.slaves' room.

I love that every time I go to camp, I learn something new...not just interesting medical procedures, but more about LOVE (and how much I generally fail at loving everyone!) God used two people to teach me more about love in 40 hours than I could have imagined. First was a young adult with severe cognitive delays and sensory needs...basically he just needs someone to walk around behind him with his walker 24/7. He walks and walks and walks and that's it. There's no expecting this guy to do an activity or socialize with others. He also has a reputation at camp as being a difficult and hitting most staff when they work with him for the first time....AND THEN I got asked to work on my first "duty" with him...which somehow turned into 2 1/2 hours of walking circles around the first floor of this mansion house (where we were staying) with him. It's just AMAZING to me how important non-verbal communication is and how sensitive people can be to the sense of touch. During my 2 1/2 hours, the guy stomped his feet a few times (meaning that he was happy), reached out to hold my hand a couple times, and only hit my arm 5 times (pretty good since he greets a lot of staff with a smack to the face!). SO cool to get to spend that time with him.
THEN the weekend progresses with my roommate. We were sleeping in "the slaves' room" in the mansion, so it was an itty bitty 2-bed room in the attic. It was just myself sleeping in a room and caring for a 43 year old woman with cerebral palsy. Her CP has left her speech nearly impossible to understand (at first) and hardly any motion at her joints, other than her shoulder, hips, and elbows. Needless to say, it was an extremely loooooooong first night as I was trying to figure out how she likes to get ready for bed/understand her speech/not lie awake alllllll night because I was SO scared she'd call out to me in the night and I'd be passed out in my bed. But luckily, I slept extreeeeeeeemely light so I heard her every time she tried to say my name (and also every time she snored and ground her teeth...hahaha). But the weekend continued and I found out how hilarious she was and I got to be really good at understanding her speech. Just a cool lesson that He continues to show me through campers about how to PATIENTLY love others, even when it's getting on my nerves. <3

.good.

God is so good. Today was a VERY difficult day at work (very very emotionally draining...I don't think I'm meant to work in end-of-life care!) but I can't thank him enough for so many ways that he has blessed me. I got a confirmation phone call from a lady who works at the same hospital where I will doing my Level II Fieldwork and she agreed to house me! She lives in a 2 BR, 2 bath condo by herself, and she is offering me a pretty reasonable price to live in her fully furnished spare bedroom...not to mention that she is a sweet connection to the hospital!! :) I talked on the phone with her and we seemed pretty compatible as far as interests, cleanliness, and fun personalities! :) On top of that, one of my mom's college friends has offered to open up her home to me whenever I want to eat a homecooked dinner with her and her family. AND she has an 11 year old son with special needs who she has offered to let me borrow as a "guinea pig" for anything that I would like try on him/to hang out with him. Then, I just signed on Facebook (which has gotten exceptionally creepier with the new look) to see that one of my campers from 2009 "tagged me in one of his activities" (whatever that means). BUT regardless, he put that he added "swimming with me (and several other staff)" to his favorite activities!!! :) To top it all off, I had a 4.0 GPA this semester. I couldn't feel more blessed right now!

.khakis and polos.

I can't believe that in 7 days I'll be home for what will probably be my last Christmas break EVER. When I look at it like this, it makes me want to go for my doctorate...buuuuuuut not that badly ;) I have 5 days left of fieldwork, for which I could not be more thankful. It's definitely been a rough couple of weeks there and I'm ready to be done....mainly I'm ready to be done wearing a combination of the two pairs of khakis and three dark colored polos that I own. I haven't realized how much I really love sweats until I'm forced to rock the khaki/polo look 8+ hours per day for 3 weeks. I'm starting to pack for home for a MUCH needed break and for CAMP this weekend. I'm PUMPED for the Christmas reunion for our adults...I haven't seen any of the adults campers since May, which feels like FOREVER ago! Luckily I will be able to re-connect with a bunch of friends after work each night, so I'm hoping that will make fieldwork a little more bearable. Here's the big 3 things I'm most recently thankful for:
1. Good health. It breaks my heart to see what some of my clients are going through and I can't imagine being in their position.
2. Tide to Go pens. I know this might sound ridiculous, but I spill things all the time. Since I have discovered this wonderful little pen, I think I have saved several items of clothing from various food stains. :)
3. Getting to go "home" to camp soon for the holidays!! It's just such a beautiful place and I can't wait to get there and see all sorts of wonderful people! :)

.diciembre.

OH SNAP. how is it diciembre already?! (<--Part of my Christmas break plans include whippin' out some more Spanish to prep for Medical Spanish in the spring!) Well I supposed I am an epic failure about this blogging schtuff. Oops? I mean, I'm gonna go ahead and blame in on being a 2nd year grad student...I feel like that is a legit excuse. I suppose that school kept me over the top, ridiculously busy for the last month. Those last 3 weeks of classes involved turning in 4-5 major assignments per week, as opposed to the normal 0-1 that we had all semester. It was not fun, however, I survived, and kicked it in the butt (just found out today that I have a 4.0 for the semester!) As soon as finals were over I got to head straight home (after an epic double birthday celebration...dating someone with the same birthday is a lil' strange!) for an AWESOME Thanksgiving break. It was just so so good. It made me realize how much I REALLY REALLY have to be thankful for (<-- sorry to end that in a prepositional phrase). Since Thanksgiving break, I've been back in Indy doing clinicals at a hospital. God is DEFINITELY challenging me to love on these clients and my "co-workers". This is no easy task, and these clients are EXTREMELY difficult for me to love on, but God has clearly placed me here for a reason, even though I am unsure of what it is. I guess I am enjoying them, in the respect that I'm NOT in the classroom 8 hours/day anymore AND my homework load is very light...aka I get to see people on weeknights to hang out! :)
Even though I'm semi-miserable at clinicals, God never fails to show His power in my life. Last week my mom FREEEEEEAKED out on me because I haven't started thinking about where I was going to live when I move to Columbus in 3 months. Well, God is a cool guy. I sent one message to the hospital's Facebook page, and sure enough someone who works at the hospital offered to house me for 3 months in her fully-furnished condo. I'm still waiting to talk everything through with her, but WHAT A BLESSING!!!!!!! :)
I suppose I will list my 3 blessings since the last time I've blogged...or at least just 3 good things I can remember from the last month ;)
1. Thanksgiving Day. I've never been close with my extended family, but boy was this the BEST Thanksgiving ever. My family celebrated with close family friends for the entire day (into Black Friday until 8:00 AM) and it was RIDICULOUSLY fun. I haven't laughed that hard in a long, long while :)
2. The BF- I hate to sound cheesy/awkward/mushy-gushy or anything like that, but God has truly blessed me by putting him in my life. Don't know how I would have made it through the last 6 months without ripping my hair out if he wasn't in the picture...
3. Christmas trees- my family picked ours out the last time I was home and it was just LOVELY. They just smell so good and just everything about Christmas makes me happy :) :)

.3 and 3.

Ok. I can do this. Or that's what I'm going to tell myself....honestly, I am VERY VERY VERY stressed and on the verge of sickness, so I'm just going to go ahead and lay out 3 prayer requests and 3 of my daily happy things in order to write at least more than like 2 blog posts for November...
Praises:
1. My grades are actually pretty close to where I'd like them to be.
2. The student I assist on campus told me that he thinks I'm a wonderful person.
3. Carrot Cake ice cream by Ben and Jerry's.....tangible proof that God loves us.

Requests:
1. Competency: I have to write two 8+ page papers this weekend for a competency next week with a REAL adult with REAL disabilities. I am scared....to death. Not to mention all of the planning that comes next week to write goals/plans for them...ugh.
2. Finals- I need to kick butt on some finals and I KNOW that I will be dead after competency week...so I'm praying for some sudden burst of energy from somewhere...not to mention I'll spend my 23rd birthday (and the boy's 24th birthday) cramming for the ergonomics and biomechanics finals....
3. Friend- My favoritest research group member (who had also recently started to come to church/Bible study) has been out of school for a week. She is having some really severe mental health issues, and right now we don't know if she'll be able to finish the semester (aka graduate with our class). Prayers prayers prayers for her....even thinking about the details of the situation makes me want to cry. :(

On that note, the next time I probably blog I will be: done with classes for the semester AND 23! :)

.paper chain.

Well, week 10 is coming to a close. CRAZINESS. But, I am glad to report that week 10 was hands down THE BEST week I've had this semester :) So I was some sort of homework-doin' maniac on Saturday and it made me have a fabulous week. I got way ahead on a handful of projects and this week has just been AMAZING! And I am so thankful for that....I suppose one could say I am thoroughly enjoying the calm before the storm :)
1. Monday I had the opportunity to "do life" with my 6 closest friends from school. We had a soup and hangout night where we made THE LONGEST paper chain I've made to date...and that's saying something since I love paper chain making. As of 11/1/10, we had 361 days until graduation. Needless to say, that paper chain took up all of my friends dining room and living room. :)
2. Last night I had the joy of spending time with my research group. A year ago, we were 6 randomly selected girls sent to work with our program director on an unknown research project. Now we are a close group of friends (although we have our FAIR SHARE of fights/arguments) with a potentially super cool thesis project....we'll see how cool it is in another couple weeks once we analyze our data!
3. Tonight I had a great day (minus the 3 hour lecture to start off my day). I got to play with some 'thermal modalities' in one class (including paraffin wax...amazing). Then we went on a field trip to play with adaptive communication devices....again, way fun. I just got home from church tonight and I am just SO thankful for so many wonderful people in my life. It was just refreshing to see so many good friends all in one place at one time :)

.employable.

God's timing is perfect. I can not see it or understand it, but somehow, it's just perfect. I must keep reminding myself of that with the ridiculous amount of things happening in the next three weeks and the next 361 days. In three weeks I will be done with the semester....just 20 days to finish an INCREDIBLE amount of projects/papers/online forums and a handful of tests. Crazier, is that I only have 361 days until I am EMPLOYABLE. I don't know if that is a word, but in 361 days, I will have a legit degree and can start practicing with a temp license. HOLY COW. Somehow, I'm going to get through this all....regardless, here's my three highs:

1. I just got home from a game night/dinner party with my 6 closest OT friends. We have somehow made this ridiculously awesome group of girls this semester and I LOVE IT. I would probably be failing this semester without them. Basically, I'm going to be one sad girl when we all spread out (literally...Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, and Texas) for fieldwork....eeek! However, it was a much needed break from the craziness known as this week.
2. I got a letter from my HS best friend today. It wouldn't be such a big deal, but timing and her living several time zones away has kept us from chatting on the phone for MONTHS and hearing about each other's lives. Literally. It sucks. I almost started crying today when I got her letter...it was SO uplifting and JUST what I needed to hear.
3. I share a birthday with this new fellow in my life....some would refer to him as my boyfriend (which is in fact true) but I prefer to call him "Hey You" or something like that. KIDDING. But really, we share the same birthday...it happens to fall RIGHT in the middle of his exam block II for school and right before my finals for the semester. Sooo.....oh happy day, we will not be getting to hang out on our birthday, HOWEVER, we keep talking about doing something amazing to celebrate tests being over. More on the celebrations later....I'm sure it will be epic. :)

.swift.

I wish everyone could understand camp. That is my conclusion. It is probably the ONLY place in the world where no college/graduate students are judged for belting out HSM (High School Musical), Taylor Swift, or Justin Bieber alllll the time. And not only that, but it's through our ridiculousness that we become such good friends. Regardless, I took a break from life and went to camp on Saturday, which was AAAAAAMAZING. I got to see some good friends for the first time since July and LOTS of amazing campers. 5 of my 9 girls (including one of my all time favorites) from the 2 week session of camp were there, so it was AWESOME to see them again...and they all had AMAZING costumes. We spent the whole day playing in the leaves, making caramel apples, decorating our spooky cabin, and carving pumpkins. SO fun. So, in attempt to look at the positive things in life and not dwell on the fact that I could break down at any given moment due to stress, here's the top 3 good things that happened over the weekend. :)
1. Listening to 'You Belong To Me', by the one and only T. Swift with my favorite camper of all time. Everytime this song played during camp (which was probably twice a day for two full weeks.....) she would always come find me and we'd dance and sing to it. Well it started playing and she hunted me down from the other side of the cafeteria and said that we had to dance to OUR SONG. So precious...I about lost it.
2. Four of the campers in my cabin over the weekend play on the same wheelchair basketball team. They got to "break in" the brand new sports pavilion with some intense basketball skills and some sit volleyball. Seriously, those girls would beat the crap out of me in basketball anyday.
3. Being able to escape real life and spend 13 hours in "the woods". This is one of my favorite places in the world and being able to spend time here with such amazing people was fantastic. It made me realize that there is SO much more to being a good OT than just knowing facts from the book....it's about being able to work with people who have different abilities and make the best out of what we've got. <3

.10-20.

I know that could quite possibly be the lamest title of a post ever, please forgive me. This is going to be quite short and postings from me are going to be minimal over the next few days/weeks (side note: 4 weeks, 5 days until classes are over for the semester). Continuing on, school is going to be ridiculous over the next 4 weeks. I can't even count the projects/competencies/tests/data analyses without seriously having a panic attack. Regardless, in the midst of it all, God is still proving himself to be mightier than all this ridiculous earthly stress stuff, and that He is the one bringing me through all of this. So, here's my top 3 of the day:
1. I FINALLY got the home address of one of my fave campers who passed away last month. I've been waiting for it to write to his family and tell them what a positive impact their son had on me (and our whole cabin) during the last two summers.
2. I got an email from one of my favorite adult campers. He was asking me if I was going to be working at the retreat in November, which I am sadly not, however, I told him he'd better come in December when I'm there! I love that this guy (hmm.....probably like 70 years old?) sends me emails. He has a some major difficulty with fine motor skills, but his email mostly made sense and it made me happy to know that he was thinking of me! :)
3. Homemade treats. I'm still enjoying pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, pumpkin seeds, and honey chex mix I made while I was home!

.heart.

We hear it everywhere..."home is where the heart is" and "Ohio: The Heart of It All". Luckily, I've been blessed to have my home IN the heart of it all. :) It's been a pretty good weekend at home, but basically every time I come back, I feel a little bit older. Tonight I went to the HS volleyball game where I babysat for one of the graduating seniors when she was in ~4th grade and three of my little swim team girls are now SOPHOMORES and are on the varsity team. Weird. I sat at the game amongst a bunch of old familiar faces, wondering how these parents could POSSIBLY have kids in HS now....haha. Seeing my name up on the wall for All-Ohio swimming from 2004 makes me seem WAY old. That was over six years ago!!! Craziness. So yes...I feel quite old and slightly out-of-place in Findlay anymore. However, Findlay still has that good ol' feeling of going just about anywhere and STILL seeing someone I know. :)
Ok....here's 3 of my happy things of Fall Break...
1. Baking pumpkin chocolate chip cookies with my seeeester :)
2. Going to Dietsch's and then driving around Findlay with my family and 2 other adults squished in my dad's work car....
3. Having a break from homework and getting to spend some quality time with the family :)