An oldie but goodie for the weekend

I saw this poem on a message board I frequent. I know it's a forward that we often get in our inbox, but I think the message is still worth sharing.


“SLOW DANCE”

Have you ever watched kids
On a merry-go-round?

Or listened to the rain
Slapping on the ground?

Ever followed a butterfly's erratic flight?
Or gazed at the sun into the fading night?

You better slow down. Don't dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won't last.

Do you run through each day
On the fly?

When you ask “How are you?”
Do you hear the reply?

When the day is done
Do you lie in your bed

With the next hundred chores
Running through your head?

You'd better slow down. Don't dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won't last.

Ever told your child,
We'll do it tomorrow?
And in your haste,
Not see his sorrow?

Ever lost touch,
Let a good friendship die
Cause you never had time
To call and say,'Hi'

You'd better slow down. Don't dance so fast.
Time is short.
The music won't last.

When you run
so fast to get somewhere
You miss half the fun of getting there.

When you worry and hurry
through your day,
It is like an unopened gift....
Thrown away.

Life is not a race.
Do take it slower
Hear the music
Before the song is over.

Speaking for myself, I do need to be more mindful of the message in this poem because I am super guilty of going a million miles an hour, taking on multiple tasks and not always appreciating the smaller things in life. I also feel guilty a lot of the time if I am not doing something, or going somewhere.

How much time should you devote to one client?

Before you feel like they are treating you like their personal assistant/slave? When do you say enough is enough? How many tasks do you feel like you need to follow up on for that same person in one day?

If any other social workers are reading my blog, I'd love to hear your thoughts! Right now I feel like the girl from The Devil Wears Prada working for some very "entitled" people.

Monday is down..............

and Tuesday is here. Have a good one everybody!!!

The closing from my yoga teacher tonight..........

Be Mindful..........

Be mindful of your thoughts; your thoughts become words.
Be mindful of your words; your words become actions.
Be mindful of your actions; your actions become habits.
Be mindful of your habits; your habits become your character.
Be mindful of your character; your character becomes your destiny.

~Author Unknown.

Really good day today.......

And I feel totally revived to go back to work tommorrow.

I was up with my son around 6AM, got some baking in, made sausage and peppers in the crock pot so my husband has some go-to food for the week when I am at yoga, I got to go to a 10AM yoga class which is a huge rarity on the weekends these days-----came home, made us a nice lunch (tuna melts with fresh strawberries on the side) and then played with my son for most of the afternoon.

I also had a chance to cook us a delicious dinner of which I have lots of leftovers for this week's lunch (fresh tilapia with lemon butter and dill, and orzo with spinach, cannellini beans, EVOO, parmesan cheese and loads of garlic, yum!).

I also just got back from a quick Target run.

Now I am getting ready to climb into bed with some kind of junk food hee hee and watch a Law & Order marathon. Have a great week everyone in case I don't have time to get back on here.

Don't say anything to her but she thinks you don't like her.

I got this in an email this morning. One of the services the program I work for provides is a disability-related adjustment counseling. Pretty much the goal of it is to help participants who may be newly disabled learn ways to adjust to their life post-TBI. This email came from a staff member who provides this service to my client.


This one lady will on occasion get super angry and perseverate. It usually gets to the point where I have to tell her I will call her back at another time because she is not able to listen to anything I say to her because she is unable to calm herself down and at that point, she is screaming, cursing and basically blaming me for everything that went wrong in her life since birth (I've only been working with her a few months ha ha).

Anyways, this lady had an encounter with me a couple weeks ago where she got pissed off because her primary aide who drives her everywhere was not working, and the aide filling in did not have access to a car. She was unable to accept this and felt that she was told that she would always have an aide available to drive her places if she needed one and I WAS NOT DOING MY JOB BECAUSE I HADN'T GOTTEN AN AIDE OVER THERE TO DRIVE HER IF SHE NEEDED "TO POSSIBLY" GO SOMEWHERE. (she had no plans but I know that's another issue).

In any event, she did not like my response when I told her that is not the case, I personally would never promise a client this because we cannot guarantee that----especially because we are there to help our clients become INDEPENDENT and not DEPENDENT on staff to get to where they need to go.

I told her I would be more than happy to arrange Medicaid transportation to take her to her appointments, but I was not going to again, "promise" her a staff member who would drive her. As an aside, I don't do this myself due to the insurance liability, so I certainly don't expect it from others (although I know some workers do transport clients in their vehicles and I am sure in their shoes if they are getting reimbursed it may be helpful for their own sanity if they are spending a 12 hour shift with a client who perseverates).

Anyways..........So I can only assume that the reason my client thinks "I don't like her" is because I didn't give in to her demand. We are having a team meeting with her next week to discuss reducing some of her 1:1 staff hours (right now she has 24 hour coverage) which she has been asking about forever. As a team we are going to discuss her needing to become less dependent on staff if she wants this to become a reality. Because right now she has more than dependence going on----she is totally manipulating if you ask me.

Dream interpretation

I have been having some very strange and vivid dreams lately. I have decided to try to capture what I remember in a dream journal the next day. A quick search of google helped me locate this site which is helpful and interesting in being able to interpret what goes on in my head at night. Check it out! It's pretty neat.

Cheap & Easy Spring Decorating

I like fresh flowers, but do not have any growing on my property, and purchasing every week tends to grow into an expensive habit. I ended up in Joann's last night and saw they were having a 40-50% off sale on all of the spring "fake" flowers. I got all of this for $20.00 and now have them all around my home. They really brighten up the place with color and a fresh, positive vibe.

The overflowing dresser & closet project

I started straigtening up one of my dressers this morning. Just folding and going through a couple drawers of clothes made me realize again just how much I have of this stuff. It's beyond ridiculous.

I don't FEEL like I go shopping for clothing items very often. But I must be doing it somehow. I have decided that starting today I am going to take on another challenge which will be to see how long I can go without buying another clothing item. Not only will I be saving more green, I will just BE more green in general, which are really good things on both counts.

I have plenty of underwear, plenty of pajamas, plenty of work-out clothes and dresses galore for if I have a more upscale event to go to. I also have lots of shoes, boots, flip-flops...........wow, it's really very overwhelming. I tend to rotate between a few staple outfits every week, and because I don't really need to dress up for work, I don't have to worry about having a lot of business/corporate items on hand. Most of my wardrobe is also very "basic". The majority of items are not super trendy, most are plain and never go out of style for the most part. Most of my clothing can be mixed and matched and my outfits can be made unique and trendy with many a accessory I already own.

So today is April 23rd.............I am going to just try. No more clothing stores!!!

And now it really is time to tackle those dressers and my large overflowing closet. (I have about 4 HUGE folded piles of clothes on the floor ALONE in there to go through). Wish me luck!!

Maybe I will try to post some before and after pics, as well as some pics of outfits I have created :).

Day off from work

I used a sick day today to kind of just relax and take care of myself (I've been stressed out lately due to work and some personal issues I am not ready to go into here) and especially to hang out with my son.

It's so nice. I don't do this often, but I have the time, and I didn't have much planned for today anyways back at the office. Tommorrow is another day. My paperwork and job responsibilities are not going anywhere.

I was planning to take a nap today, but since it's almost 4PM perhaps I will just plan for an early bedtime? Nice.

Some clients

make me feel out of my freakin' mind sometimes. It certainly is Monday!

Happy Sunday everyone!

Well, me and the hubs did actually end up going out last night sans bambino. He decided to put it on the business. It was the first night in a long time I can remember going out. We really don't do that much anymore. For 2 reasons: Money & Baby. Plus I actually enjoy cooking, especially on the weekends when I have a lot more time to do so. So our evening..........we went to celebrate his best friend/business partner's birthday at a Mexican place. Towards the end of the night, the restaurant had karaoke. A few people were so so but the rest-----it totally was like the bad auditions on American Idol. Not that I watch that show anymore----I think I finally got bored with it the season Carrie Underwood won.

So anyway. Sunday. Sunday is one of my favorite days to just sit around and relax. I read the Sunday paper, drink coffee and clip coupons. Later we are going to my in-laws for dinner, and my parents are actually going to come down this afternoon for a couple of days.

Then it's back to work tommorrow. Weekends always tend to go by pretty fast. I didn't get a day of yoga in this weekend either because of DH's schedule. Oh well. I am going to *try* to go Monday-Thursday this week. We shall see...............

My pugs

Well, we were going to go out tonight..........

but I just spoke to DH and we decided we don't want to spend the money. He still doesn't know when he is going to get paid. So very frustrating. Especially because he is working every day, 7 days a week, sometimes for 12 hours or more.

Thank goodness for my job and income :)

And I know it could be much worse............just wanted to get this out though.

Thinking the worst but hoping for the best

One of my team members just called me to see if I heard from one of his clients (I used to be this guy's Service Coordinator).

He has been missing for a few days and he's schizophrenic. He actually got his head injury from a "fall" from a building that everyone suspects was a jump when he was running from "the mob" who in his mind was after him.

He also has not been taking his meds.

It's so bad that after doing this kind of work for over ten years now, my mind automatically thinks the worst.

My co-worker did say something interesting to me though----a lot of times "God" (or some special force for those of us who don't believe in God per se) seems to protect many of our clients from themselves, even when WE expect the worst to happen to them.

This just happened with my bipolar lady. She actually is in the hospital right now. Not for psych, but for some medical issues that randomly happened a few days ago. At least I can sleep a little more easily at night now knowing she is going to be there for a couple more days.

I hope my old client shows up and can get things together. I hope for the best for everyone right now who may be a danger to themselves or others.

Take the May Challenge

If you notice to the left of my blog, I have posted about the May Woman's Challenge. Basically, this is a challenge for all women to take part in some kind of regular physical activity starting next month.

It really is so healthy for all of us to get some kind of exercise in each day. Especially for those of us who work in stressful fields such as social work.

Timely as it is, my yoga studio is planning a May yoga challenge. They are encouraging all students to attend 20 yoga classes throughout the month of May. I think I am going to definitely sign up. Right now I attend 3-4x a week so I really think I can do it. Wish me luck!!!!

I hope others who stumble across my blog will join me in this challenge in the upcoming month.

Sophia's Cure Foundation

FORD=Found On Road Dead!

This is the second week in a row I've had issues with my car.

I drive a tiny 2003 Ford Focus that has close to 90,000 miles. My husband and I have talked a lot about getting me a new car, however, neither one of us are crazy about the idea of adding a car payment into our budget right now.

My car for the most part works well, gets me from point A to point B, is excellent on gas, and the fact that I drive so much for work----I don't want to put a ton of miles on a NEW car that I am just going to be driving so much.

Even the idea of spending money on a new "used" car causes me a lot of stress.


So we have continued to delay this kind of big purchase.

Anyways, I was at a light earlier today when my car started to shake. The engine light then came on. I finished doing what I was doing, and being relatively close to home, drove back to the mechanic I was at just last week.

He told me that I had had a "misfire". And that basically my 4 cylinder engine was only operating on 3 cylinders. He said it's a pretty simple repair. I am just hoping it doesn't end up to be more than that as well as being an EXPENSIVE repair.

We have a lot to think about financially in the weeks to come.

Natural tooth whitener

I heard this tip on the radio recently. Just mash up a strawberry and baking soda together, and brush on your teeth. Leave on for 5 minutes or so. It really works!


You can re-apply once a week.

I even tried using whole frozen strawberries I had in the freezer. (I put in the microwave for a couple of seconds). Worked really well.

The whale finally passed

A few days ago, a young humpback whale beached itself out East. I've been following the story, and it's pretty sad. It's devastating to see such a large animal suffering, and crazy at the same time to see how ridiculous human involvement can get to the point where you wonder if we are causing more harm than good? The latest I read was that a huge tranquilizer dart was "lost" in one attempt to euthanize the whale. My local paper had a whole story on this today, about what one should do if they come across this huge "needle".

I am just so glad the poor animal is finally at peace.

401K

My quarterly 401K statement came in the mail today. It was nice to see that this is growing, even though I've been taking money out of our personal savings account lately for bills and other expenses since DH hasn't gotten paid lately. I guess that's what it's for though right? They say you should have at least 6 months of expenses in savings to play it safe so I guess we are in pretty good shape fortunately.

I also am still able to put money into savings each week so I really can't complain even if it's $50.00 here or a $100.00 there.

Money, money............

I think I did pretty good with my March budgeting challenge, and hope to continue to reduce our spending even more in April. I am trying to stick to buying only what we need food-wise. Things have been tight for us as a family over the past couple of months because my husband is waiting on a bunch of jobs to be completed so he has not had money coming in.

I saw my younger sister last weekend and she gave me a bunch of spring/summer clothing she no longer wants so that should spare me from having to go out and buy more clothes just for the sake of buying new clothes in the upcoming weeks.

I am also thinking of having a yard sale when the weather warms up a little more.

We have so much stuff around our house that we no longer want, need or use so it would be nice to make a little something on it all.

My sister said she'd even come down and help. I may also give her a few things to sell for me through her Ebay store. Her and her boyfriend have started doing this with vintage clothing and actually make some decent extra cash this way.

I have not been able to really give up my morning habit of stopping for breakfast on my way to work, or going to Panera for coffee and a bagel if I have a few hours to kill between clients. I have, for the most part, continued to bring lunch to work though each day.

As I mentioned in the last post, my tire blew out earlier this week, so I had to take out money from savings for that repair, as well as the tow.

We've also had to dip into our savings in March and April for our mortgage since my husband is still waiting to get paid. I know that that money will go right back into savings once he finishes these jobs, but it still makes me nervous to take it out to begin with.

I hate seeing our savings dip down!!!!!

Missed a major meeting this week

I had one of my tires blow-out on the way to the meeting of the century at work for one of my clients. Thank goodness my supervisor was there and able to fill in for me. It still bothers me so much that I wasn't able to get to this meeting, even though there was absolutely nothing I could do. This is that same bipolar lady I've talked about in earlier posts. She is on my mind so much, probably because I feel like I spend half of each work day trying to get her to follow through on things she needs to follow through on. I just really feel like I am losing this one though. She's not even really calling me anymore either. I hope that I can track her down to meet this week with me, and convince her to go back on her meds.

Have a great Easter/Spring Weekend!

I am going out of town this weekend for the holiday.

The weather is supposed to be beautiful.

I hope all of you social workers (and non social workers as well!) get some much needed rest, and sunshine!

After all the rain we've had (and yet another flooded basement----I am getting ready to fill it in with cement!!!), we certainly deserve lots of warmth and sun!!