Elderly joys

Working in a nursing home (or several, as the case may be) falls under the category of "When you were in high school, did you ever think you'd be ______?". That being said, I actually kind of like my job. The work itself is a little tedious: finding visits, seeing the same diagnoses (CHF, COPD, diarrhea, fever, cough, anxiety...) over and over and OVER again, fighting old ideas about ways to treat patients, keeping up the facade that I know more than I do (don't get me wrong, I know a lot, but perhaps the thing I know best is where to find the answer to the things I don't know), etc etc. Patients, and the eccentric families that come with them, can definitely be trying at times, but I secretly hope that my family will do the same for me when I'm old. So, while there are moments when I want to run screaming from the nursing homes (sounds like the beginning of a very funny novel), for the most part I enjoy going to work.

So, in honor of my new-found love of nursing homes, I've decided to attempt a weekly top 5 awesome/cool/funny/sad/poignant things that happened in my workplace(s).

Finding joy in a nursing home Week 1

5. In honor of Nursing Home Week the staff put on a talent show that pretty much showed their amazing talent to make fools of themselves. The patients LOVED it. Even the ones that can't see very well were laughing and smiling.

4. One of my patients with end-stage Multiple Sclerosis and total paralysis was sitting in the hall with a book on a bookstand. Every single person (aide, nurse, supervisor, administrator, secretary) that walked by offered to turn the page so that she actually got to read her book without having to ask every 5 minutes for someone to turn the page.

3. A favorite patient had to be sent to the ER to rule out a stroke, and she cried on the way out because she was scared. The aides that take care of her every day cried right along with her.

2. The same patient was working with the occupational therapist later that week, and couldn't remember what to do with a comb. But when asked who I was, she brightly said in her adorable English accent, "Why, that's Katy of course!"

1. Again as part of National Nursing Home week, the staff arranged to have an "extreme makeover" for several of the residents. It was one of the most emotional things I have ever seen. The residents who had the makeover were absolutely thrilled and talked about all day long. The staff cried when they saw them all made up. And one resident remarked that her roommate (who had the makeover) probably wouldn't be staying with her that night 'cause she was going to get swept away on a romantic date "looking like that". The kicker? That hot mama was given a hair cut as part of the makeover and it was nothing less than... a mullet.