New ventures

If you stumble across this blog, or used to follow it, or whatever, I have pretty much moved shop to here:

iwannabeadinosaur.wordpress.com

-Chelsea

Admittedly.

A picture of my grandfather that I stole from
my mother's blog.  Shhhh....

I have no idea how to start this blog.

It's been rolling around in my head for a long while now.  There are a million intricate threads to keep track of here, and I'm worried about dropping a few.

But I'll give it a whirl.

In the six months I've been working as a caregiver in a Dementia and Alzheimer's facility, I've come to realize one of the biggest gaps in our healthcare system.  Dementia is not a "normal" part of aging, but a growing number of our population is falling victim to this disease.  The CDC estimates that 5.3 million people currently suffer from Alzheimer's, which is only one type of Dementia--another 1.3 million suffer from Lewy Body Dementia alone, ignoring the multiple other varieties of Dementia and the many who suffer from them.

Caring for Dementia patients is an expensive endeavor.  According to Ruth Bettelheim, Ph.D., a contributor on the Huffington Post,

In 2011, the medical costs of American dementia patients will come to $183 billion. The care provided to them by family and other unpaid caregivers was valued at $202 billion, for a total annual cost of $385 billion, according to the Alzheimer's Association. Unless effective treatment and prevention can be found, by 2050 the number of Americans with dementias will triple to nearly 16 million, while the medical costs of caring for them will balloon to $1.1 trillion per year,more than double the total current Medicare budget.

                                               - source

The challenge this will place on the system is unfathomable.  As it stands, long term care facilities do not receive adequate funding.  On paper, facilities appear to be well staffed.  But the reality is quite different.

As a caregiver, you're always pulled in a million different directions.  You step into a room, and eyes turn to you.  You see people shift, getting ready to acknowledge your presence.  You can only pick one person to help though--one person to connect with at a time.  And while you're engaged with that person, you are shutting out all of the others.

The emotional and social aspect of living in a long term care facility is one that is often neglected.  At the facility where I work, we do have an Activities Department that will engage the residents.  But even then, there is little time for one on one conversations.  Many times, I have felt like I had to let someone suffer emotionally because I had to help someone out physically.  And while the physical aspects are serious--I'm always worried about several of my residents falling and injuring themselves--it is my opinion that the emotional aspects as just as important.

On the slower days, I have had the chance to sit and talk with residents.  Even those who have lost the ability to speak themselves can participate in a conversation.  It's nice when someone comes to chat with you, will look at pictures with you, and is genuinely interested in what's on your mind.  I love those moments where I get to talk with a resident one on one.  Even though they have lost a large part of who they once were, they still retain quirks, and many of them still retain a great sense of humor.

I will never forget when a nearly bald man told me not to mess up his curls.

But as the Baby Boomers age, and more of them develop Dementia and end up in facilities, I worry that the system will not afford to be able to provide a completely healthful environment.  The facility where I work tries hard to adhere to the Gentlecare paradigm, but the funds just aren't there to take it to the level I would love for it to be.

How our society will deal with this financial and social burden is yet to be seen.  I do not possess the economic know-how to find a solution on a grand scale.  I only have one opinion on what the solution is not: some say it would be easier if families kept their elders with dementing illness at home and out of facilities.  This is not a viable solution.  Dementia presents multiple problems that are hard to witness in your loved ones.  If you can never get away from taking care of them, it's easy to only remember their bad days.  We all need help as we go through life, and sometimes, a facility can provide the care that you cannot.
As long as facilities are well funded and can provide that care.


Before I took this job, I hated the fact that my grandpa didn't recognize me the last time I saw him before he died.  But now that time has passed, I don't think he didn't recognize me.  I think he was locked away inside himself, somewhere.  And I know this because I still remember that classic grin he flashed us before we left--the last image I have of him.

Dementia is horrifying.  But it can be made less so, in my opinion, and I try really hard to make sure my residents don't feel lonely while I'm there.

The unknown is less terrifying when you feel someone holding your hand.

Not procrastinating.

I have reached the point in my educational career when it is absolutely necessary for me to stop calling it "procrastinating" and start calling it what it really is--a strategy.

I work better when things are cutting it close.  Those essays I've written the night before they're due have always sounded better than the ones I slave over for weeks.
So as we're rolling in to Dead Week here, and I'm staring down a 2-3 page essay on Sylvia Plath, a 5-7 page paper for my literary theory class about a subject still TBD, and the final compilation of my non-fiction portfolio...I'm not in the least bit worried about anything.

I'm also trying to make it a point to worry about things less.  I say this as I glance down at a scratch I received at work every five seconds, wondering if it's infected.  I know that the only reason it looks red and swollen is because I keep poking at it, but I probably have MRSA.  Just saying.

Clayton "Beach"

In other news, I can endure more than I thought.

The pictures in this post are from a trek Will and I made in February when we decided to play hooky. Clayton "Beach" is somewhat tricky to find, but it's nestled up in the Chuckanuts and had some lovely views.  However, the hike was not all that strenuous.
Excepting my need to keep up with Will, who walks at Turbo Speed.

A couple weeks back, we also made the hike up to Oyster Dome.
A point of contention before I continue on.  Will told me the hike was 6.2 miles roundtrip.  According to this website, it's 6.5 miles.  Those 0.3 miles make a difference.

Anyway.
The hike is something I've heard about pretty much since I arrived in Bellingham.  For that reason, I assumed it was going to be an easy hike.  You know, a nice stroll.  For some reason, the fact that you had to climb up a huge hill seemed to register in my mind as a slow and steady and manageable rise.

Rocks!  Sandstone.  Sediment from Idaho, if my brain
is recalling correctly.  If not, disregard my stupidity.  Either
way, I will continue to hold that belief.

Wrong.

It's essentially three miles of walking up really steep stairs.
Really steep, muddy stairs.

This is the sort of physical activity that I balk at.  If I knew what I had been getting into, I am not so sure I would have been so happy to go.

But I made it to the top of Oyster Dome.
Very slowly and with plenty of stops to catch my breath and I fell a couple of times too because I am silly and like falling in public and getting my pants muddy.

But the point is that I made it to the top.
Which was really cold.
So cold that it started to snow these big fat beautiful snowflakes.

And, true to Washington, halfway back to the car, they turned into really annoying raindrops.

I'm short.

I'm not really sure which was easier: the hike up or the slipping running hiking down.

Either way, I am excited for it to warm up a bit here so that I can hike up again.


I suppose that's really all I have to say at the moment.  That's a lie, but everything else meanders way too far from the content of this post.  I really need to get back in the habit of writing on here more regularly.

Because I'm that kid.  That Creative Writing Major who loves to talk about her life and the things she finds important.  I have lots of ideas for less narcissistic pieces in the future.  But, hey, I like my life and I like how awesome it is and how awesome the people who are a part of my life are.

Also, Mom, I am so glad that you are doing better :)

Bottomless.

I have been out of the country precisely two times.  Both of those times were excursions to Canada.  Both were not particularly all that fun.

The first time, in sixth grade, is very fuzzy in my brain because I was 11 (which means my brain was equivalent in size to that of a hedgehog's), and I hurt my hip the next day.  Not something I spend a lot of time reminiscing about.  The second time was an absolute disaster, and also, not something I spend a lot of time recalling and yearning for.

However, I am fascinated with the world outside of what I know.  I would like to go abroad.  Not necessarily to study--I know that's just asking for a great blow to my GPA thanks to my desire to experience the life outside the classroom.  But, I have decided, I will bike through France.

When?  When I can afford to.  Plane tickets are crazy expensive, donchya know?

So, ahem, yeah.

Awkward angle is awkward!

First big purchase with money I earned from my job?  A bike.

I know three things about bikes:

A) They have two wheels

B) You use them to commute

C) They have things called gears (now as to what gears are, I have no clue)

When I decided I wanted a bike (so that I could build the skills necessary to bike through rural France), I asked some friends for some advice.  Eventually I ended up at The Hub, a bike co-op downtown.

I took a leap of faith, and the guys down at The Hub fixed me up this bike for $375.  It rides really well and has fenders to keep the "rainy bits" off me (as the guy explained, haha).

One of these days, I will be able to ride my bike without getting winded within the first two minutes.

And I now reject the maxim that "you never forget how to ride a bike."  I didn't forget how to ride a bike, per se, but I forgot how it feels to fly over pavement.  It's frightening is what it is.  My stomach drops every time I sit on my bike.

There's something unnerving about being on a bike.  Something that seems unnatural to my atoms.  Mainly the fact that I shouldn't be moving so fast with so little between me and the world.

Also, I'm a chicken.

Although, naturally, I buy a bike and then two days later Bellingham gets three inches of snow dumped on it.

Huh.

So yes.  Me.  Bike.  France.

It shall happen.

And in unrelated news!  I have now switched to being a Creative Writing major with a minor in the Study of Religion.

Who is going to have zero job prospects upon graduating?

ME ME ME!!!

But I will live my life with a greater understanding and appreciation of my place in the world.

Plus, I have some pretty awesome adventures coming up.  Making my way to Seattle over break, spending a week in the South, driving up to Mount Shuksan with Will (at some point in the future), and the Epic Showdown Between Chelsea and the Kitchen: A Battle of the Cleanliness.

This is love.

Derp Cat.

So I am sitting on my couch, right?  Listening to the wind and pretending like I don't have six dull pages to read about the Puritans.  The wind has been tearing through the trail behind my house all day.  I love Bellingham wind...
So I'm sitting here.
I open up a new blog to start writing about Atticus and then, lo and behold, Atticus appears out of nowhere to lay in my lap.

He's my sidekick.
He's always RIGHT THERE.

Why am I writing about my cat again?
Because a) this is not homework b) I love him to pieces and c) he's such a cat.

When I first adopted him, I was completely surprised by how un-catlike he was.  He came when I called, he never did things to annoy me, and he was generally pretty nice.

Now, he's turned into a srs cat.

First sign of his transformation into a cat: He started knocking things off my dresser just to annoy me.
I'd be chilling on my bed, reading or interneting, what have you, and then I'd hear a soft plunk!  I look over at my dresser, and sitting there is this:

Addy, looking at me all innocent-like, going "What?"  I look away and he starts knocking things down again.

The next sign came when I watched him turn my alarm off, twice, in one morning.  I use my phone as my alarm.  He was using his nose on the touch screen to turn it off.  I am not exaggerating--my cat knows how to work my phone.

A little while later, as it has been getting colder, I put my duvet inside my duvet cover (which was an adventure in and of itself).  This cat has slept with me every night since I brought him home.  Every night.  Without fail.
Except when I put the duvet on the bed.
Cat refuses to sleep with me now.

As I mentioned earlier, he's my sidekick.  He's always right where I am.  Except a while back I took a nap, and when I woke up, he was gone.  It wasn't worrying or anything, just odd.  When I walk out into the family room, I find him in this position:

Just, ya know, hangin out.

The latest frustration: I bought him a bed.  I even put a generous amount of catnip in his bed.  Has he even sat in it?  No.
Of course not.
He likes to sleep on my homework.

He also likes to bite my chin and face.  I'm not sure why.  I have read that it's a display of affection.

The most frustrating of his catlike behaviors is his constant need to be in my lap.  And when he can't get in my lap, he'll sit on my computer keyboard.  It doesn't matter if I almost throw him across the room, he toddles right back for more.

One slightly less catlike behavior: He has to eat whatever I'm eating.  Cheese.  Black beans.  Potatoes.  Spinach, for crying out loud.

But despite being sometimes frustrating, I love him and his cat-ness.  I love how he has to talk to me whenever I come home.  I love how he has to rub up against my face.  I love his little feet.
Unfortunately the poor little guy has to get allergy tested this week.


As far as life goes, work and school.  All I ever do.
Although I did manage a hike up to Fragrance Lake with a friend.  Didn't take any pictures because I spent the entire time trying desperately to not admit how out of shape I am and to not fall on my face.
For now, it's back to the books and then 30 hours of work between now and this time next week.

Stupid Moments (or How Irony Almost Killed Me)

So I occasionally have these astoundingly stupid moments.
We're talking moments here where my entire system of logic flies out the window and then crashes to bits on the asphalt and I'm left inside running around like a lunatic, thinking that I'm making perfect sense.

Before I divulge one of my favorite stories, I suppose I'll share two examples of what I mean here.

Example One:
Last week, I wanted to get a pint of frozen yogurt out of my freezer.  After having done such, I sat on my couch and started to check my email.  Five minutes later, this quiet thought starts to form in my head.  Wait...I could have sworn...my phone was just...  I spent a couple minutes searching the nearby area (read as: the couch) before my eyes settled on my pint of frozen yogurt.
Yep.  I swapped my phone for a pint of frozen yogurt.
Thankfully I noticed quickly enough.

Example Two:
This is more like Example One version 2.0.
A couple days after the phone incident, I was making some gluten free toast using some gluten free raisin bread that I have in my freezer.  I happily make my toast, toddle over to my couch, sit down, and then realize I can't see anything.
Once again, I swapped an item for something from my freezer.
I have no memory of taking my glasses off and putting them in the freezer.  But I did it, because that's where I found them.  Right on top of the frozen soup.

Ok.  Enough set up.
We all get it.
I'm not always the most logical of people.
Now onto my favorite story to tell ever.

Meet 10 Year Old Chelsea.

A couple months after this picture was taken, America changed after some devastating terrorist attacks.
But I mostly don't remember that because 1) I was 10, and 2) I was more concerned with the fact that I had spelling homework and I hated spelling homework.

That was also the time in which we were moving, but our house wasn't done being built, and so we ended up living in a rental home from September to January.

Where am I going with this?
In December of 2001, I almost died under the crushing weight of irony.

Wait.  What?

Because our rental house was a good 30 minutes away from school, my mom had to drive us to and from school.  We were also a bit more creative with our Christmas decorations that year, since most of them were in storage because we had not planned on being in the rental house that long.
Key point:
This is the only Christmas in my memory where my mom put out Lifesavers as some sort of holiday decoration/treat.

One day, after coming home from school, I grabbed a handful of the red and green lovelies, and plopped down in front of the TV to watch some Ed, Edd, 'n' Eddy.  Classy.
I was laying on my back, my feet resting on the TV stand (something that my brothers and I were always being yelled at for doing), and eating some candy.
A nice way to unwind after a hard day of fifth grade, right?

Until I choked on a green Lifesaver.




Let that sink in for a moment.




I choked on a Lifesaver.






And then I had a stupid moment.  While starting to panic because I can't breathe, I have the presence of mind to consciously decide to not get help because I am afraid of being yelled at for having my feet up on the TV stand.

Chelsea.  Come on now.  Seriously?  You could almost die, and you're worried about getting yelled at for something that stupid?



Yes.  Yes I was.  I'm pretty sure I would do the same thing today too.


I lived though.  How?  By guzzling a ton of water and a lot of luck.

The College Thing...

One of those buildings on campus that, as an English Lit
kid, I have no reason to ever enter.  But sometimes, I do.

So the College Thing.

Let's go to parties and get like, totally wasted, brah.  We'll meet some hot lasses/fellows and we'll bump and grind in someone's (we don't know whose) living room.  The smoke will be thick, and who cares if we have class in the morning, because this is awesome.
Let's stay up all night, just waiting for the RA to come tell us to pipe down, ignoring the reasons why we're at college, and play video games and create everlasting friendships based on the bonds of boozing it up and leveling up.
Let's run around and do crazy things.  We'll eat the night.  Because we can.  Because we are young, and for the first time in nearly two decades, we are free from the oppressive control of our parents.  Freedom tastes sweet.


That Thing.
I'm not into it.

I'm actually really super annoyed by it.

I mean, seriously.  Is all of that necessary?  I fail to see how it is.
There's no way for strong connections to be made on an individual level if you're always in a pack, screaming and yelling and getting yourself into all sorts of shenanigans.  Well, at least as I understand connecting with people.  I will openly admit that this could work for some people--it just doesn't for me.

It's a mountain?

And I now realized that I sound really anti-people and anti-fun.
Which I believe is how all of the people who lived in the dorms around me felt last year.
I rarely took people up on offers to go do things with "the group."

Now that I'm out on my own, away from the whole dorm scene, and removed from the whole College Thing a little bit, I've decided that one of the reasons I never wanted to do anything is I was just simply peopled out.
From October to June, I was peopled out.

Too many people around at all times.  I mean, you can lock your door, but they're still knocking, coming in from the bathroom, peering in your window to see if you're there.  You can hear the people all around you.  You bump into people on your way to class, sit in tiny seats in a cramped classroom.  If you eat a meal "alone" in the dining hall, people are everywhere (including at your table).
So you venture to odd spots of campus...but people are there.  Or they will be there.
So you venture off campus for a walk, and THERE THEY ARE.

Still haven't quite figured this one out.

Aaaaand now I sound like I hate people.
But I don't.  I love people.
I just like to be alone sometimes.  I'm not sure when I have the most difficulty thinking: when people are around, or when I'm outside.

I like my privacy.

I enjoy having fun and going on random adventures and all that stuff...but there's still some limits here.  I don't want to be stupid just for the sake of being stupid.  That defeats the purpose of everything.

Oh dear.  Where was I even going with this?
I'm not into the whole College Social Thing.
It's not how I make friends.
And as much as I drag my feet when it comes to schoolwork...
This is school.
I'm here to cram information into my head.
Often in formats that I disagree with.  Often in forms that don't push me intellectually.  Often in ways that, quite frankly, bore me to tears.
But I'm spending thousands of dollars for the chance to come into contact with new ideas, not go out every night and party it up with sketch people who are my "friends" I swear.

And if you do it right, you can come into contact with new ideas--challenging ideas--in a social setting.
You just have to know the right people.

This is another one of those situations where I just don't do things halfheartedly.  Social interactions that are only skin deep because we're all about the silliness and fun?  That's not a friend to me.  That's someone you hang out with.  But if you needed someone to talk to, would you really feel comfortable talking to them?  Probably not.
And life is heavy sometimes.
And you need people to talk to.
And it's hard to talk to people you aren't connected to on that level.

And sometimes, you get a cat.

Derp Cat is Derp!

Maybe I'm not into the College Thing because I like to grapple with ideas and other people's thoughts.  I like to try and confront myself with new, possibly contradictory, information.  And, generally, discussions like that rarely come up, if at all, in that sort of setting.
Oh I give up.
Time for more coffee.