Stress

So yeah, it is 4 AM and I am awake. I cannot sleep. The dog woke me up by barking a ton and throwing up. After taking care of that, I still could not sleep. Too many things on my mind.

Work has been wicked stressful since I got back from our vacation. I think it was stressful before the vacation but I had not relaxed for so long, I did not know just how stressful it had become. I recently had to gather together all the things I have done at work for our clinical advancement program. When I typed up all the committees I have been on, the special projects I have worked on, the research I do, my different actions as a leader, etc., I saw there was a huge discrepancy between how my boss treats me and what the paper said. I had so many more points than needed to maintain my clinical leader status (highest level of the clinical ladder). So my questions since vacation has been "why do I feel like I am on the verge of fucking up when I actually am far from a fuck up?" And the answer is within management. I wish I could say more but fear retribution if found out. However, the other thing I have learned of recent is how much I am respected by other managers and upper management. When I hear that the head of the medical branch of the hospital, a world renowned researcher in burn care, respects my work and research, I about cried on the spot. Medical facilities are so very based on hierarchy and I am very low on that hierarchy. To be noticed by the chief medical officer is pretty good. So, I have decided to not feel like I am a fuck up but to look at the macro view of me and the hospital. However this shift, although less stressful for me in the long range, is very stressful in the short range. Shifting perspectives like this is taking me time to adjust to. Hence, I am up at fucking 3:30 AM.

There is plenty more stress at work though that adds to this inability to fall back asleep. Abstracts for the American Burn Association are due on the 21st and I need to have my data analyzed so I can submit. I do not know squat about stats and have to rely upon other staff. They are always quite happy to help but I feel bad that I cannot do this all by myself. I know, no man (or woman) is an island. But I have built my career, including my research, by myself, except for the stats part. I have not had the luck to get a leg up from anyone.

Until now. There is a resident at a hospital next door that wants to continue his research on the effects of music on hypermetabolic state at my hospital. I was asked to help him out. We met yesterday, the resident, the assistant chief of staff, the research nurse, and I to discuss his research plans. My bottom line to help out was to be an author and the resident agreed. I was not too sure because much of the meeting was conducted between the doctors and I felt like I was not even there. I was wicked stressed for that meeting but it worked out.

I have had so many meetings of late that I have not been able to devote adequate time to my clinical load. I see some kids 1 to 2 times a week instead of every day I am there. This is bothering me greatly.

Oh, a few years ago, I received a grant award that is funding one of my research projects. It was to be completed in one year but has not been completed yet. There are a myriad of reasons including red tape, subject evaporation (when your study finally gets approved and all potential subjects disappear even though the hospital was filled with them the week before), clinical load not allowing me time to do the research sessions, procedures starting without me there to conduct the research, etc. But it is poking along. I have 8 more subjects to do to complete it.

Well, the 10th anniversary of the grant award is coming up and at this conference in Nov., I have been asked to present on my research (my incomplete research). Great. So, I said yes and hoped it would be completed. Well, the due date for the PowerPoint slides is MONDAY and I have not started yet. Luckily, it is a 10 minute presentation but FUCK, what am I going to say? And my hospital wants us to use their new template with the new branding design for all talks but I cannot figure out how to use their template. It is too much in the graphic designer stage and not a simple template that has all the colors and shapes they want that I can just enter my text. Crap. Now I have to see if the graphic design guy at work can help me out TODAY and I still do not have any fucking clue what I am going to say in the presentation.

And it is day surgery day so I am in pre-op all morning without a second to work on any of this other stuff. Or see my regular patients.

And the dog is sick.

And I have not had more than 5 hours of sleep any night this week.

And Sarah Palin. Or however she spells her name.

And friends are in distress.

And I have a HUGE to do list for the house.

And I have hardly seen my wife or daughter this week.

I am gonna buy the BIG coffee today cause I am going to need it.

Catch Up.

Clementine has been after me to post again. So here is my post of what I have been up to.

1. Our farm share started and both of us are trying to cook and eat all the veggies we get. They are delicious but definitely more than we usually have. Both of us are making conscious efforts to eat veggies we may not like a lot in order to model good eating behaviour to Hester as well as to not send all this food to the compost bin. Also, our garden is growing beautiful tomatoes.
   
   
2. We went to our town's 4th of July concert and fireworks display. As we ran around with Hester, I noticed that the program was exactly the same as two years ago but different from last year. We laughed at the possibility that they only have two programs of music that they rotate.



3. Clementine and Hester visited the in-laws in July. They were gone for 5 days but it felt much longer. Instead of moping around the house, I worked on remodeling this toy kitchen. I sanded it, replaced the hardware, painted it, and polyurethanes it. Not bad, eh?



4. When they returned, we went to Clementine's family reunion. Lots of visiting in a few days.
   
5. The weather has been lots of rain and thunderstorms which have curtailed our Mumzy-Hester day adventures. We did go to two zoos recently. Hester has learned to say emu, flamingo, and buffalo. Also, we saw this tiger swimming because it was so hot.


6. Hester had her 18 month blood work including the lead test (2!!) and a extra test for a condition she might have since birth but they could not test until now. She does not have it and Clem and I are breathing a big sigh/sob of relief. I did not know I was so worried about it. Also, someone is getting four teeth at the same time.



7. Hester has started exhibiting anxiety in the doctor's office. We purchased a doctor kit, I brought home some syringes, and we bought some going to the doctor books. We do lots of medical play to teach her about the different medical equipment, gain mastery over them, and allow her to play her experiences. It helped some but clearly we need to do more. Her doctor is cool with us stopping by to say hi between now and her 2 year appointment.



8. Also, 2 year appointment!!!! Halso!!!!!!!



9. We went to a spray pool with friends from our Queer Adoptive Parents group. It is so great to have friends. Hester loved playing in the pool. So did we cause it was so HOT!
10. Hester has started showing interest in the potty so we bought a book about it (Mr. Rogers) and she sits on the potty when she wants to throughout the day. It is just the beginning and we just want her to get comfortable with the idea of the potty.



11. We went to the wedding of a former intern. It was in Wellfleet (Cape Cod) and was so very beautiful. Hester was so taken with the bride and groom, she learned their names and called to them throughout the party. She also got to walk on the beach the first time. She loved the ocean and the sand.



12. At work, I hosted nine visitors from a music therapy program in Japan. We had a mini conference with the other music therapist I work with, a music therapist who works at a hospital near by, and I presenting on medical music therapy. It was really cool to meet them. They were so very appreciative and the professor had the students sing two songs to thank me. It was beautiful. The professor was so excited for my work and what I was saying, she wants me to come to present in Japan. That would be way cool. She also thought I should be teaching medical music therapy at a local university, where she got her Masters degree. She was going to talk to the head of the program there about me. OK, that would be way cool too.



13. I have nine subjects to go on one study I am working on. Oh, please, may it be done soon!!!!



14. I was asked to serve on a small (6 person) task force by the president of the American Music Therapy Association. We are to work on the research priority. I am a bit nervous about this as the other five members are professors, PhDs, and superstars in research. I have a MA, am a clinician, and have published only 2 research articles. I feel a bit out of my league on this one. Actually, I feel WAY out of my league. EEEEE!!!!



15. Work is very busy, intense, and stressful. I'll stop there so I don't write any horribly downer post about it.
    

So that is the past month. Kind of busy, I guess. Funny, now I see why I have not posted much. I will try to post more. OK Clementine?

Writing

Hi there blog friends.
I just want to say that I am so happy that I am finally writing a manuscript for a journal article. I wanted to write this for three or so years but have not had the a) time, b) energy, c) guts to do it. But I decided it was time to, as my dad says, "Shit or get off the pot." I have one hour of unstructured free time at work each week and I have been using that time to get this done. I think the first draft will be complete in 2-3 weeks! I am thrilled.

**Update**
I actually had some more time this week and finished all of the first draft but the conclusion and the abstract. Next, I have to go through and make sure everything is cited, have my co-author read it, and start the endless seeming revisions. But the biggest hurdle of finding the first set of words to convey my ideas is over.

Check out the Price Tag

This coffee was a gift from a missionary who brought a child to the hospital for care. She was very impressed with music therapy and it's effects upon this child. She gave me the MOST EXPENSIVE COFFEE EVER! Check out the price tag!

$ 93 coffee! Clearly, she is a very generous person.

One More Thing

I was published again! I just got a copy of the JMT and there was my study!!!! Hurray!

Hello Again

Hey there bloggy friends.


Sorry I have been absent. I have been quite busy through the day at work and then when I am home, I really only want to focus on Hester and Clementine. But I have missed blogging. I do read your blogs a few times a week. However, I have moved to lurker status by not commenting.

So I wanted to tell you a crazy thing that just happened. I was telling Clementine about this annoying OT at work. She was lying in bed and I was standing at the doorway with my hand on the bathroom doorway. All of a sudden, I felt this strong tap tap on my fingers. Frightened, I pulled my hand away and turned in horror, thinking someone was hiding in our bathroom, tapping my hand. I looked in, only to see little miss Josephine. Clementine laughed so hard, she nearly wet herself.

My daily life with Hester and Clementine has been wonderful as always. We have been taking small and large trips here and there with her. Every day with her is a gift. As is every day with Clementine. My life is so very blessed by both of them.

Here we are at a farm.

Here we are at a museum.

Here we are at a family reunion.

Here we are at the zoo.

Work has been good and hard. It is good to be more focused there. I feel like I am really there, present, and making a difference in some kids lives. There is the usual personality differences like the annoying OT from earlier but it is all manageable. I still struggle to find my professional identity post-baby. Before Hester, I had a razor sharp focus at work. Work was my life. Home was very important but I really worked hard to get to where I was for my career. I wrote articles, wrote research proposals, wrote grant proposals at home in my spare time. The moment I saw Hester's head, my life and focus changed to family. Work is still very important and the work I do is very compelling. I love it. But I love my family more. Who am I now as a music therapist that work, my clients, my career, music therapy is not my life? I am not sure. I just keep putting one foot in front of the other and expect one day I will wake up one morning and know.

Work has been hard too. There was a girl from Latin America who when I last sang to her, I knew that day it was the last time that I would ever see her. That evening, she was transferred to the PICU at another hospital where she passed away. It is amazing that a little girl who never woke up reached out and touched my heart. Her passing is a sadness that stays with me as I see her sister and grandmother daily. Her death was pointless and an outcome of violence from a family member. This is one of the hardest part of my job, knowing the evil that lurks within the heart of human beings.

At the same time, I have seen how simple kindnesses from me have touched deeply the hearts of two other patients. A sympathetic ear, a kind smile, singing a favorite song, holding some one's hand when they are scared, rubbing some one's back as they cry, these things do more than we ever know. It is an honor to be with these children as they recover and rebuild their lives.

A fun story of professional activities to follow all that is needed. So I belong to the MT listserv, which is so incredibly annoying and asinine at times. Some people say things that make me wonder what they studied in school, how they ever got a therapy job, and fear for the future of my profession. One of those times came recently. I was so flabbergasted by what someone was saying that I had to confront it directly. Just so you know, I did not swear, say wicked, or threaten violence. I used I statements and not even my favorite one "I feel you are a jerk." I was polite, saying perhaps we had different ways of practicing. But I effectively shut her up from saying any more untherapeutic things. I also appeared to stopped all threads on the listserv for a few days, except for various job postings. It was excellent!

I fit in shorts I did not fit into at the beginning of the summer. I also went down one scrub size.

My hair is finally cut and I do not look like a muffin.

Mitt Romney is a jerk, comparing serving in the military in Iraq or Afghanistan to working on his campaign. Please God, do not let him be elected president!

Also, Carl Rove is leaving! Oh happy day!! Bush is truly a lame duck now. Kick him while he is down, Nancy Pelosi!!

Oh, when passing out packets of sunscreen at a local outdoor concert as an awareness campaign for the hospital, the park rangers came to us and told us we could not pass out that at a family event. We were dumbfounded. Sunscreen is not family friendly??? But then we noted the size of the packets were the same as that of condoms. We laughed and told the rangers what it was and that we were from a children's hospital.

It is late and I gotta work tomorrow. thanks for coming by to check on me. I will try to post regularly. If you don't hear from me, I am probably busy but lurking around your blog.

The End is Near

If you read my wife's blog then you know that Hester is getting close to discharge. It looks like this Sunday or Monday if things go well with the final treatments. So far, it has gone really smoothly over the past week. Hester is feeling great and happy as can be.

We are just so thrilled to have this journey come to an end. Last night, a per diem nurse who has cared for Hester on occasion said good bye to us. With hugs and kisses, she told us we are her favorite parents and Hester is her favorite girl in the NICU. Her outpouring of emotion was unexpected but so very sweet. It is funny to feel sadness to not be around all our new acquaintances of the nurses on the entire floor and that we will not see all the new born babies around us or the teeny tiny preemies.

We had a bit of a scare last night. I was changing Hester and getting her ready for her bottle, including 1/2 oz of breast milk (pumped all day long), and I noticed dried drainage on her ear and that it was red, hot, and swollen. The nurse was disturbed by it too so she called the pediatrician. He came and looked at her ear and said everything was OK, that it was just ear wax liquefying and draining out. Weird. But the best thing was she was OK.

Tuesday, this week, one of the first things I did was put in for my maternity leave. I am taking a month off starting the end of this week. I have only three more rides on the train and one more alarm at 5 AM to catch the train. I am thrilled to have the time off to bond with my family and relax.

I keep hearing "you better sleep now cause when she comes home, you'll get no rest." That really makes me angry because for the past nearly 7 weeks, I have gotten no rest. Neither of us have. We are at the hospital with her, often spending the night, getting up for her feedings or to soothe her, getting up at ungodly hours to then go to work, working all day, then rushing back to the hospital to do it again. And on the days we do not spend the night, we are struggling to drive home awake, getting there around 11 PM and starting over again at 5 AM. I think being home more than 1-2 nights a week, not juggling work duties and intern training, and no train rides will be much more restful even if Hester is cluster feeding all night every night. I will be home again, with my cats and dog, with my wife, with my daughter, sitting on my couch, looking at the walls we painted, showering in my shower, eating food we make. I think I will be more rested.

The other thing that pissed me off is my boss insisting that I will get nothing done because I will be so tired from no rest. Doesn't she know that if you say "you can't" to me makes me say, "Oh yes the fuck I will, just watch me?" I plan to work on revising a paper for publication and sending it off, writing two brief essays for a national internship site application, and write a policy paper with Clementine for publication. And if any of you say, "Oh, you'll be too tired" you will just add fuel to my fire to get this stuff done and show everyone that doubted me that I can.

The feelings I have about bringing Hester home and really bonding with her as a mother are so complex, they defy words. When I am not so freaking tired, I want to write more about it. The irritation at others is much easier to write about right now. Those feelings are simple and familiar. All these changes in me, my role, my identity, my boobs, I feel them and know them but the words for them are lost to my half mast eyes. Give me a few more days for a deep meaningful post.

Oh, here is Hester! She is wearing scrubs to match me!!

Conference Highlights

Oh, girls and boys, I had a BAD cold. It is nearly gone now and I feel more like myself again.
So, let me summarize things from the big music therapy conference in Kansas City.

1. I had meetings upon meetings to attend but most were not the type where you are so bored that you want to poke your eyes out with your pen. No, actually they were entertaining. In one meeting, we were waiting to hear if there were any new charges for us so we all started talking about our home lives. It was weird but nearly everyone in that room had adopted a child. They were all giving me advise about adoption and telling stories about traveling to get their kids or telling their kids they are adopted. I was so shocked and thrilled that there is such a supportive community right at my fingertips.
2. My presentation went well. I think that I caught my cold then from one of my co-presenters; she was quite ill and rather voiceless. It is fine; I don't begrudge her at all. She is wicked smart and talked about tweaking the presentation and "taking it on the road." My response was "Hell yeah!" or was it "sure."
3. I saw my SMWC buddies! We had lots of fun talking, drinking, goofing off, and listening to a crazy trio! I feel so close to those friends. We went through 2 intense week long trainings in our masters program which cemented our friendships for life. Two in particular, L1 and L2, are just dear friends and when I am with them, I feel so loved and at home. I am so grateful to have such wonderful friends but am always so sad that we live so freaking far apart. Also, thankfully, they find some things that happen at that conference to be weird too so I have someone to turn to and say "Did she really sing that?" A shout out to L1 who just got engaged to a very wonderful man! Way to go! Another shout out to L2 who should consider the whole lesbian wife thing!
4. Each year at conference, I see my old profs from my undergraduate degree. I still feel like I have to prove myself to them and want to show off. It is crazy cause it has been like over 13 years since I graduated. But I saw one in the hall and I said hi and then blurted out, "Did you see my article in the JMT?" I was like a freaking puppy looking for a pat on the head. He said he had and congratulated me. Later we talked about me guest lecturing at the school when I am in the area. I hope I grow out of the "puppy needing praise" phase soon.
5. Some straight man flirted with me. Canada can attest to this. She saw it all. This has not happened in years and years. I think the last man to flirt with me, straight man that is, was the psychotic straight men at the state hospital where I worked. I did not know what to do.
6. Canada and I shared many meals of sushi and a couple martinis! Oh, we took a fantastic training together on NICU work. It is always fantastic to see her. A shout out to you, Canada! Did all the Bath and Bodywork stuff weigh too much for the airline? Did you have to pay extra?
7. I procured another speaking gig (for money)! I was also recruited quietly for a doctoral program. I am not pursuing that yet.
8. The lobster slippers I made for the silent auction were such a huge hit. The package they were bundled with went for $125. And I have already gotten one request for rhinoceros slippers!
9. I had dinner and drinks with my first lover and her wife. It was great to see them again. And yes, Peaches knew we were getting together for dinner. NBD. It was 18 years ago. Ancient history!
10. It is all such a blur now but I met lots of great people, heard about some fantastic work, and networked a ton.

Away

I will be away from this blog for a week as I must travel to a conference in Kansas City. I blogged a few entries today to make up for the time I will be away. I hope you have a great week.

Reservation Reservations

Tonight, I finally made all my reservations for the upcoming AMTA conference. I have meetings a-plenty and am presenting with two other people I have never met. I still have yet to see the presentation content and plan out my part. But, I still have one and a half months. Good times!

I always stress out when I see the totals for the conference. They really add up; my costs this year are as follows: for the flight ($220), conference cost ($540 cause I was late and did not get the early bird rate and I am taking the NICU institute), and hotel (almost $800). It is silly to stress because my work is picking up the bill. But until I return and submit my paperwork, it is on me and the credit card. I know it is silly but even though I know they are paying me back, making that much debt really stresses me out.

Kansas City, here I come.

Lord, my stomach does not feel good.