It has been reported that Walt Disney once said, “It may not feel like it at the time but a kick in the teeth might be the best thing that happens to you.”
Really, Walt? A dirty, well-aimed booted foot to the dentition?
“Ouch,” is what I say, spitting out a handful of teeth and gravel. “Brutal,” and “uncalled for,” also come to mind. Well, last week I got just that – in the form of medical lab results!
Like a drug addict, I have mastered many whys and wherefores to justify moderately sloppy lifestyle habits: “I’m quite active,” (people in my life call me a hummingbird and say I should sit a minute.) “I’m of slight build,” “I eat way better than most people,” “I cook from scratch,” and up till a few years ago, “I have excellent genetics.”
The sloppy habits were aided and abetted by a rabid love of cooking – especially carbohydrates. I adore them. Each one is AMAZING. And so beautiful. And gratifying. And coffee with creamer is of the gods. I know my relationship with sugar is not a good one. It’s like the bad boyfriend my friend keeps going back to. “Do not be misled: bad company corrupts good morals,” the good book warns in 1 Cor 15:33. I need to seriously limit our interactions. I need to unfriend it. Unfortunately bad company tends to be fun, but as my new favorite bumper sticker says, the trouble with trouble is it starts off as fun!
What about drinking water? One should drink 1/2 – 1 oz. of water for each pound of body weight, so my body weight divided by a million times some crazy number… Surely a max of 16 oz. a day should do me. When I was pregnant, my midwife, Dr. Brenda would shake her head in dismay and say, “You need to drink more water to sustain this pregnancy.”
“It makes me nauseous,” I explained.
“I don’t know how you don’t just pee a little puff or pellet of pee-powder…”
Powder-Puff-Prego proved her wrong and got away with it, again!
Till last week.
Today a 1 liter pitcher of water sits on my counter and I aim to drink 2 of those a day, so help me God. If I ‘must’ have my carbs then I’ll return half or two thirds of it. I have revisited my list of good cholesterol (HDL) foods to increase and bad cholesterol (LDL) to decrease. I’m educating my boys even more on all this. I’ve downloaded a fitness app and I aim to make it beg me to stop!!
I bare my soul and my medical records here for all to see. AARP reports that the average 45 year old American takes at least 4 prescriptions. I’m 45 years old and I aim to take zero till I have to take an aspirin at 90. That won’t happen if things in my life continue as they are. That’s at least 4 sets of side-effects to deal with. 4 sets of expenses. 4 sets of food/drug interactions. 4 sets of medical visits and tests. 4 sets of headaches. Fortunately for me, I ducked in time and didn’t receive the full force of the kick – this time. I wish you the same, at worst.
In a nutrition class I took this spring, Dr. Erlandsen taught us that, for optimal long-term health, adults should consume no more than about 25g of added sugar daily. There are about 12g of sugar in a tablespoon! By added sugar, he excluded naturally occurring sugars such as fructose in your fruit and lactose in your milk. Added sugar includes any that’s added to prepared products such as breads and commercial juices. Keep in mind that prepared products can be store bought or home-made.
I aim to consume less sugar daily, and certainly less added sugar. While sugar is necessary for sustaining life, the impact of high amounts of it on our bodies is deleterious and the majority of us are a far cry from have sugar deficiencies. In observing my habits, one of my sugar culprits is creamer in my coffee. I love me a steaming cup of that creamy wake-up-and-love-life goodness. I drink 2 cups a day and add 2-3 tablespoons per cup.
When taste-testing, I used to add the sweet stuff till it tasted just like I wanted. By the end of the cup, the drink was so sweet it was distasteful. So I trained myself to start with it less sweet than I think I want. You can inure or habituate yourself to consume less sugar (or other offenders like salt) this way. Just a few sips into the drink, it tasted just right and continued to be so to the last drop.
You can also do this with your other senses such as hearing. Start a TV show off at a lower volume than normal. Your hearing will habituate to it, as long as the volume within a reasonable threshold. The same thing goes for smells, especially with things like perfumes.
A majority of recipes call for ridiculous amounts of sugar. Think for yourself, promote mindfulness and don’t do things just because a recipe called for it. Get in the habit of using about half of the amount of sugar called for in recipes when you make them yourself. The difference is astounding: it does’t taste that much less sweet and you can actually taste other ingredients like spices or flavorings better when your sweet receptors aren’t overwhelmed with syrupy taste.
Another area where being mindful pays off is with portion sizes. You don’t have to accept or eat a portion of dessert just because it’s pre-cut and served to you, e.g. at a birthday part. Ask for less. Or take what you are given and eat just part of it.
Soda and fruit juices have got to be the worst offenders when it comes to sugar consumption. They have zero to minimal benefit and horrific consequences. Don’t fall victim to clever marketing and thinking that you need to consume them. Cutting regular consumption of those will give your body – and your wallet – significant relief.
Be more aware of habits that impact your health and take small steps towards wellness. You’ll start to notice that things you thought tasted normal soon taste too sweet. Be drastic when it comes to children or when you are diagnosed with a lifestyle related disease. Sugar is a real killer.
My poor sons were raised in an adult foster home so they have some rather peculiar perspectives on life. Yesterday I was taking residents’ blood pressures when one of my boys said, “Did you just say blood pressure? All these years I thought you’ve been saying ‘butt pressure’.”
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One of my residents, Judy, was coming off some wicked antibiotics and pain medications that left her terribly constipated. We’d been fastidiously following her BM regimen to try and get her relief but it finally came to the big guns – the enema.
After days of being backed up, she was miserable and ready for anything that would give her relief. I was teaching my caregiver Lora how to administer the enema. Our miserable Judy lay moaning on her bed, facing the wall, obviously a very humiliating and vulnerable position. Lora was on her knees on the floor behind her, quaking with nerves. I was bending beside Lora, soberly walking her through the daunting process. Unfamiliarity, risk, and pain made them both skittish.
Lora is a luminescent personality. She is Texan and ex-military, meaning she always has a straight-faced badinage that leaves people around her rolling on the floor snorting in hysterics. I was talking in low confident tones and slowly rubbing Judy’s back with my gloved hands to relax her. I started to say, “Lubricate the nozzle and very gently insert…” when Lora poked her head straight up, enema in hand, and interrupted me with, “Now, Judy, in the military, when you’re about to fire a shoulder mounted rocket launcher, you scan behind you to make sure no one is in the danger zone and yell,” – and she YELLED, “”Back blast area clear!” Then you fire.”
“So I would ap-rciate it if you would give me that there courtesy pr-cautionary proclamation if you feel you are about to expel any hot gases or other dangerous explosives in my general direction seeing as I am in the primary danger zone,” and she bent back down to business, leaned towards me and said quietly, “Pardon me m’am, please continue.”
It’s been two weeks and neither Judy nor I can tell the story without crying.
It starts subtly enough with the passing of summer, my favorite season. The weather gets cooler and the days shorter. Then I know it’s time to get my game face on. On September 29th five years ago, my sister passed away from ovarian cancer at the age of 49. October 13th grandma passed away from Congestive Heart Failure. October 20th is my sister’s birthday. October 22nd is my deceased brother’s birthday. October 26th 2014 my mum passed away from a massive heart attack.
So it is that the end of September feels like diving into murky turbulent waters and that I have to wait till the end of October to exhale. I experience a profusion of emotions, some at the same time. They vary from a punch-in-the-gut breathlessness to exhilarating hope, and a million in between.
I thank God for His ministry of comfort to me without which I would be a wreck. It continues to blow my mind that the Holy Spirit is called our Comforter. He personally attends to healing our broken hearts. He prepares us, buffers us, and endows us with grace to endure the pain. In John 14:27 Jesus says, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” He then continues to shield and teach us about our hope in eternity. This is not a wishful thought but a certain expectation that we will see our loved ones again, whole and restored. We will also see our beloved Jesus face to face.
Death is our final enemy 1 Cor 15:26. And it is a formidable enemy indeed. He strikes a terrible blow. But after we have overcome that, if we know and loved Jesus, we will never die again and pass from death to life.
Receiving news of a family members death is surreal to say the least. If you’ve never had to endure it, let me tell you that nothing can prepare you. It sucks like crazy. But One stands with you. That’s the best you can hope for. If you are in the thick of it, He stands with you still. In many, many, many days it will get a little better. Then a little more. The sun will shine again.
To read through mum’s medical report on her final day, I am further saddened that we as a family had not made the necessary steps to protect her in the even of flat-lining. I thank God for the crash team that rushed to her side to help her. Yet they were at it far too long and I hate to think of her beholding her Savior yet being surrounded by experts attempting to jolt her back to life. Not necessary. We, especially as believers, must take steps towards believing that we have a fabulous place we are going and to do what we can to eradicate unnecessary medical heroics. Though she’d had a rough last year and we were devastated by the thought of letting her go, so we didn’t plan on what the end would look like. Please take the time to talk with those you love about what you’d like and what they’d like. Better yet, write it down.
So I look outside at this fantastical fall we are having and feel ready to exhale. I thank my spiritual family for their priceless support through prayer and other gestures of love. I’m so honored to walk this road with you and can’t wait to be finally home forever.
Mum, Irene, Mick… plus all others who have gone before us, we’ll see you all very soon.
I took a magnificent Dementia class by fellow occupational therapist Teepa Snow. She taught a contact technique to use on people with dementia. She elaborated that it led to the release of Oxytocin, a hormone produced in mammalian brains.
I call it our herd hormone.
I later learned it controls social recognition among like kinds, and is involved in attraction, orgasm, and bonding. It affects factors like trust, generosity, and eye gaze. “An oxytocin nasal spray caused men in a monogamous relationship, but not single men, to increase the distance between themselves and an attractive woman during a first encounter by 10 to 15 centimeters” (Scheele et al, 2012). Sheep injected with Oxytocin inhibitors did not show maternal behavior towards their young whereas virgin sheep injected with Oxytocin exhibited bonding behavior towards strange lambs (van Leengoed, Kerker, & Swanson, 1987).
Wow!
When I got home from the class that night, a young man delivered medical equipment for a new resident of mine. I shook his hand at the door and commented that he had a great, firm handshake. I have a thing about handshakes and frequently request a redo if I get a limp one.
“Turns out firm handshakes elicit Oxytocin release,” I said to him as we were setting up the equipment, eager to teach him what I had learned.
“Dude!” he exclaimed, “I AM the Oxytocin man!”
“What do you mean?” I asked, taken aback.
“I love Oxytocin so much I have it tattooed on my shoulder!”
“I’ve got to to see it,” I said wide-eyed, leaning in after looking over my shoulder to make sure my husband wasn’t walking in on me gawking at the delivery guy taking his shirt off. I expected pretty calligraphy of the word.
People! The guy had the chemical formula of Oxytocin tattooed down his shoulder and clear across his chest!Mind. Blown!! I squealed in delight and disbelief as I snapped the picture below, quite like a giddy school girl.
Needless to say, I stood transfixed (10-15 centimeters further away) and stared at him in rapt attention as he assembled the equipment and taught me about Oxytocin.
Part II: CO-REGULATION
Fast forward to co-regulation, a term I recently learned. You might be familiar with self-regulation which has to do with self-monitoring so as to control our own emotions and behavior. Self-control requires time, thought, and deliberate decision making (a top-down process.)
Co-regulation, on the other hand, entails herd members influencing each other’s emotions and behavior. It is the “continuous unfolding of individual action that is susceptible to being continuously modified by the continuously changing actions of the partner” (Butler & Randall, 2013). American social worker David Belford says, ““being with“… [emphasis mine] can help co-regulate the other person more quickly because it bypasses our thinking brain (bottom-up processing).”
Co-regulation is fundamental to all human relationships from conception to death. We become stable human beings if we receive healthy regulation from our primary caretakers. If not, “we struggle with our own regulatory challenges and may turn to drugs, alcohol, sex, food or other externals to regulate our anxious or depressed systems. If this goes on long enough, we can find ourselves in addiction. Living in isolation or addiction is self-destructive, while turning to responsive people to soothe our pain is constructive.” (Katehakis, 2017). Katehakis asserts that co-regulation is a main reason why adults are in relationships.
Part III: ADRENALIN
This is an abbreviated version of what is, hands down, my favorite YouTube video in the world. Please take a minute to marvel at it.
This video has over 79 million views! 66 million are mine. What you don’t see is that at one point in the course of the scuffle, the baby buffalo falls into the grateful jaws of a crocodile! Not only is he officially having a bad day, but he doesn’t stand a chance!
Imagine that you, mum, and dad are strolling along at Kruger National Park, enjoying some family time by the river when a pride of lions waylays you. Before you now it, you are squealing for your life as the lions mount, claw, and bite at you. You have no idea what hit you in the watery brawl before you are dragged and pinned helplessly onto shore. Mum and dad are off at record speed and you are dead meat. The lions growl and snarl with drooling, primal pleasure. It’s a wonder you can hear it over your visceral groans. The uproar intensifies as they tear at you despite your failing fighting efforts. You are a sorry match for these killing machines.
Adrenalin floods your heart and the earth thunders to its deafening rhythm. Boom. Boom. Boom! The drumfire should be fading along with your draining life, yet it gets louder and louder, rumbling, stampeding. It’s not just nature’s greedy heartbeat as she gapes her ravenous jaws, it’s the hooves of a hundred irascible kin on a rescue mission. Boom. Boom. Kaboom!
Suddenly, your neck is released and surprised lions are flying in the air. Kicked cats are whimpering and scampering for their lives.
All because your tribe came back for you. It’s a fuming , foaming sea of them. You can’t make out mum or dad for the massive, cranky herd. You’ve never seen so many, never heard such enraged bellowing. It’s dizzying. And it’s all for you. That’s the power of belonging!
It gives me chills EVERY TIME.
I, for one, am just dipping my feet in the warm ocean of these beautiful concepts and can’t wait for an exploratory swim.
Have an Oxytocin rich day!
Video retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGvj7NxMMMU on 10/20/17
Scheele D., Striepens N., Güntürkün O., Deutschländer S., Maier W., Kendrick K., et al. (2012). Oxytocin Modulates Social Distance Between Males and Females. The Journal of Neuroscience,32, 46. PMID23152592.doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2755-12.2012.
van Leengoed E., Kerker E., & Swanson H. (1987). Inhibition of Post-Partum Maternal Behaviour in the Rat by Injecting an Oxytocin Antagonist into the Cerebral Ventricles. The Journal of Endocrinology, 112(2), 275–282. PMID3819639.doi:10.1677/joe.0.1120275.
Butler, E. A., & Randall, A. K. (2013). Emotional Coregulation in Close Relationships. Emotion Review, 5(2), 202–210. http://doi.org/10.1177/1754073912451630
Katehakis, A. (2014) Co-Regulation. Mirror of Intimacy, Daily Reflection October 8, 2017 via email.
If you know anything me, it’s my feelings about cows. You can find contributing factors here: https://thukumainen.wordpress.com/2016/10/11/wild-about-cows/. And to think I am married to a man who calls himself a rancher. Very sad. I posted that blog a year ago and my feelings haven’t changed much.
Shortly after that, Emma who’d grown up on a dairy farm shared how she was washing dishes in the sink one sunny day while her kids played outside. She was watching them dreamily in the sand pit through the open kitchen window. She’d just picked up the last glass from the warm sudsy water when she heard a sickening bellow. She looked up to behold her 3 year old daughter sitting on the bottom rung of a gate to the field while one of their massive bulls came bounding across the field. “Oh God,” she moaned gripping the side of the sink. There was no way she could even set that glass down before the bull got to her baby, let alone get out there to rescue her.
In slow motion, it seemed, little Layla hopped off the gate she was sitting on and authoritatively stuck a stubby little hand straight out in front of her and yelled, “You stop!”
The colossal brown bull skidded to a screeching halt not five feet from Layla. He lowered his immense head and pounded the dry ground. He seemed to be reconsidering his actions. His responding moo projected slime all over the place. “No! Bad cow!” commanded the little girl, leaning her stern face forward, hands akimbo, and stomping her miniature pink cowboy boot in defiance.
That bull lowered his gargantuan head repentantly, sniffed at the dirt, and slowly turned away.
Emma hadn’t heard the glass shatter, muffled by the soapy water, as she tore through the door. She ran pell-mell to her baby in the field, tripping over broken branches while her apron fluttered like a flag in the wind. She grabbed her like she would never let go, sobbing fitfully.
“Mama sad?” asked Layla quizzically placing dirty little hands on her mother’s tear-stained face.
“No, baby. Mama’s very happy.”
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This week I have encountered many people who are going through various degrees of apprehension for one reason or another. It has astounded me, I don’t remember it being this unbridled, almost epidemic. Many posts I’ve visited have entailed details from anxiety-ridden writers expressing hopelessness about the world’s plight and our leaders’ wanton disregard for us. Sitting in prayer groups, I’ve prayed for people dealing with fears of flying, fears they can’t put their fingers on, and fear of the future.
It seems we are being pummeled by angst and asphyxiated under its weight.
Are we paying too much attention to current events? More importantly are we basing all our trust and hope on the shifting sands of circumstances? Are we listening too closely to the primal internal voices that are gifts for our survival, but which we have amplified with the megaphone of attention?
The resulting degree of stress is ravaging our health, our wellness, and our souls. It exudes from our every pore so that we contaminate people around us. It’s affecting our children and grandchildren and shortchanging any chance for joy and a vibrant life. It grows like a cancer and stifles our very lives.
Can we, like little Layla stand up to these demons and gain control of ourselves and our reactions to our stressors. We can drop and allow them to trample us mercilessly and fling us up in the air. We can turn and run like lightning with the massive bulls in hot pursuit. Or we can stick our little hands out in their face and scream “STOP!”
This lion must find a heart.
See that day, Emma learned and then taught me about authority that is vested within us. It is the authority of a thirty-pounder against a thousand-pounder. Within me is mastery and dominion over my reactions to circumstances. But I must learn to wield it. It is a spiritual weapon that I can brandish to quell the enemies of my soul.
Jesus died that I might have life, and life abundantly. Peace and His presence are two things He has assured me He will never withdraw from me. Hope and joy are mine to enjoy despite the worst possible circumstances in life. Otherwise what is our faith for? I’ve tried many others and they are all sinking sands. He alone has seen me, and countless others over the ages, through thick and thin VALIANTLY. His are promises that we will not be shaken if we stand upon the Rock that He is.
If you don’t know Jesus, He is a simple invitation away. All you have to do is believe He is the son of God who died to save you and who came back to life so YOU might have life. His presence in your life is the authority to speak over your perspective on life’s circumstances and command your fears to be still.
Here’s a great truth: You can’t think two thoughts at the same time. And tough times call for soul talk. In 1752, Katharina A. von Schlegel penned “Be still my soul, the Lord is on your side.” What a great mantra. It has amazing words. Enjoy Kari Jobe’s rendition of it.
Ages before, King David said, “Why so downcast oh my soul? Put your hope in God for I will yet praise him,my Savior and my God,” Psalm 42:11. Sometimes I say, a thousand times, “I trust you Lord, I trust you Lord.” I’ll sing a song or meditate on and recount a piece of scripture. Scream it if you need to or just think it, though your knees are knocking.
And should the circumstances do you in, you have a blessed promised eternity awaiting you. One of complete rest and bliss in His presence. Death will be your final enemy and you WILL overcome it victoriously. You can’t lose!!
So put your hands on your little hips and stomp those sparkly cowgirl boots. Silence that bellowing bull and speak your truth!
I’m scraping my left overs into the kitchen-scrap bin for my chickens. I smile sadly as I think of Coach. I wish it was his left-overs I was scraping …
As far as I can tell he has always commanded authority, even though he is the biggest kid on the planet.
I would watch his stooped form hobble into the front room, an iron-grip on his aluminum front wheeled walker. The caregiver has him firmly by the belt. She has finally learned to do it properly. When the caregivers first start, they inevitably pull his belt up as high as they can. Pretty soon his every step is higher and higher, driven by the abominable wedgy, until he is barely walking on tip-toe, then his legs are flailing about, trying to make up with the floor; and the caregiver, blood vessels pulsating on her temples, is about to strain bulging arm muscles from carrying a grown man by the waistline.
“Hi Trouble,” I tease.
He glances at me furtively, and chuckles. Just a few months ago he would have said, “I’m going to knock your ass to the floor.” I love it! Walking has become arduous now. He keeps shuffling along, as though fearing that he won’t start again if he stops. With every other step, the left Hush Puppies shoe rhythmically hits against the right one and his left knee buckles slightly. I watch with bated breath, willing him on.
Sadly, his speech is also failing him lately. I can tell by the gleam in his eye he is trying to tease me back and can’t. My heart breaks. I’m certain it would have been a good one. When he finally sits, exhausted, I bend over to wipe a little rivulet of drool from his dignified chin and plant a playful kiss on his forehead.
“Wow! THIS is the BEST comb-over in the world!” I exclaim and realign a stray hair. “I don’t care what anybody says.” He looks at me through brilliant blue eyes and smiles again. He tries hard to say something and then abandons it. Instead, he shakes his head in mock dismay. So I raise my eyebrows and shake my head slowly as I say it for him. “… knock my ass to the floor.” He smiles, trying to glare at me and settles for a fist.
We used to erupt in laughter at “the fist.” It was the formidable mechanism of knocking asses to the floor. One was liable to get it several times a day for one reason or another. A tear comes to my eye as I realize we are getting the fist less and less any more.
‘I’ll miss that someday,’ I think to myself as I clear his plate after breakfast. He did’t eat much, again. Nothing tastes good any more. I breathe deeply and stare absently out the kitchen window as I scrape the plate’s contents into the kitchen-scrap bin. Bacon, eggs, and rye toast. His favorite.
Today, I’m scraping my left overs… I wipe away another tear. I wish it was his left-overs I was scraping …
This is a tribute to one of the most dignified people I have ever had the privilege of caring for. He and his family impacted my life deeply for almost 2 years. Some people grow deep roots into our hearts in no time…
Our beloved Gorge flares in a fury of flames and ash
Started by thoughtless fun and games
Fueled by bone dry underbrush,
By cowards who then skinked away and hid. No names.
Blazing,
Devouring,
Devastating.
On this Ash Tuesday
Another inferno has ran its course.
“I say what I mean and I mean what I say.”
His was a life lived deliberately
With honor, honesty, & humor. No remorse.
Simple and humble, hilarious, approachable.
A diligent, brilliant, outstanding human being
With warmth blazing through bright blue eyes
Fed by a fire in his belly, seemingly all-seeing.
His was a no nonsense, kick your ass to the floor, tell-it-like-it-is kind of warmth.
It was fueled by Polish pride and delivered with New Jersey precision.
Robert was a rough-hewn character. He lived in a nursing home outside of Melbourne where I worked as a caregiver. We heard him before we saw him. He walked with a cane which he leaned into heavily. “Old injury from the war,” he explained, when I asked about the limping hip. The cane tapped a beat on the tiles on the floor and the metal on the sole of his shoe kept rhythm.
He wore the same shoes every day. “Worn ’em forty years, mate. That’s a good shoe right there,” he explained academically, tapping at the toe of his right one with his cane. “It’s been there for me through the good and the ill.” They were made of very old brown leather and he meticulously polished them every morning. Even the insides had a high sheen with a dark outline where his toes nested. His room had the distinct smell of the Kiwi shoe polish he used.
It was rough being an international uni student and not only having to work to fund my schooling but adjusting to culture shock as well. The job wasn’t much to speak of. A friend had recommended me for it and I’d decided to give it a go. I was grateful for it but it was certainly grunt work. The hardest part was thinking I spoke English but having to learn a whole new version here.
I tied Robert’s shoe laces, and chuckled as he told he about the ‘deadorse” and “wilted rabbit food” he was served for dinner last night. “Where’s the lamb around here? Or how about some roo for supper?” He complained. I liked this crusty man but would like him even better if he quit scratching his nuts in front of me. He did it every time he put his shoes on, “Only thing is, these shoes make me itch my budgies.”
He loved to talk about his wife. “We raised chooks up north,” he said, pointing to a grainy photo of her in her bathers on his old dresser. “She was always full as a boot on the amber fluid.” She was a good distraction while I helped him get dressed, otherwise he’d tell me to nick off. He called me a stickybeak and a perve when I first started.
I shook my head as I left to attend to a buzzer going off in room 24. “I’ll never get over this place.”
Robert loved to walk outside after brekkie. I’d been there about 4 months when he came clicking by the nurse’s station one day. I was enjoying my job well enough and getting a good handle on this culture. “How ya going Bob? Beautiful day out out there.” I said, replenishing towels from the laundry cart.
“There’s a dead duck in the parking lot,” he announced, adjusting his hat without looking at me. He kept walking.
“Oh dear.” I said, and went back to my towels, thinking it was a good thing the garbo would be here tomorrow.
All of a sudden, my cart was pushed by a nurse of larger build in a tight uniform, running faster than seemed possible for her size. I was thrown against the wall like a rag-doll. She was yelling orders as she ran outside and my fellow off-siders were running behind her in pandemonium, dodging wheelchairs and their occupants. “What was going on?” I asked after I caught my breath, frantically looking around and wondering if I should run or hide.
Turns out a female resident had fallen in the parking lot and Bob had saved her hide with his announcement! So much for my cultural competence…
