Jun. 27, 2009 - Show & Tell Friday - sign language at work
Well, I admit it -- I'm a little late with my Friday post, but the computer wouldn't cooperate with me last night, so I gave up until this morning.
I had a really neat experience at work yesterday. One of the volunteers brought a lady to the admissions department. She explained that the lady was deaf. I immediately began to use the little bit of sign language skills I have to communicate with the patient. It went really well. Though not required, I signed to her that I would go with her to the department she needed to visit after checking in with us. When we arrived at the next department, I explained to them that our patient is deaf and asked them if they needed me to interpret any basic info to her. They did, so I did my best to communicate it to her, and thankfully, she understood. A short while later, when the patient was finished at that department, rather than just leaving the hospital, she stopped by my department again to sign "thank you" to me. I could tell that she really appreciated having someone who was willing to try to "speak" her language. It blessed me to be able to help her, and it encouraged me to try to hone up on my ASL skills. The only problem is -- I don't know when I'll have time. 
I have the weekend off, but I work six out of seven this next week. With the health issues, trying to manage the home, homeschool, and work nearly-full-time hours, when I have a day off, I feel absolutely wiped out. I need to figure out a way to delegate more around here so that I can have some time to rest, as well as refresh my spirit. I am VERY weary today. It would only take a minor infraction to get me to start crying because I'm so tired. And that is even with sleeping in until almost 8:45. 
One of the gals in the department told me that the error report came back for last month on our department's work. ALL of us ranked in the 90s, which she said is an EXCELLENT job for those of us who are new. The job is so detailed that it is often hard for newer employees to reach those numbers right off the bat. I praise the Lord for helping me to catch on so quickly. There were sure days when I thought, "Will I ever understand the processes for registering a patient?" 
Last night we had an extended family get-together. Some out-of-state cousins were in town, so we all got together for pizza. The kids got to swim in an indoor pool. It was really fun to watch my cousin's baby enjoy her time in the pool. Her older brother was so good with her. It was a joy to watch the two of them, especially when they would smile. The smiles were identical. 
We got to watch my uncle's twin granddaughters enjoy playing with my dd. You can tell they adore my dd. One of the twins was showing off her newly-learned swimming skills. It was quite impressive, and safe too, since another cousin is a life guard and would stay right next to her while she swam in the deep end of the pool. It was a very enjoyable evening.
I'm off to plan our lessons for next week so that I can have that out of the way for the weekend. I also need to catch up on a couple of loads of laundry. Once dd returns home from a church function, we will brave the extreme heat and humidity to run to Walmart and pick up some much-needed items there.
