Samantha Hanson, LPC, ATR, Clini-Coach®

Archives 2013

Winter wonderland

So pretty outside with the snow!   But drivers are crazy.  Last week in one day in an expressway near my house, there were three pile ups, one hundred cars, sixty cars and 30 cars! (Between a stretch of highway during the blizzard, one took 2 hours to clean up!)  Thank goodness I didn’t have to take that road that day.

Ugh this month has been icky, stomach flu, bad cold, hanging cough, food poisoning, and today I feel like a truck ran me over! I’ve taken Aleve, two naps, tea, chicken broth, and I’m still sore all over, even though the weather is clear! So in between the soreness I’ve been working on knitting, I’m making a blanket for my nephew, twin size and almost big enough!  Then I’m going to embroider a giant J, and if have time a border.  Only two afternoons off this week so who knows how much time I’ll get to work on it with how tired I am after work, plus our outings!

Work is iffy, still having issues with boss. But tomorrow is the holiday party, we have about 30ish family members coming for residents, we have Santa, which I have to pick up suit early morning, and we will have Carolers! (granted they waited till the last minute to confirm, it’s ok).  SOOO nervous.  Any Hoo, watching a sad hallmark movie (determined to sit through it, even though the person is dying of cancer, cause I’m sick of avoiding movies. Just keep telling myself, it’s a completely different situation!). And knitting and sipping on tea.

Where has the time gone?

My goodness, already the end of November, a day to be thankful!  Four years since I found out my pain was real and started chemotherapy (started the Friday before thanksgiving 2009).  I had gone to a doc who initially thought it was an old soccer injury, he had me go for an MRI cause the pain was in the wrong place.  A few days later, within hours of the MRI, he called me from his family vacation in Texas to tell me to get off the leg, and wait for a call, as he had scheduled all the necessary tests for us, and we just needed to confirm the dates and times it was one less thing for my family to worry about.   When I can find his name in all my records again, I plan to send him a bushel of thank you cards, for doing that, and checking in on me while I was going though treatment (even when the docs at the larger facility that he referred me to, wouldn’t communicate with him).

Any Hoo, at work this month we really haven’t done activities.  I had a banjo player, guitarists, singers, outings on scenic drives, visits to a famous cathedral in the area (holy hill). Longish ride, but totally worth it if you’re in the area!   This next month we have another greeting card workshop by Trisha Klowak, Crafty paws! Caricaturist, banjo, guitar/harmonica, and Mary Kay!  As well as Christmas light scenic drives, out to dinner, and a family Christmas party!  Busy busy. And I’m planning February’s and March calendar already!   (if you’re in the upper Midwest and have some sort of skill to share such as those listed above, contact me and we’ll have a chat!).
This week I made a big step.  I contacted cancermatch.com and made a profile.  It’s a free social networking / dating site for individuals with cancer, survival treatment post, recurrence etc.  I know it bothers me to think what if I fell in love and then we had to go through cancer all over again, watch them or them watch me suffer?  But I’m trying to think more positive, make some friends, have someone to vent to see what happens.  We could both be lucky and never experience it again until we are old and grey.  Until the old and grey part comes, I’m going to see where it goes.  I did mention this worry, as other people mentioned their worries.  It seems like no one really messages on this site… Pretty ghost townish, so we will see if anyone responds to the posts, I made in different areas.
Happy turkey day y’all 🙂
October office updates, part 1

This month has been fun! Not everything has gone as planned when I made my wonderful, themed calendar, but that’s ok.  With people who have dementia, it’s good to have a schedule, but at the same time be willing to change it if necessary.  Every day is different, moods can change quickly or slowly, or be set and not change. Fatigue can come on quickly or last all day.  With age comes aches, and with Wisconsin weather we have plenty of aches most of the year, especially if we are human barometers due to age or sickness.  Luckily, we had some nice days for pumpkin painting, but lately has been too cold to go outdoors so some activities had to be adapted into completely different activities!  As long as my residents are happy or willing to do what I recommend, the change works out :).  Every resident gets an activity schedule, and one is sent to their power of attorneys.  They don’t always remember they have a calendar, but that’s why we help them remember.  Some of my ladies are on top of me with what daily activities are, and others would rather sit in front of the news all day (we are working on finding a happy medium).  I have some residents who don’t care to join in activities, or arts and crafts, or bingo, so I’m trying to work with them to find a happy medium for us all to enjoy.  Many of my residents have stated that they have never done arts and crafts, except embroidery or possibly knitting in the past.  With each activity that we do I start out very simple and as weeks progress, I find activities that are more challenging to build up their stamina!

These photos are not in order:

Card workshop! as you can see, the tables were filled with supplies as my residents were building their cards.
This resident chose to do several “Happy Halloween” cards with spider stamps, crafty paws custom designs
Pumpkin Yahtzee! I will be adapting this game to make it easier for my residents, right here I used either a felt orange pumpkin, or a photocopy of a finished pumpkin, and felt pieces.  I will be adapting it by creating thicker pieces, and possibly magnetizing it like the Pinterest one or using Velcro.

Here we were painting wood objects, or paper to go towards bookmarks.  The end results will go towards our “bazaar” a facility fundraiser.

Pumpkins~ painted and foam applicated! the foam application pieces came from http://www.orientaltrading.com

as people finished making masquerade masks for our Halloween party (oriental trading.com), I introduced watercolor paints!
Expressive art therapy holiday card workshop- Togo!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/331052639678?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649

Check this out y’all! My friend and I are hosting an expressive art therapy holiday card workshop next week, and since the internet world can’t all join us, here is the link to purchase a holiday card Togo kit! Enjoy crafting everybody, for the Art Therapy portion, while you work your mind is at ease which releases your bodies tension thereby reducing blood pressure and taking away daily stress!!!
Catching Up with office updates

I’m going through my September photos, and here are what I have found! Please excuse the horrible, pixelated images, I will get better with practice, until then technology and I don’t agree!

We used bubbles as a way to transition from the last day of summer, into fall! Bubbles, to reminisce of memories of the past.
God’s eyes! To hang in the windows, full of fall colors or give to the facility to sell at a fundraiser!
Here are images of some smaller god’s eyes, as well as some residents coloring in the leaf drawings.
Our entertainer played both harmonica and guitar simultaneously!
Finished leaf drawings, and god’s eyes. the leaf drawings are now on the resident’s apartment doors, and we have pumpkins for October!  The god’s eyes are in process of getting to the windows.
this resident chose to outline her leaf and color it in naturally, as nothing is perfect, not even nature.

October update soon to come!  will have to be in sections, as we still have one week to go!

Updates!

So, I’m running out of things to talk about myself!  And my experience with cancer, I know I could write about all the icky things I went through, or the bodily changes I experienced, or write about each treatment from my diary I kept back then, but as no one has asked any questions, I’m going to leave that a mystery for now!

Instead, I’m going to continue writing about different art projects and activities I do, as well as update about projects I do as a life enrichment specialist, aka art therapist, with my residents at work!   For HIPAA / confidentiality concerns, I will not include photos, or names of my residents, but just cropped photos of the activity.
Feel free to use my ideas, as I have received them from Pinterest! And will try to include all the links along with my adapted activity.  While I went to school to be an art therapist, I did learn about different activities, mostly how to adapt activities to the required population, and thinking outside the box to create our own activities.  (We were told it was perfectly acceptable to take other ideas and adapt them as needed).  We learned much more but, in this case, a life enrichment position with dementia is wonderful! I’m absolutely loving my job, and my residents are so sweet, and always trying new things! They like hands on activities, music, the outdoors, and bingo, and Yahtzee!  I’m trying to bring in a large variety of entertainers, so if any of y’all are southeastern Wi and have talent to share, please private message me or comment with your email!!!!
Being a life enrichment assistant, I get to plan activities, including arts and crafts, outings, parties, volunteer programs, a little bit of everything!  Quite overwhelming but I think I’m finally getting the hang of it, but there’s still something new every day. I was told the first year is the hardest in this position.  For my group, I try to plan movement-based activities twice a week, such as tossing a beach all back and forth to stretch and work our muscles, get the blood pumping and reminisce to relive stress!  We have chair yoga volunteer on Tuesdays, and Wednesday is arts and crafts day! We have decorated the kitchen calendar wall with colored leaf drawings, tissue paper pumpkins and masquerade masks for our upcoming Halloween party. Pumpkins were donated by a local business, and the residents painted one side, and used foam stickers to put fun faces on the other!   We also have had bingo about every other day and started doing Yahtzee in between.  We’ve also done ring toss, pumpkin bowling, and pumpkin Yahtzee!   Our place is full of Halloween now thanks to the residents’ hard work, and my coworkers setting up the outside decorations.
Some entertainers we have had are, crafty paws custom design cards, banjo bob, a guitar harmonica player, with more to come!  Even though I’ve only been working a month, I feel like it’s been forever, I have accomplished so much here!  My goal by Christmas is to bring in more volunteers :).  Pictures and descriptions will come soon, promise!
Activities outtings and crafts oh joy!

To start with, I did have to cut my temporary hours, so I am at my primary job 5 days a week every morning and two days a week in afternoon at temporary and every other week, one day at my internship.  I was scheduling entertainers and outings today and boy is my monthly planner filling up!   Somehow, I was able to find space in next two weeks to squeeze in a haircut and my massage (thank you momma and daddy for the welcome home /graduation gift!)

Soon though my budget will include money for massages on top of car, phone and loans, cause boy do they help with stress! This weekend mom and I are taking a break from watching my nephews and going to a local public museum, so excited! Going get Dominos after and watch a free on demand movie thanks to a coupon from time warner cable 🙂 (good luck again to all the hunters out there in the nasty forecasted weather) next weekend, I have work/internship Friday, work 9-5 sat and supervision Sunday 9-1 and crafting the rest of the day.  Totally excited to craft and prepare for the card workshop I’m co-leading but soooooo going to be tired.  May need naptime! Lol.  And to think I thought it was silly as a child.  Kids don’t know how good they have it.

Side effects strike again

Well to start with, I’m loving my job!!! But, these extra “temporary” hours at the other side of city at the larger facility where they run things differently are kicking my butt.  One long term side effect of going through chemo is exhaustion or fatigue, so I get tired easier than most people.  Forty hours a week plus easy to exhaust, no good.  But the residents are mostly wonderful, and the coworkers are trying to work with me, but it’s hard being the new one.

I laughed at one the other day, this young girl still in school didn’t want me to do nails because they might yell at me and she didn’t want to toss me under the bus, I laughed and said she shouldn’t worry, cause I interned at a hospital and while I didn’t do manicures I had to have them do arts and crafts, and we all know how people feel at a hospital in the first place much less to try and get them to think and try something new while on medication and in pain!  She just went ugh…but..but….  needless to say, I let her do nails and tried to start discussion while she painted.  A lot of the residents (in 90s) think I’m sweet and love my fun scrub shirts!  I’ve only been grumped at three times in one week and easily switched it around.  Too bad for all this tiredness though, even with my thyroid medicine. Hopefully I will adjust to the new schedule soon.

New job update

My new job is wonderful!  Starting next week for the next three months though I’ll be at two different facilities 40 hour a week total!  Woohoo!  Today after 4-hour shift though I had to take a nap.  My fatigue is still with me, and some days are unbearable.  Yay for long term side effects and “new normal”.  Time to stock up on mountain dew and coffee!  I really did get lucky with this job, my boss is wonderful my coworkers are nice, and the residents are so sweet! I’m already connecting with many of the residents, bringing out smiles left and right, and as this population is primarily dementia, the lighter stage individuals help me out with the later stage individuals.  All are sweet though, can’t wait until our activities truly start!  I’m hoping to get the new calendars signed off and shipped out Monday afternoon. Time to learn Yahtzee and canasta!  I have October filled with fun activities thanks to Pinterest. I even have some ladies who want to learn crochet, so many of these activities that are sensory based will be helpful as it activates other sections of the mind to help keep the mind ticking, stretch out its plasticity for as long as possible. So glad that I can be here for them.

My Story

Wow, 29 viewers in a few short hours!  Here’s a recap of my situation so you don’t have to scroll all the way back to wherever it is I posted my story (can’t believe I’ve done 45 since I started in Jan! With 499 views total!!
I was always a sick child, catching every cold.  You sneeze, I was guaranteed to get it.  By the time I got out of high school my immune system seemed to be a little stronger, but the pain became more frequent. (Had pain a lot with sick, but parents thought I was seeking attention) over the course of 4 years in college I had a procedure for endometriosis which gave me temporary pain relief.   Then it came back and got worse.  That is pain I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.   In 2009 I was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins’s lymphoma large b cell in about 85% of my skeleton.  I went through 5 months of chemo and was very fortunate that the drugs took away the tumors and healed the bone!!  It took me awhile to process what I went through, I went back to school and graduated and continued to master’s and graduated!  I’m feeling better than ever. The pain stopped halfway through treatment and my family is closer than ever, I’ve worked on forgiveness and moving forward and understanding what I went through, how I’ve changed and where I’m going.