Sneaky sneaky

Yesterday when I woke up my neck was SO stiff! (Teehee, I said stiff).
By the time I did a few things in the morning I was a little worried about possible cage fighting aka fall damage. I emailed my boss and it was decided to have it looked at. If I wouldn't have done it at work I would have waited a week or so, but with it happening at work I thought it best to follow up. I need my back/neck for my job and my dream career would basically end if I was seriously hurt.
I checked how many people were in the ER and decided to wait until it wasn't slammed. So I continued to work on getting my room together and I was picking something off the floor while I was making my new bed (yeah!!) and my back totally seized up. For the love! I decided to heat pack it and when my daughter came home at midnight the ER looked manageable and so she took me in.

Can I tell you how embarrassing this whole ordeal has been? It was cage fighting! (By cage fighting I mean fall) I was hoping to sneak in and sneak out.

Luckily one of my favorite techs was working the front desk. She also put a fall risk band on me. :(
She ushered me into my room and as I turned around, BOOM there was an attending standing there. Not just any attending, one I know and have worked with multiple times. Not so sneaky, but he was great and I can't tell you how much appreciation I have for people that I work with that care for me. I would hope that I would give my co-workers and friends the same attention and care. While I was telling him what happened I was a little taken aback by the undivided attention. What the heck? Hahaha

My nurse was awesome, the charge nurse, whom I just love working with, checked on my "drama 1". I was given a muscle relaxant, examined and xray'd. No serious damage and I was there for less then an hour. I was minimally embarrassed, and can only say awesome things about the U's ER. Yes, it's a little awkward, but if I was really hurt I would insist on going there. I say that knowing that traumas get a complimentary clothing removal.

So, I'm trying not too feel too bad. I've had to cancel 2 workouts at the Pilates studio and of course I can't run. I have to put the rest of the painting on hold but at least I have my bed to sleep in. Tomorrow I have a 90 minute deep tissue massage. I thought their deep tissue was just pushing harder but it's hot towels, bio-freeze and stuff. I am pretty sure that I'll be fine for work on Monday.

I was thinking about lots of things last night. What if I was really hurt and had to take weeks off of work. I would definitely need to be medicated to get me to rest for that long without going seriously crazy. Medicated as in a versed drip.

It also gave me a little perspective. Pain scale. In my head I couldn't come up with a number. Hahahaha. I was in pain but not narcotics pain and if I positioned myself right then it was comfortable. As I nurse we just need a number. It's subjective and gives us a starting point for treating it. As a patient it was more complex. (Just give me a damn number!!) Finally came up with a 7, positional. I will never have a pain scale of 10 unless I get pancreatitis or something. I've seen 10/10 pain and its not pretty.

I would be a horrible in-patient patient.

Thanks to all that took care of me! Today my daughter is going to drive me around to run errands. Don't be jealous!

Blog on..........

The one week painting plan

When I haven't been working and going to meetings I have been working on my bedroom. The plan was to paint the walls and trim, get the carpets clean and then get a bed. The plan NOW (it's not just a job, it's an adventure) is to finish the closet trim when I can and my carpets will be cleaned on the 7th of February.  I have my sisters old piano and I want to get rid of it before I clean the carpets.  

Back to the bedroom:

First I took the cover off of this.  

I have no idea what it is.  Guess I'll buy a white cover and cover it again.

After I was done painting I decided that the chair rail needed another coat of paint.  There were some splatters from the roller on it.  I did a lot of research on the best way to paint the trim without removing and I'm finding that some of the advice is good and some is sketchy.  Next time I'll paint the walls first and then the trim.

I had to re-tape EVERYTHING. I waited for 24 hours after I painted the walls to put the tape on.  Then I removed it as soon as I painted it.

Best advice EVER!!  Use packing tape on carpet by the baseboards and tuck it in and under with a butter knife.  It works FABULOUSLY!!  

Yeah.  I didn't notice this little oopsie so I painted over it.

After the chair rail and before I finished the baseboards.

After the painting was done.  I took the blue tape off pretty fast but left the packing tape until the next morning.   The next day I ran the edge with a spackle knife to prevent pulling any fresh paint off.

This is today, after I put on the new vent.  Not bad eh? 

The bump in my carpet is from a dresser that was there for a long time. When I get the carpets cleaned in a couple weeks and it should help that.

In the meantime I've been sleeping in the office on this:

Although I was grateful for the 3 inch foam topper on top of the air mattress it was depressing.  Getting out of bed was awful.  Maybe it's because I love reading, lounging and watching movies in bed.  I won't miss this, because today they delivered my mattress set!

BOOM!

I cleaned the wood blinds and re-hung them and made the bed but that's about all I could muster today.  My "biff da slam" on the ice yesterday has me pretty sore.  I'm suppose to go into the ER to just have it checked out since it is work related, but I'm waiting until it slows down.  That means I'll be rolling into the ER around 4am.  Hahaha.  

I'm pretty sure I just have some whiplash or soft tissue injury.

But back to my "new" bedroom.  I plan on some new bedding, hopefully an actual bed to put the mattress set in (I do have a frame), and lots of little things I still need to do.  I would like to get a curtain above the window behind the bed and a few things to hang on the wall. I still have to paint the trim around the closets and change out the plugs.   It's a work in process and with my schedule and now my sore old body it could be a month before it's all put together.  I can live with that.  It's better then stressing over getting it done.  THEN....the office!!!

If anyone is interested in running the Del Sol Ragnar Relay Race with my team we have an opening in the shaggin wagon.  17 miles, runner 10.  Let me know if your interested!  We aren't fast but we have a blast!

Blog on...........

Trust Fall

Last night after I wrote this post, I still couldn't sleep.  I was at work in Rock Springs and since I couldn't sleep I naturally gave myself a mani-pedi at 2am. Just as I was settling back into bed and starting to get sleepy we got a call.  Unfortunately for my team, I was wide awake and wired.  My body is so crazy. Well it turned out to be the longest transport/return of my career. 

This is what the plane looked like by my side in my frustrated hustle for some patient care. I may or may not have tossed a few things to the side.  

Pointing out that although my job sounds glamorous and looks bad ass, there are some moments where everything seems to be going wrong that a few (hundred) cuss words may pass my lips.  

After we delivered the patient safely to a tertiary facility (big word = big hospital) we took a cab back to the hanger and we were told that the plane was covered in ice and we would have to let it thaw in the hangar for an hour and it might be 2 hours before we took off.  I was at about the 24 hour mark of wearing the same clothes and only had a 2 hour nap in those 24 hours.  I grabbed a blanket and tried to get some sleep on our sweet pleather couch.  

A couple of hours later and the ice on the runway was still bad and before we knew it they closed the ENTIRE airport because of ice conditions.  That put my pilot in time out and we were stuck.  Pilots are only allowed so many hours on duty and then need a set number of hours of rest before they can be on duty again.  The FAA is very strict and our pilots follow those rules and the rules of Air Methods to a tee.  Safety First!

In the end, we hung out with the Salt Lake crew at the Hangar until the airport opened back up and our SLC based plane took us (including our pilot) back to Rock Springs and picked up our other Rock Springs pilot to go get the plane. They were on their way to a transport so although it isn't like dropping off a friend, they did get us back around 3ish.  TWELVE HOURS! 

Before we left I was walking out of the SLC hangar when I saw three of the big snow removal machines go by.  They are pretty darn awesome.

The main International airport is just behind our planes. Crazy foggy/yucky.

 Looks like there is snow on the ground, huh?  NO no no.  Ice.  

Never trust an airplane hangar to catch you in a trust fall.  It was more like a violent slam to the ground.  Phone, helmet bag and work laptop (in a well padded bag) all went flying.  Luckily only the 3 pilots, 2 medics and multiple mechanics saw me.  One of the mechanics checked on me and the other guys just yelled from the plane.  It was so icy and SLIPPERY that they couldn't hurry to me without falling. Either that or they were too busy laughing.   

I brushed off and made it to the plane.  

I can't decide if I'm feeling crappy because of my "hard landing" or the fact I've been up around 40 hours.  I feel really lucky that I didn't hurt myself.  I am sure I would have had I not spent the last year working on a strong core.  TRX/Pilates ROCK!  I do know that my body wouldn't tolerate much of that.  

We had to take off over at one of the big runways.  The SLC team was on the way to pick up a patient so we were one of the first to take off.  Medical transport can get priority.  Bye bye horrible weather and ice.

Of course then I had to drive home. 

Guess I should get some sleep!  I have more painting to do and a post showing all my progress!

Watching the news it was clear that many many people fell today.  Utah doesn't do ice storms and we were running amok.  It was like a snowstorm in Georgia...what do we do?  what do we do?

Have you ever turfed it hard in front of a crowd??

PS. Not much about running right now. This long, hard to heal injury is just killing me!  

Blog on.................

Work: there and here

Sunday was my first day on my own on the helicopter. We didn't fly, but my day looked kinda like this.

Wednesday I drove to Rock Springs for my 24 hour shift. It started nice and it was a beautiful drive.

Later, after we checked out the airplane and were headed back to the apartment we saw this.

This was the dog that the sheep followed. Sheepdog? I had no idea. There were three of them and some Border Collies too.

Gotta love flight nursing! Everyday is different. Haven't transported a patient yet this week, but it is the slow time of year!

Blog on..........