Exchanges with People that Make Your Brain Hurt

[Kimblee]

Oh man! You just gave me trauma flashbacks. TAAS and TAKS were the nasty words in our house.

Weirdly, I always (except one year) did great on them. But the leading up to them was always brutal. And one year they lost my essay portion to the english test and I failed my grade because of it. (How they lost it is a great mystery. If I remember correctly the thing was attatched to the booklet! But seven kids' essays disappeared.)

Yikes I bet heads rolled over that.


A few years ago a troubled student burned down a historic HS near me. The TAKS tests had been counted and locked up the principals' office to be shipped back to TEA. They burned. The kids had to retake that round of tests - there were death threats against the boy and his family.

Not sure. I had to retake the test in summer school, and I hated everyone involved with all the hate my heart could hate.

Second time around, I got a perfect score though. But I did NOT get to go to sea world like the kids who got passing scores on the first round. I'm still mad about both that and the Accelerated Reader program. I was the top reader for the entire year... until the last week when a girl who previously had 38 points suddenly jumped up to over 700,000 points. Her mom was one of the parent volunteers for the program. Think it might be related? So she got a scholarship and I got the honor of smiling graciously holding my second place plaque in a picture for the local paper.

Even now, 13 years later I'm feeling my blood pressure rise as I remember it. You'd think I would have let it go by now, but nope. Still mad.

[Kimblee]

I had insomnia last night and ended up coming down to the couch to sleep, finally falling asleep at about 4:30am. At 7am the kids started getting up for school and DH got up as well, everyone moving around the house woke me and I got up to help the kids with a few things. At 7:30 DH told me to go up to bed and he'd come wake me in a few hours. I had just drifted off at about 7:45 when I heard someone crossing our very creaky bedroom floor. I looked up to find DH there who said "Did I wake you? I was just checking to make sure you were asleep." I said "Well, I was..." and thought "When I'm coherent again this is going in the brain hurt thread!"

I know he was just being concerned, and I love him for taking care of me, but yeah. 

A co-worker was telling me how when her son was an infant, she would poke at him and wake him up while he was sleeping, to make sure he was still alive--she was a very nervous first-time parent. I will admit to having stared at certain people to make sure they were still breathing in their sleep, but actually waking someone up seems a little counterintuitive to me.

Hand mirror. Seriously.

When we first got my baby cousins living with us, Girl!Cousin was kinda sickly and my mom would wake her up to make sure she was still alive.

So I got my makeup mirror, held it beside her nose and mouth and showed mom the steam. Until that poor kid was four, a compact sat on the table beside her bed. Then when I tried to put it back in my purse she cried because it was "hers" so I give it to her.

Kimblee, may I say if I'm ever sick, I'd want you (or someone like you) to look after me? You combine compassion, cleverness and common sense so well.

Sounds good. Just move to north Texas and gimme a call when you need me.

I like taking care of sick people. It give me something peaceful to do and I'm really pretty good at it. I've done everything from sick baby care (the mirror trick works great with toddlers and kids that have flu too.) to sick elderly care. (Which is when I found out I can indeed change an adult diaper. But that I prefer getting them to the bathroom instead.)

Oh, and want a real brain hurter? The home care nurse who I was "helping" (That means doing the job of because she was leaving my kinda-grand dad on his back long enough to get sores) told me to let him go in the diaper because its easier than getting him to the bathroom. I managed to resist punching her, but it was hard. My white trash roots run deeper than I thought.

I need to find a profession I would be useful for. Nursing is out because its not a one-on-one kind of care. And I'd probably lose my mind in the paperwork. A friend is an RN and she says she does more paperwork than sick people care. I wonder how much education it takes to be a home care aide.

[Acadianna]

I wonder how much education it takes to be a home care aide.

Is there a community college near you?  (We have Austin Community College, near where I live.)  Community colleges often have programs like that, and they could probably advise you about how to get started.

I hope you go after this, because from your posts it sounds like you'd be just awesome at it!

[Dr. F.]

Not an exchange, but something I saw that made my brain hurt.

I was at Target recently and saw a toddler-sized onesie with "Single and LOVING it!" written on it.

WHY?

[Softly Spoken]

*snip*

Kimblee, may I say if I'm ever sick, I'd want you (or someone like you) to look after me? You combine compassion, cleverness and common sense so well.

Sounds good. Just move to north Texas and gimme a call when you need me.

I like taking care of sick people. It give me something peaceful to do and I'm really pretty good at it. I've done everything from sick baby care (the mirror trick works great with toddlers and kids that have flu too.) to sick elderly care. (Which is when I found out I can indeed change an adult diaper. But that I prefer getting them to the bathroom instead.)

Oh, and want a real brain hurter? The home care nurse who I was "helping" (That means doing the job of because she was leaving my kinda-grand dad on his back long enough to get sores) told me to let him go in the diaper because its easier than getting him to the bathroom. I managed to resist punching her, but it was hard. My white trash roots run deeper than I thought.

I need to find a profession I would be useful for. Nursing is out because its not a one-on-one kind of care. And I'd probably lose my mind in the paperwork. A friend is an RN and she says she does more paperwork than sick people care. I wonder how much education it takes to be a home care aide.

Have you considered HOSPICE? 

[suzieQ]

My mom has caused me plenty of brain-hurting moments with computers, too, so I feel your pain, Miss Tickle. She really, really tries and has actually learned to do some stuff on the computer on her own, that I don't know how to do, because she really wanted to do it. But then she'll call with a problem and can't really explain it to me with words I understand, and can't answer the questions I ask, and can't do simple things like copy and paste or type an address into a browser, and we both just end up really frustrated.  I'm not at all a computer person, I just use them a lot more than she does, so I really don't want to be "responsible" for her computer use and maintenance, but I also don't want to be totally unhelpful.

I apologize if someone else has pointed this out, but if I don't post it while I'm reading this post, I'll forget. You can download a program called "Crossloop" onto your computer and your Mom's computer (next time you are at her house). With this program, it's really easy to link to her computer over the internet and you control her computer. Makes fixing things much easier without having to leave your house!

You both have to have the program, right?

I wouldn't mind if daughter and son have access - they won't abuse it! and neither would I - but would worry that anyone with Crossloop could get on my computer.

I'm pretty sure that there's a password system involved. 

Yes, the person who wants help has to call or text or whatever a passcode that is generated each time they request help. You put the passcode in on your side, they click to connect, you click to connect and all is good. And it's a different code each time.

[Iris]

Not an exchange, but something I saw that made my brain hurt.

I was at Target recently and saw a toddler-sized onesie with "Single and LOVING it!" written on it.

WHY?

See, that actually amuses me and I usually hate that kind of thing on babies/toddlers (or adults for that matter). Possibly because my brain interprets it as a mockery of the whole idea of writing your relationship status across your chest, but maybe that's just me.

[Amava]

Not an exchange, but something I saw that made my brain hurt.

I was at Target recently and saw a toddler-sized onesie with "Single and LOVING it!" written on it.

WHY?

See, that actually amuses me and I usually hate that kind of thing on babies/toddlers (or adults for that matter). Possibly because my brain interprets it as a mockery of the whole idea of writing your relationship status across your chest, but maybe that's just me.

Or maybe the interpretation of the word "single" is "only child", and the onesie is for the child of parents who are sick and tired of their relatives asking them "So when are you going to have another one?" 

[Iris]

Not an exchange, but something I saw that made my brain hurt.

I was at Target recently and saw a toddler-sized onesie with "Single and LOVING it!" written on it.

WHY?

See, that actually amuses me and I usually hate that kind of thing on babies/toddlers (or adults for that matter). Possibly because my brain interprets it as a mockery of the whole idea of writing your relationship status across your chest, but maybe that's just me.

Or maybe the interpretation of the word "single" is "only child", and the onesie is for the child of parents who are sick and tired of their relatives asking them "So when are you going to have another one?" 

A far more likely interpretation.

[MommyPenguin]

Kimblee, my aunt runs a company where she does home visits (and nursing home visits) to elderly people.  Some of them live alone and are mostly okay, but they need somebody to come by and help them wash their hair, or run the vacuum, or things like that.  Others are people who need a lot more help, some are even in nursing homes, and they are normally getting that help, but their family wants to go on vacation for a week or two.  The family doesn't want their elderly mother to sit in the nursing home alone with no visitors for those two weeks, so my aunt or her employees go by the nursing home and spend a couple of hours visiting the elderly person, chatting, bringing things to them, reading to them, taking them to the bathroom or for a walk, etc.  That would be an awesome job for you!

[Kimblee]

*snip*

Kimblee, may I say if I'm ever sick, I'd want you (or someone like you) to look after me? You combine compassion, cleverness and common sense so well.

Sounds good. Just move to north Texas and gimme a call when you need me.

I like taking care of sick people. It give me something peaceful to do and I'm really pretty good at it. I've done everything from sick baby care (the mirror trick works great with toddlers and kids that have flu too.) to sick elderly care. (Which is when I found out I can indeed change an adult diaper. But that I prefer getting them to the bathroom instead.)

Oh, and want a real brain hurter? The home care nurse who I was "helping" (That means doing the job of because she was leaving my kinda-grand dad on his back long enough to get sores) told me to let him go in the diaper because its easier than getting him to the bathroom. I managed to resist punching her, but it was hard. My white trash roots run deeper than I thought.

I need to find a profession I would be useful for. Nursing is out because its not a one-on-one kind of care. And I'd probably lose my mind in the paperwork. A friend is an RN and she says she does more paperwork than sick people care. I wonder how much education it takes to be a home care aide.

Have you considered HOSPICE? 

You know, I really never have. But now that you mention it, it does sound kind of like it would be a good fit.

I think I'm going to call some of the local ones Monday and ask what qualifications they look for. Thank you.

[Kimblee]

Kimblee, my aunt runs a company where she does home visits (and nursing home visits) to elderly people.  Some of them live alone and are mostly okay, but they need somebody to come by and help them wash their hair, or run the vacuum, or things like that.  Others are people who need a lot more help, some are even in nursing homes, and they are normally getting that help, but their family wants to go on vacation for a week or two.  The family doesn't want their elderly mother to sit in the nursing home alone with no visitors for those two weeks, so my aunt or her employees go by the nursing home and spend a couple of hours visiting the elderly person, chatting, bringing things to them, reading to them, taking them to the bathroom or for a walk, etc.  That would be an awesome job for you!

Yeah, that sounds like what I used to do foir kinda-grandpa. Any idea what that service might be called so I can find out if there's something similar around here? (sorry to unrail the thread with these questions, but this actually sounds like a job I would enjoy a lot.)

B/G on Kinda-Grandpa, since I've mentioned him twice: He was my evil grandmother's ex-husband and while my cousins were his grandkids, he and I didn't meet until I was an adult. I went to his house several times a week to unpack his groceries, make sure his medicine box was stocked correctly and change the afghans on his furniture. And some weeks to take care of him because his home care nurse was being a [word I really shouldn't say].

I also went to the VA hospital with him, although my aunt was his main caregiver for that. i was just there because I have a strong back and could help him on and off the toilet. Auntie just couldn't handle that with her bad back. Plus I got to hang out in the motel and be away from my "real life" for a few days. Everyone won on that situation.

[Dr. F.]

A good friend of mine does elder-care. She's EXTREMELY good at it, and quite well-paid (which, as her husband has been working on his dissertation for 5 years, is a good thing). I don't think she's had any specific training, aside from basic first-aid and CPR types things. She gets clients through word of mouth, and is in high demand. I can ask her if you're interested - PM me if you want me to ask her.

Kimblee, my aunt runs a company where she does home visits (and nursing home visits) to elderly people.  Some of them live alone and are mostly okay, but they need somebody to come by and help them wash their hair, or run the vacuum, or things like that.  Others are people who need a lot more help, some are even in nursing homes, and they are normally getting that help, but their family wants to go on vacation for a week or two.  The family doesn't want their elderly mother to sit in the nursing home alone with no visitors for those two weeks, so my aunt or her employees go by the nursing home and spend a couple of hours visiting the elderly person, chatting, bringing things to them, reading to them, taking them to the bathroom or for a walk, etc.  That would be an awesome job for you!

Yeah, that sounds like what I used to do foir kinda-grandpa. Any idea what that service might be called so I can find out if there's something similar around here? (sorry to unrail the thread with these questions, but this actually sounds like a job I would enjoy a lot.)

B/G on Kinda-Grandpa, since I've mentioned him twice: He was my evil grandmother's ex-husband and while my cousins were his grandkids, he and I didn't meet until I was an adult. I went to his house several times a week to unpack his groceries, make sure his medicine box was stocked correctly and change the afghans on his furniture. And some weeks to take care of him because his home care nurse was being a [word I really shouldn't say].

I also went to the VA hospital with him, although my aunt was his main caregiver for that. i was just there because I have a strong back and could help him on and off the toilet. Auntie just couldn't handle that with her bad back. Plus I got to hang out in the motel and be away from my "real life" for a few days. Everyone won on that situation.

[Black Delphinium]

Kimble, I used to work in a private care home as a Direct Care Provider. No certification needed, minus First Aid and stuff.

We did meals and baths and stuff. It was both nice and awful. Some days were awesome and some days drove me to drink, but on the whole it was lovely.

[MommyPenguin]

It's sort of like this, Kimblee: http://www.homelifecareinc.com/services.htm  So possibly look up "personal care services" or "home care aide," etc.  Respite will get you lots of hits about foster care, so I probably wouldn't start there.  In general, the type of company seems to be a "home care agency."