I called work to see what the schedule looks like for next week. Four doubles and that’s it. After that all the extra shifts are over. I’ll be going back to just working the weekends with an occasional day shift here and there. One more week. I can hang in for that. I feel free again. LOL I can clean out that God forsaken room I have been staying in…not that there is any mess in there (just a few beer bottles and stuff like it).

I am so looking forward to having a life again. Looking forward to being home. Being with the cats and the kids and neighbors and friends coming over for cookouts. Already planning some trips to the beaches and down to Boston. I just bought some tickets for some concerts that are coming up.

The trip up the Northeastern coast is still on…we’re taking a fishing boat up the coast from Rockport to Canada in October. 15 days of pure heaven.

It’s weird to think about getting back to normal. When you work and live like I have for the past month and a half, you get used to very little sleep, very grouchy moods, very little time for anything. It’s time to relax again and just…live.

I need a break from working. I told the bosses this and they agreed. I went into work at 2am this morning, the schedule showing that I was to work until 10pm tonight. I told them NO. Enough is enough. The dept. head-Director of Nursing- authorized me taking the rest of this week OFF. I don’t have to be back until Saturday am.

Now I sit here trying to figure out what I want to do first. Decisions, decisions. Should I go to the beach? Or down to Boston for some food and shopping? How about driving up north for a hike? It’s hazy, hot and humid and I could just go to the quarry for some swimming. I’ll figure something out, damn straight.

Work has been crazy as always. I’m there so much these days I have become a permanent fixture on each shift now. I do feel like I live up there, and often stay up there in a small room they got me. Last week I worked 86 hours. This week it’s not quite that bad…depending upon how it goes I could be up there 72 or 80 hours. Doing four double shifts and either one or two single shifts. Week 5 of this schedule. 4 more to go at least.

The new staff have been great. They seem to catch on quick as to what is expected of them. And so far they seem to like the work and the patients and the intense nature of what we do. We don’t hire anyone who hasn’t had years of experience and that helps a lot. The first group of orientee’s just passed all their competency tests with flying colors. Now we’re working on the second group. Once they are trained, I’m done with this awful schedule.
I can get my life back and do the things I want to do.

There have been some sad events at work and it’s hard to live with it. I imagine it’s more difficult for new people to see this stuff happen too. Death is never a pleasant thing to work with, and when those who die are young kids and teenagers, it’s worse.

The people who I have known and worked with for a long time have been my rocks and steady force in my life for the past several weeks. I don’t think I would have been able to stand it had they not been right along my side working rough hours with me. We’ve held each other up when we were ready to collaspe, and pushed each other around when needed. We have laughed and cried together. I’ve worked with some people I didn’t really know either…and we have become fast friends (I make friends quickly). When you work long 16 hour days, day after day, there isn’t much you end up not knowing about the people you work with.

We have tried to make the best of a bad situation. We take breaks together and we goof off together and we get into some trouble together. Every night around 8pm, after the patients are bedded down for the day, half us go out front to the big field and just have fun. When it’s hot and humid we do the waterfights; when it’s cooler out we just play touch football or softball. Then we go in and let the others go out for their time. It’s a good way to relieve the stress and it keeps us all sane. Rain or shine, we always get out there and do something active and fun.

I’ve worked some swing shifts too…second and overnights doubles. That’s crazy because overnights is pretty calm and days is extremely busy. Go from mellow to wild in about 5 minutes. The bad things (death) always seem to happen in the early hours of day shift…kind of weird.

This week’s schedule is Tuesday- 10pm to 2pm Wednesday; Wednesday, 10pm-6am Thursday; Thursday-10 pm to 6am; Friday-6am to 2pm… and Saturday 6am to 10pm.

The last thing I remember thinking about was killing myself. I woke up to a brightly lit room with a cold draft rushing over me. I felt something hard down my throat (it was a intubation tube). You can’t talk or swallow or move your lips with one of these hooked up. I also felt a mask over my face (it was a re-breather)…I tried to move my hands, but they wouldn’t budge. (They were restrained with ties downs). It was scary as hell.

I could move my eyes around, and that is when I saw Jimmy. He was standing over me, looking kind of weird and strange. Then he was gone. I thought I was in some nightmare. I wanted to wake up because it felt so real. Then a man stood next to me with a nurse…he was a doctor. They asked me to use my eyes to communicate with them:
Two blinks for YES and one blink for NO. (The same sequence used to this day for people coming out of comas who cannot talk).

He asked me if I knew my name, which he said…I blinked twice, really hard in case they missed it. He told me I had been in a coma for 96 days; the date was February 14th 1982. He told me I had been found in SLC almost dead from a heroin overdose. Then it all came back-Janine, the blood, the horror of it all. I must have tried to cry or something because they quickly knocked me right out. When I woke up the next time, the tube was out and I could swallow and know I was doing it. And I could move around a little. I was hooked up to machines and a cath, had little probes on my chest and felt….miserable. felt like I was going to throw up. I was cold. I wanted out of that place.

I way laying on the cold hospital bed, shaking and scared when it happened. At first I didn’t know what is was. My hands got stiff and I couldn’t move them; then I smelled burning rubber; then I started seeing everything in double. Then my eyes rolled up and I could feel my body start to really shake. I don’t remember anything else.
It was a seizure. The first of many. A direct result of the heroin overdose. And a lifelong issue for me.

I got to go home today. I ended up working Friday night, another double. Four of those in a row will zap the life out of anyone. It was pretty intense and maybe I’ll write about that later. When it rains down bad shit at my work, it pours all over our souls. We saw death and it still has me reeling.
I have been so out of the loop with everything that is going on, I cannot even begin to try to catch up. I don’t know what’s up with the news since I forget when. I don’t know what my friends have been up too. It’s like being in prison I think…maybe worse because there is no contact with anyone other than your co workers, who are working the same hours you are. They are in the same boat.
Anyway I am going to try to catch up. I am drowning in emails by the hundreds, have a ton of snail mail to go through, have a party I am going to tonight, and some fire works to go see. R & R is good.

Blogging from work. This is a first. Actually, I’m not working…just staying up here now. They got me a room, with a bed and nothing else. In staff housing. How boring. I hate this. I’m going home after work today.

It’s Friday am right before report, and I can’t wait for Monday to get here. A day off. I’ve worked all week (64 hours so far and still counting) and it’s getting to me…I feel the need to VENT and SCREAM and YELL and KICK and SWEAR and KILL. But being the level headed person I am, I’ll just say:
THIS FUCKING SUCKS.
There, I don’t feel any better but it was worth a try, right? LOL

What does a person do for entertainment when they live up at my work? Besides either join the parties or kick them down? We have a gym, 2 olympic size pools, tennis courts, a running track…we have a softball team, a touch football team and a tennis team (employees battle other local places’ employees). I don’t have time to join up. I just did a roller blade run down the mountain…going what felt like 80 mph…then I realized…shit…I have to go back up. A grade 7 hill, 3 miles straight up. So I did. Blew off lots of stress though.

I have no life. I miss my daughters. I miss my cats. I miss all my friends and our fun. I miss my nosey, idiotic neighbors who constantly just walk into my place without knocking. I miss our block parties we had every week. I miss my stupid little town with all it’s traffic jams and and road raged drivers; I miss reading books; I miss driving my Jeep with the top off, speeding on Rt. 101 past the State Police Barracks in my town. I miss going swimming in my quarry pond at 2am every day. I miss the ocean and the smell of it. I miss everything I guess.