As you all know, I take public transportation to work everyday. It takes me 45-60 mins door-to-door depending on the shuttle and transfers and costs me about $8.90/day.  Apparently we’ve reached an exceedance in emissions this week so they announced a Spare the Air Day yesterday. That means I get free rides on Muni (all day) and BART (until 1pm). Awesome. I’m saving about 6 bucks a day! It started yesterday and keeps going until emissions are down. However, I think we only get 4 free days per year. Oh well, I will take whatever I can get.

It’s Friday and I survived my first week at Children’s. I saw my first patient on Wednesday and I’ve completed two feeding evaluations too.  I’m also happy to say that my Canadian desk buddy has gone back to Canada and has taken his suitcase, three pairs of shoes, and various bags of food with him. It was nice to have a place to store my things and I even put up a couple photos on the cork board to help me settle in. Before I left for the day, my boss also gave me my very own key. It’s official now. I have a badge, pager, key, and desk. Awesome.

I just got home from my second day at my new job. The commute has been pretty easy and takes me about 45 mins door-to-door. My first day was rough since I was expected to be there by 8:00 am. That meant waking at 6:15 and being packed and out the door by 7:00 am. That was rough, but I did it.

I hopped on Muni at 7:08 and transferred onto BART at 7:21.

I got off at MacArthur Station at 7:36 and caught the hospital shuttle at 7:37.

I arrived at the front door of the hospital by 7:42.

Monday morning was all orientation: Corporate structure, Health and Safety, Customer Service, blah blah blah… I didn’t even have to stay for benefits and didn’t get out until 1:00. Then I headed over to Rehab, where I will be working and started shadowing and training right away. I also got my badge, which made me an official employee. Yay! The rest of the day was lots of training and learning how to navigate their computerized documentation system. Overall, my first day was just awkward. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do and they weren’t exactly sure what to do with me either. At the end of the day, I was more than ready to go home and was simply exhausted.

Today was far more interesting. I also got to arrive a bit later in the morning – 9:00 am. I also met up with someone who I was going to shadow for the morning, whom I had already worked with at Children’s Hospital LA. That was cool! I also met one of my cousin’s PT classmates who works there. We were both very excited to meet each other. I’m starting to get the hang of things and slowly settling in. I’m just a little bummed that they didn’t really have a place for me to set my things down just yet. I’m going to be using a workstation that is currently being used by the guy who I have been training under for the past two days. He practically lives there so there’s clothes, food, and papers everywhere. It sounds like he’s going back home to Canada for a few weeks and then it’s unknown whether he will be returning or not. Does that mean I will get to take his desk when he’s gone and then give it back if he returns? I have no idea and it’s a little annoying.

I assisted on a couple of evaluations and treatment sessions today and the kids are so cute and a lot of fun to work with. It’s so different working with kids who can talk and interact with you. I’m used to kids with Autism, who often avoid eye contact and aren’t able to really have a relationship with you. I was also unsure of what to expect from these kiddos but very quickly realized that I actually know what I’m supposed to do and it was all coming back to me.

So, tomorrow I will have my first patient. It’s weird calling them patients since I’ve been calling them students or kids all this time. I think I’m going to start bringing in my books and belongings to help me get a handle on things. Perhaps that will also force my desk-partner to start cleaning up his space. 🙂

Today was a marathon moving day at work. Yesterday we packed the remaining items in our clinic in preparation from the moving guys today. At 7 am, I arrived at work and found five big guys from Custodial Services with two trucks ready to help me move. They managed to move every last piece of furniture, equipment, and paper into our new space within a matter of two hours. We spent the remainder of the day unpacking, arranging, and cleaning to have a brand new OT clinic ready and waiting for my last day at IUSD.

Here’s the view from the front door. That’s our fine motor area in the foreground.

We now have TWO mat areas!!

We created a snazzy office space with a window.

I still can’t believe how large the new space is. It’s wide open and has sooo much storage!! It was so nice to have a place for everything with extra space for future supplies and therapists. We also have separate areas for swings and gross motor activities so that two therapists can easily treat simultaneously without getting in the way of each other. I’m so jealous of whoever takes my place this fall but so relieved that it’s done and ready for September.

This has been a pretty interesting week at work so far. The week started out a little crazy considering half of our furniture was already moved to our new portable. On Monday, I also had my last day working with Dave. I was looking forward to working with him next year but at least we got to hang out for a few days this month. Here are some photos I took during our last week in the old clinic. I’ll certainly miss our little portable.

This is my intern working helping two kids with an obstacle course.

Here are the PTs in action. We definitely need a larger space.

Today is Wednesday. That means I have two days left to finish up all my work. I’ve been staying at work later than usual each day this week printing, organizing, turning stuff in, and making sure that the work I’ve done in the past three years doesn’t fall apart as soon as I leave. On top of that, I still have one or two more reports to write, three IEPs tomorrow, and my student’s final evaluation to complete. On top of THAT, I’ve gotta finish moving to the new portable. The custodians are scheduled to finish moving our equipment and furniture tomorrow morning at 7am. Sheesh.This afternoon, I met with the Director of Special Ed and basically tied up loose ends. They’ve decided to keep me on as a consultant to help with the high profile cases and the transition in general. We haven’t found a replacement for me yet but it’s no longer something I can help with anymore. I’ve done my part to recruit everyone I know and now it’s up to them to find others out there.

This evening, I had dinner with some old co-workers and it was so great to catch up again. I love how we’ve managed to stay in touch after all these years. Elaine gave me a large mug from Starbucks that had a said “ORANGE COUNTY” on it so that I’d always remember her. That was very sweet.