live free, walk in victory

(Hey Girl – Anne Wilson)

Sorry I fell off the face of the earth again…August is not my month. One Sunday morning my laptop would not let me log in. It just spun and spun and spun. I went to church and when I got home (4-5 hours after I’d originally tried to log in) it was still welcoming me. I learned that the hard drive had died…which means bye-bye mr lappy pants…and it was hard because usually my dad would be the one I would call in that situation to help me figure out how to fix it or what to do next and just to talk about it. And even before this had happened I’d been struggling a little about my dad…so yeah, it wasn’t a great day.

A few weeks later I finally have a laptop again and am starting to come to terms with my entire previous life being likely lost forever. That is hard because it is really hard to lose things that you’ve had since at least 2011, as well as things you were still using like your budget (that you’d finally gotten re-caught up with that week) and your CV (that you’d updated just a couple weeks ago). It is also hard because it was a little bit of a reminder of leaving my job last summer when it didn’t occur to me that I may want to have any of my documents from my laptop there, and then have realized over time how many things I really wish I had a copy of…lol, I was told HR could get me whatever I needed…that was either a misinformed statement or (more likely) an intentional lie designed to frustrate me. HR had no access to anything, not to mention that HR at that hospital was less than ideal to put it lightly.

I also am not ashamed to admit I cried that day and later. My new laptop came in the mail. I had ordered a different one from Best Buy than the one that had been recommended to me from Dell, because it had slightly lower specs but also had a slightly lower price and that was an exchange I decided I was okay with. I had been a little hesitant to do that (and I find big purchases really stressful, and even more so when it is for something I don’t know a lot about – I just feel afraid that I am going to mess up). And I got the laptop out of the box and setting it up was stressful…

And I realized that I couldn’t remember my Microsoft product key so I couldn’t use word/powerpoint/outlook. I looked everywhere I could think of, and I found a 5-year limited warranty for the muffin tin I got for Christmas 7 years ago, and I found some other equally useless items, but I did not find where I wrote down that information. I do remember very clearly writing it down and putting it somewhere special to ensure that it didn’t get lost in case I needed it again. I even remember where that “somewhere special” was…the problem is that I’ve moved probably about 5 times since then which has led to things being moved around so many times that I haven’t got a clue where things are anymore. It seems like things have just completely disappeared. I thought that perhaps I had a receipt somewhere…and I did…and it showed I had paid an extra $10 for a CD backup of my download information. And you can probably guess that I definitely can’t find that CD either. Hashtag frustrating. But the biggest problem was when I realized the speakers weren’t working…

Over an hour at Best Buy later, the Geek Squad had determined they’d done all the things they could do for me for free and got permission to exchange my new laptop for an identical but different laptop…but the store was closing so I couldn’t check that it worked while I was still there. Luckily it did work.

Another thing made very evident when setting up my new computer. For some reason I cannot explain my new laptop could remember the links saved to my favorites – but not the ones that were actually saved any time recently…nope…it remembered the ones from somewhere between March and June 2020…so that was pretty much zero percent helpful, but it did show how tightly I hold to people and experiences that are important to me and how hard change is for me. I had a link to a prior employment’s email account I’d lost access to in summer 2017 for example, and a friend’s baby shower registry link for a kid who in 2020 would have been around 3 years old. I haven’t talked with that friend in years, but she is incredibly important to me, because she is someone who was amazingly inclusive during the time in my life where people were lucky to even get a few words out of me in person, but could get a multitude of written notes…it wasn’t a lot of people’s style, but I am so grateful for the people who recognized that even someone who really struggles to communicate may still yearn for community. I might be struggling to use my voice and big groups may be a huge barrier, but I was also extraverted and really needed people who didn’t mind someone practically clinging to them for survival in social situations.

Lol, this post was a lot longer, but then I guess I didn’t save it…but yeah, I am incredibly grateful that August is on the way out. September isn’t perfect – I can tell you a lot about where I was various days in September last year just like August 2019 is highly preserved…hashtag trauma…but I think I am doing well enough for it to feel less crushing. Most of the September trauma led to something ultimately better for me than would have likely happened without it. I learned that standing up for my patients and my team might put a target on my back, but my patients and team deserve that care. And I learned that good people will recognize my worth and do what they can to do the same for me.

(intervening semi-related but incredibly tangential story that I may very well have told before…one night a little over a year ago when I’d been at the hospital well into the late evening, a family of one of my PICU patients who were returning to the hospital after taking a break to take care of things at home saw me waiting to turn left and I’m not sure if it was because they remembered seeing me much earlier in the morning and knew it’d been a long day or if they would have done it regardless of the circumstances, but they stopped when they didn’t have a stop sign or really any reason they would be obligated to stop so that I could turn so I could get home. It was little and only marginally impacted their time to the hospital but made a huge difference for me because even after I spoke up about what hours worked best for me and got my end time moved up to 8:30pm instead of 9pm, those evenings still were long and kept me up at least a little bit late which added to the large sleep debt I’d been accumulating via grief. Also, I remember that family because at the beginning of their child’s stay, very likely because of the trauma of going from having a reasonably healthy child to one who is in the intensive care unit, they were somewhat difficult to work with, but by the time they were nearing discharge to a long term rehab facility (with their child still far from baseline) they were so kind, caring, and appreciative of the team. I never expect a thank you from families, but it always is meaningful to be recognized. I think sometimes it feels especially good when the outcome isn’t amazing…because when you were able to be involved in a big piece of the recovery you can feel some self-pride, but it is harder to feel good about your own contribution even when stepping back it really was significant when the outcome is that the patient is not going home in the condition you were hoping they would. I can no longer say I remember every single one of my patients, but I do remember a large proportion of them to some extent, and most patients while they are in the hospital I do get really attached and think of them as if they were my own children…which makes it incredibly difficult to let go. As much as I want my patients to be ready to go home, I miss them and worry about them when they leave. And I mourn the patients who do not make it. It was probably good for me this winter to be forced to completely disconnect and not be able to follow my patients from afar. I much prefer work life blend over work life balance, but I will admit that during PGY-1 I’m not sure by the second half of the year if I ever had even a single day I didn’t look at anything patient-related…sure, I took days off, but on those days off I was still too worried about my patients to not at least give a cursory glance over at a few of them throughout the day…I’m not someone who values or even desires leaving work at work. Caring for my patients really is my passion).

Anyway, I learned that I really am an excellent pharmacist with a great ability to interact professionally. Hashtag no more imposter syndrome…okay, to be honest, imposter syndrome tries to creep back in on occasion now that it has been a little longer since figuring out that I am incredible, but I am brave, I am a willing learner, and I am learning to listen to the people who recognize my value rather than those who are afraid of the shadows cast by my light. And I learned there are bad people in the world and you really can’t kindness people into becoming better people. Not being confrontational just teaches them that they can get away with their antics, and while you may not feel comfortable addressing the issue or even may feel uncomfortable seeking safety, that doesn’t mean it was okay for them to treat you like that.

I’ll end this with some advice I got from the internet…if life gives you lemons, do not make lemonade unless it also gave you sugar and water or your lemonade is going to suck. The internet also suggests squirting lemon juice in bad people’s faces and freezing the lemons to throw at the bad people, but I do not believe in repaying evil with evil. I believe in loving people even when they deserve the opposite. You may be exhausted of being the bigger person, but do it anyway. Prove to yourself just how big and strong and brave you can be. It might not feel strong and brave, but the people watching you will see it.

100% unrelated but a few days ago I watched a youtube video about this 19 year old who was fighting to get off the sex offender registry because if he knew it was a crime he wouldn’t have done it…like, um, lol…it was still a bad choice to have sex with someone you didn’t know and who was unable to consent regardless of whether it was a crime. There are reasons we have these laws…and then my very minimal trust in the American justice system was broken even further when at the end of the video I found out he was successful…the court determined that it wasn’t reasonable for him to have understood what he was doing wrong, and considering the girl has decided she doesn’t want to be characterized as a victim that they would take him off the registry…and I was like WHAT?!?! That is not how this game is supposed to be played. I understand that people can change. If his reason was that he knew better now and would never do it again then I’d understand taking him off the list, but with his reason being he didn’t know it was wrong, I do not agree. As a woman and therefore the gender more likely to be attacked, I do not appreciate the court determining that not knowing it was a crime is a valid defense. Our court system should protect the vulnerable and to do that they need to recognize that there are some things people should know are crimes…like would he have similarly gotten off as not needing to claim his felon status if he claimed to not know murder was wrong? Like where do we draw the line in what crimes are relatively okay to commit so long as you claim to not know you weren’t supposed to do that?

The end. You were probably tired of hearing my random stream of consciousness by now anyway…