Psychiatric Residential Treatment Center
A Psychiatric Residential Treatment Center Like the Jackson Center After spending a year and a half at a psychiatric residential...
Nursing Care and a New Face
My current nursing care team was only made up of two people. Laurie, my PCA, and Jackie, my nurse. However, about a week earlier, my nurse Jackie had dropped the bucket of bad news over my head. She was going back to school to become a nurse practitioner. After posting a whole lot of Facebook ads and interviewing three to four nurses, I made contact with Melody. As I tried to describe the nursing care I required in medical terms, Jeff butted in. He gave her the rundown on what I was like and how my care worked. Jeff described me as some sort of high-tech, inflatable Barbie doll toy. He explained that I needed to be hooked up to charge overnight.
Melody grinned at me, “I’m up for a challenge! I’d like to do more than just provide nursing care and keep you alive. I’d like to see you thrive. If you decide to hire me, we can do lots of awesome stuff together. We can drive down to see your parents and grandparents. Other times we can go to the park with Jeff to race remote control cars. Or we can go to the mall to shop at The Children’s Place or Justice. Sometimes we can even do art projects together. I would really love if you could share some of your writing with me!
My Goodbyes and the Gift of the Present
My love for Jeff went beyond any love I had ever felt before. I just wasn’t aware of it. What I was aware of was the fact that goodbyes are one of the hardest things in the world, and I never wanted to have to say my goodbyes to Jeff.
All of Jeff’s doctors assured us that he was at the top of the liver transplant list. They kept telling us that he and his mom could get a call any day to drop everything and rush down to Umass Memorial Medical Center to be prepped for the most major, most life-changing surgery of his life. A surgery that could take his life span of months to a couple of years at the most, and add a lifetime onto it.We were in a race against time. There was a strong possibility that his liver cancer had returned. We were waiting on an appointment with a GI doctor, Dr. Xander to go over his scans. The even more frightening reality was that if his cancer actually had returned he would be immediately removed from the cancer list. I might have to say my goodbyes to him. I usually tried to put all thoughts of his mortality out of my head and just enjoy him, in the moment.