Slowed Down

I’ve run out of steam
I did my rant
Put out my words
There’s more I know
But tonight
I’ve run out of steam
What is more?
More is building up steam
Or is it
Letting hope simmer 
Long enough for 
Words to flow 
To make sense 
Out of the senseless
Logic
Out of what seems illogical
Order
Out of chaos.

“One thing at a time, all things in succession. That which grows fast 

withers as rapidly; and that which grows slow endures.

~ Josiah Gilbert Holland

Crisis of Care

In 1966, I stood in a linen closet crying because I was just too scared to do a bed bath…..on a man….kind of old - probably about 40. That was the crisis I had to deal with. 

Telling my dad that I was quitting nursing was the alternative. Just over twenty years later, there was another critical point in my nursing career. Yes, I continued in nursing. That crisis was on a medical unit in Regina. I wanted to know how, with nursing process, to care for patients in alcohol withdrawal. So I moved to Texas. There was no nursing education specific to alcoholism, however I did get experience in a treatment center. Nurses were in treatment centers, not hospitals. And yet, alcoholics and those with drug addiction frequently require medical care for the medical effects of alcoholism and/or drug addiction.

Today, there is another crisis in the world of nursing. In the world of health care workers at any level.  On the streets, in the ambulances, in emergency rooms. Fentanyl, prescription opiate and illicit opiate abuse. I’m not sensationalizing when I say the people are dying out there. Withdrawal management, better known as detox, is alive and well whether in hospitals or detox facilities. I have told many patients over these last many years that I will take care of them as many times as is needed. I have told them that relapse is not a shame but part of the process of addiction. This brings me to the next crisis in the world of active addiction. It has become so much bigger than that first bed bath. And it really is not my crisis.

We, within health care, have the knowledge, tools and abilities to treat the medical effects of this dreadful condition that spirals into so many other medical conditions. We are saving lives…..over and over again. For those that still have loving families, employment and community support systems there is some hope. Hope that a new life, a good life, is a possibility. And then there are those whose bridges have all been burned or are at least severely damaged. Those that are homeless, jobless, with no family. And yet we save lives.

I am reminded of Ebenezer Scrooge when he relegates them to ‘work houses and prisons’ and ‘if they would rather die then let them’. Is that where we are now? And yet we still ‘save lives’. And where do these lives go? The ones that are homeless, jobless, and with no family. Has society even thought about the personal addiction treatment that is needed alongside valuable medical management? In five decades, my limited view of how we have progressed past the stigma, to identify the chronicity of this condition, is that we are still blinded by the brilliance of controlling substances. We seem to have completely forgotten the individuals, the families that have been devastated by the conditions of alcoholism and addiction. 

To begin to mend this crisis, treatment centers, outpatient clinics and more importantly affordable homes are required. Housing and funding. For those that have housing, their ability to maintain clean and sober time increases, the quality of recovery is improved. Is this an easy task? No. It will require a complete restructuring of our attitudes and our ways of thinking in our increasingly complex system of health care.

“Sometimes you need a little crisis to get your adrenaline 

flowing and help you realize your potential.”

~ Jeannette Walls, The Glass Castle

Safety Challenge - A Story

Safety Challenge - A Story

Joy stood alone on the country road. Clouds building in the west obscured the sun. Lightning flickered and danced. She wanted to run to the town she just passed. She knew the old granary, away from trees and her car, would be safer. Her old beater was not the safest place to be. No other cars would brave this storm. Slinging her back pack over her shoulder, hugging a blanket under her jacket, Joy did run. Her only hope was that she wouldn’t be sharing the granary with any critters.

“In a crisis, time was always the enemy.”

~ Stephen L. Carter, Back Channel

Not In Vain

Not In Vain

Once upon a time there was a young boy who wanted to be just like his grandpa. Sometimes he  wanted to be very exactly the same. Then he would just shrug his little shoulders, put his hands in his pockets, just like his grandpa, and say ‘Hmmm’. Now this young boy was only five years old. His grandpa called him ‘young man’. He really liked that. It made him feel grown up. 

His grandpa was kind. His grandpa was smart. His grandpa had a great big laugh that made eveyone feel warm and tingly. His grandpa took care of his animals like they were family. They couldn’t live in the house because grandma wouldn’t let them. And it was a whole herd of sheep that roamed the hills behind grandma and grandpa’s house. One day, when he was in the pasture waiting for his grandpa, he tried to name them all, but after only three names he couldn’t tell them apart! But grandpa seemed to know them all. He could tell by their shapes and sizes. Even tiny differences in their wooly coats or shapes of their ears. So he stopped thinking about it. 

Grandpa was smart too. He read lots of books and sometimes read them to his 'Young Man'. One of them was written by a man with a funny name called Shakespeare. He didn’t understand all of the stories. This made his head hurt so he stopped thinkng about it. 

There was only one time when he didn’t want to be like his grandpa. He loved hearing his grandpa’s laugh. Sometimes his laugh would change. It sounded the same but it didn’t feel warm. It was very cold and it was not tingly. It scraped like it was scraping against his heart. And there was a funny smell whenever the ‘bad day’s’ laugh would be there. One of his grandpa’s friends that he didn’t like might be visiting. And grandma was usually crying and sometimes yelling. And grandma didn’t do that. She was kind too. And smart. She and grandpa would talk about that Shakespeare guy. If the young boy came over when one of these bad days were happening, he felt really bad. He would check to make sure the animals had been fed. Sometimes he got grandma a cookie and a glass of water and try not to let grandpa see him. If he did, he'd holler out ‘There’s my Young Man! C’mere, Young Man. Say hello to my friend here. Tell him all about trying to name all the sheep in the whole g.d. flock!" The young boy felt stupid and ashamed. 

He knew the next time he saw his grandpa all the bottles would be gone. Grandma and grandpa would be quiet and not talking to each other and the house would feel cloudy. His grandpa would apologize and tell him he’ll never treat him that way again. The 'bad day’s' grandpa was the only time that the young man didn’t want to be like his grandpa. One day, after one of the bad days, the young boy told his grandpa that he wouldn’t be coming back to visit them. Ever again. Because he didn’t like the bad days. He didn’t like to see his kind, smart, laughing grandpa turn into a bad man. That made his grandpa and his grandma cry. But he didn’t know what else to do. He had tried to figure it out. But it made his head hurt so he had to stop thinking about it. So he said good by to his grandma and his grandpa and walked away with tears rolling down his cheeks.

The young boy grew up and became a young man with dreams and hopes. Although his beloved grandpa died after too many ‘bad days’, the young man decided he wanted to know why. Why did his grandpa change so dramatically when he drank alcohol. Not everyone in his family changed or drank too much. In high school he had been taught how to look for answers. He found he had an affinity for research and was full of questions that begged for answers. He had an insatiable desire to chase down those answers. Despite dead ends and trails that led off in unexpected directions, the young man kept up his search. Many people told him it was useless, that there was no point chasing down something that was just a bunch of bad choices. But the Young Man knew that his grandpa only chose to pick up one drink. He knew his grandpa did not to turn into an unpleasant man - a monster in a child’s eyes. 

There were many times his head hurt from thinking about it all, but hope for new answers pushed him forward. His grandpa would not die in vain and unloved. The Young Man began his search from the intuition of a child and the sadness of watching his kind, smart and laughing grandfather.

“What we find changes who we become.”

~ Peter Morville

Homeward

Homeward

We were on our way home from the family Christmas. Blankets and wisps of cloud settled and curled, hiding granite grandeur, catching on sharp edges of pine trees and bare aspens. Inching our way slowly was our only hope for a safe trip home. The children slept soundly clutching their new toys. Georgie cuddled his new truck - not exactly the most cuddly of toys. Mandy snuggled with her new soft dolly, already named Molly. My husband Rodney was at the wheel. Radio off, we chatted in whispers. We didn’t want to wake the children or cause eddies in the fog. Finally arriving at our turn off, we left the cold drifting fog behind as we descended into the dark valley. The glow of our boisterous family Christmas brought us light and warmth.

“If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.”

~ George Bernard Shaw, Immaturity

A Special Quiet

This Christmas was quiet
mostly calm and settled ~
despite folks away
estranged from families
always hoping to 
get better
be better
recover from active addictions
find a life
that was or
that could be
pulling away from addiction’s grasp
struggling to believe where
belief had been lost
smiles and tears
for all that has been.

“It is not true that everyone is special. It is true that everyone was 

once special and still possesses the ability to recover it.”

~ Criss Jami, Killosophy