Christmas wishes have all been met.  I have a wonderful husband, whom I respect and cherish.  And now, this year... a beautiful, bouncy, loving, smart, fun 7 year old boy.

Today when we were driving home with the tree, we were talking about my mom, and then her song came on the radio.  I knew then that Mom was smiling down on us, and she was being a part of this Christmas after all.  I told Jeramy my mom would have really loved him.  I just think he is the neatest kid ever.

Also, we are working on a gingerbread house (I need to get an ingredient to fix the icing) which is really cool because I have never done it before.  I also got Jeramy an advent calender, which is fun, and I don't remember having one. 

Tonight I read him "The Littlest Angel" which I don't remember much other than it was a book I drew a picture from in kindergarten.  It was about a gift for baby Jesus.  So then Jeramy wanted me to read him some stuff about Jesus.  I got out "The Voice" version of the Bible, and read from Luke.  The Christmas story... actually I think I got all the way through Luke 5 before he fell asleep.  The Voice is wonderful to read aloud, and it really makes the story understandable as well as beautiful. I see Jeramy starting to get it, and understand the story, which is cool.

I am just so excited with how much we are growing as a family, and hope that it never stops.  I also hope to always delight in it!

Love you so much Jeramy. 

Now Dave, get better and this Christmas will be great!

This is rough

I am so not ready for the work to start on the house! I called a national hardware chain to order my stuff, and it all was insanity. Dave had the cell phone, so I had to take one that I don't know how to use, and it was on silent, so I missed every single call. Turns out the credit card got rejected, which is weird because I know I have the money in the account. I am still short one door, which I will have to get, its a 30Left. Also my buddy will have to deliver the trim cuz my pimped out minivan is too small! Also, they don't have all the floor I need. Maybe this is a sign. I am off to the other major chain hardware store to see if they can sell me. I feel like ugh. So much to do, and I might be coming down with Becky's cold.

Update: threw away the original plan and got better floor for less at other store... had to drive to Plainfield, but everyone at MENARDS is so nice, I just have to say thank you! They really do pride themselves on service! Makes me really understand service, because even though they only get paid so much, they really want to serve. It was pretty cool. One guy loaded my 72 boxes on a cart and the other loaded all 72 into the minivan. All with smiles in the last hour of the workday! Totally different from the other store where I felt like I was bothering the guy. Plus, at the Naperville store, I didn't feel like an idiot when the guy explained things to me. The guy on the phone from the other store made me feel stupid. Other than the annoying theme song, Menard's rules!

I don't glow in the dark, and you won't either.

After my lovely 5 days off in a row (the not quite a vacation vacation,) I head back into work today.

Sometimes the last thing I ever want to do is go to work. It is not that I hate my job, because I don't. It is just the fact that I have to work for a living and cannot live like a cat or dog, you know, the good life. I really enjoy what I do, I love taking care of patients and making their exams the best I can for them.

It is scary to be in the hospital. You don't know what is going on, and sometimes the doctors order all these tests and you don't know what they are and what they are for. Even a routine chest x-ray can frighten patients. I tell them that it is a screening tool that most doctors use when you come into the hospital, or come for surgery and it can tell you a lot of things. Also, they want a baseline for your admission should the situation change, that means get worse OR better. It is almost as routine as a CBC (that is a complete blood count, the most simple blood test there is.) A good rule of thumb is to never, ever lie to your patients. They always find out the truth.

Most people don't realize that the amount of radiation they receive from a chest x-ray is the equivalent to flying one hour in an airplane. Most people never hesitate to fly, but yet they question an x-ray the doctor orders. In other words, it is not that much radiation. Pilots and stewardesses get more radiation in their job than I do in mine.

And for the last time, x-rays do NOT make you glow in the dark! You would not believe how many times I hear people say this. Sometimes they are joking, but many times people are serious, they truly don't know this.

One of my favorite things to do is show kids what their insides look like on the x-rays. Most of them like it, and I encourage them to bring the x-rays to show and tell at school. I like to point out all the important parts to them; like in a chest x-ray: these lines are your ribs, these boxes are your spine, and this gray blob is your heart, the black area under the ribs is all the air in your lungs. Truthfully, I think many adults wish I would do that for them too.

What I cannot do is "read" your x-rays. That is up to the radiologist to do. He is a doctor, I am a technologist. Two years of school for me verses a billion years for the doctors, trust me you want them to read your films. Yes, I can see obvious fractures, but I bet you can too if I showed you the picture. Those are usually the people who come in with their arm going in two separate directions asking if it is broken before we take the x-ray, we can usually say yes, especially when the bone comes out through the skin, that is not normal.

I grew up being taught that the only dumb question is the one unasked. So, go ahead and ask me, because I don't mind. If I don't know I will say it. Some things I just cannot answer, or are better asked of your nurse or doctor, so don't be mad if I say so. Just don't ask if you will glow in the dark because I already answered that one.