First Frost- veggies

         Since it was the first frost of the season I had to dig up all of my garden and get ready for ...winter. (boo, not a huge fan of the season).  There were 2 days of solid frost, before it warmed back up to 60s, 70s, and today 80. 
          I don't know much about gardening, but with raised beds in my backyard I decided to expand my occupations/hobbies and plant some veggies.  This year I tried out tomatoes, potatoes, asparagus (which apparently takes ~6 years to take a good hold), jalapenos, lettuce, and perennial strawberries. 
        The tomatoes are pretty easy to get going, jalapenos always come up less than optimal for me (but I had a couple grow in as opposed to years past), potatoes tasted alright so that was somewhat successful, the lettuce sprouted like a plant (with flowers/seeds) before I could pick it to eat, and the strawberries were a little small.  I was mildly impressed to actually get potatoes and carrots out of my garden this year since it was my first year trying, and my asparagus actually took hold.
        Now that you are probably thoroughly bored, I am writing about this because of the cold weather that is coming and because it is pretty amazing to see things actually growing from planting things. I didn't water regularly, I didn't spread the seeds out as prescribed, and my soil is probably less than optimal, but I still got some veggies. So as you see to the left are my yield of carrots and potatoes.  I peeled both bowls full and will make a meal/soup with them.  I also picked around 2 pounds of green tomatoes- which are not pictured here (and I am not sure what to do with them- fry them?), but I had to pick them due to the frost.

Anyways, this school week is a slower week before we pick back up with more quizzes, finalizing capstone projects, and pumping through more tests and assignments.  Last week was a little rough, with quizzes, practical and assignments.  I have to keep reminding myself that the end is in sight andit will come faster than I know it.

OT thoughts:  Gardening is hard.  Maybe balancing everything as well as gardening is hard.  I did not water regularly, did not evenly space, and did not weed the garden properly and so I probably got low yields of veggies. I have talked to some people that say gardening and yard work is how they 'burn off energy' or that is their 'hobby'.  I am not sure that I would go as far as saying it is my 'hobby', but it is something I do that is not necessary to do, but I still choose to participate in it.   So kudos to you that garden regularly and are good at it (or at least better than you used to be.  Any thoughts on how to help me with gardening- tips etc...simple or complex please note them below (I need the guidance, believe me.) Thanks for reading.

The little things

THIS WEEK- Well hello followers in the blogosphere.  I have been busy this week with a musculo lab practical on Monday (Carpal Tunnel patient), an orthotics/splinting assignment due today, a capstone meeting tomorrow, a quiz today, and then 2 more quizzes tomorrow. I have worked 4 hours and will be working 14 by the week's end.  The sad part is that is how this semester has been going.  My stress levels have been high, my tiredness has been high, and the fact of being wore out from class is also running high.  However, get me to January 9 and I will be to the next step of this program- Level II fieldwork.

NEW INSIGHTS- As I was thinking about what to blog about, I realized that my life isn't all that interesting.  Sure I can offer insights into being a nontraditional student in a Master's of Occupational Therapy program at RU, or about being newly married and balancing grad school, but overall I feel as though there are more insightful people, smarter, more creative, than myself. This is not a discredit to me, but a credit to those creative, genius minds that are at work 24/7. With that being said, it made me think today about focusing on the little things.  My life is very busy and my focus is very much in this program and getting through it, while doing the best I can to balance all areas of my life.  My hope for this blog is to begin blogging more frequently and that you, the reader will gain some insights into my life, as well as think about your own.

STOP AND SMELL THE ROSES...They say to stop and smell the flowers, which means that we all need to stop in our busy days and have a look at life and see the little things that we pass up on by not slowing down more often and see these GOOD things in our life.  This program at times makes it hard to do that, but it is a goal and there is a reason it is called a Master's degree.

DAILY MOMENT- So my moment today was- COFFEE.  I have had a cup of homemade Starbucks the past couple of days and drank it on my drive into class, with the brisk air of fall coming in quickly I enjoyed the moment of having a cup this morning.  I thought about the good things in life, and today's good thing was the gift of coffee.  I thought about the hard work that goes into harvesting it, the warmth it provides on a cold day, and the caffeine that helps me get through the day's work.  So today, if you have/had coffee- enjoy the moment.  I thank God for the good in my life and for letting me take a moment to enjoy one of the many gifts I have in life. 

OTS thoughts: long week, I survived- bring on the quizzes and next week.

thanks for reading.

-John

Making some splints: lab

Quick quiz- What is one major skill that sets OT's apart from other disciplines?    ...SPLINTING

Over the past few weeks we have been getting into more peripheral nerve injuries (ie Carpal Tunnel, Cubital Tunnel) as well as other hand injuries (ie DeQuervain's Tensosynovitis, Dupuytren's Contracture). Our first test was this week, and I will let you know how the practical goes (as it is after break).  These pics were taken in lab the other day.  My partner and myself fit these splints using some pre-fabricated splinting material that was heated in a simmering pan.  They are some of our first attempts at a wrist cock up splint.  We learned about how well the material molds, how to roll some of the edges so that it does not cause skin breakdown or irritation, and we made sure that it fit the right dimensions of our arm.  We also made a resting hand splint, which looks like the picture below.  We have been learning about the protocols behind making splints like what injuries to wear them for, the wear schedule, and what type of anatomical position the splint should be made in. These splints are not finished with the velcro straps to make sure that keep the splint in place.

The wrist cock up splint helps keep pressure off the Median Nerve, who is the main culprit in Carpal Tunnel Syndrome.  The splint helps keep the wrist from bending backwards (extension) or forward (flexion) too much.  This gives the wrist a nice neutral position to rest the 'Carpal Tunnel' which is comprised of nine tendons and the Median Nerve- kind of a tight squeeze already.  You hear of this injury in occupations that do a lot of typing, writing with bad hand position, chefs, doctors, housewives, musicians, cyclists etc. Anything to put a continuous stress on the tunnel squeezing the median nerve and tendons that run through the tunnel. 

OTS thoughts: The musculo class and lab has reinvigorated my love for occupational therapy.  We have learned about splinting and an overview of modalities that we will encounter in the clinic.  I enjoy building and making things, and it will be even more rewarding to know that it will have a functional purpose that will help someone get back to living their life. Hand therapy is a long road to get certified and is hard to get into, but as I focus more on my area of practice I hope to still be making splints in some area. 

fantasy football anyone?

FANTASY FOOTBALL (FF for this blog)

As I mentioned in last week's edition of the blog, football tends to consumer my fall semester and tends to make it hard for me to balance class and doing any homework on Sundays, Mondays and Thursday nights.  I have been doing FF with my in-laws for the past 3 seasons (and now this season).  I was the league champ last year, pretty much by luck and a certain DeSean Jackson returning a punt return against the Giants to seal the deal for me to win.

WHAT IS FF?
If you have never played fantasy football (FF), it brings in a new element to just having a favorite NFL team.  The gist of it, is that you 'draft' players at the beginning of the season, you are allowed to play a QB, Running backs, wide receivers, a tight end, a kicker, and special teams/defense and they each score points based on how well or not so well they play (my starting line up from last week is posted- left).

 Each league can set different rules for how to score points and how many players each team can have.  The nice part about FF is that it makes you tune in to many of the NFL teams across the league and the individual performances of selected players that add points based on the productivity for the day.  Even if my Bears go 0-16, I could still win the league in FF by drafting the best team and having FF team play well. 

 

LEISURE ACTIVITY

                 The Occupational Therapy Practice Framework (OTPF) defines leisure as "a                 

                 nonobligatory activity that is intrinsically motivated and engaged in during discretionary

                 time, that is, time not committed to obligatory occupations such as work, self-care, or 

                 sleep." 

 

Watching football and playing FF is an occupation that I enjoy because it is part of what OT's call 'leisure activities' (or a hobby).  When I used to watch football it was a good social event but we did not get into the logistics of who is doing what on the team as long as your favorite team won.  Now with the added dimension of being able to compete with other people and having to think of each individual match-up, there is more to think about in 'competing' week in and week out.  It is my 'break' from school work and the much needed element of competition in my life.

SO JOHN, WHAT'S YOUR POINT?... (OTS Thoughts)

My point is... I love fantasy football and my brain tends to look at every activity how an OT might view the activity.  An OT takes every situation and thinks of how it can be adapted, made relative, and be functional for our clients to keep them engaged in daily activities.  I think that FF is such a great idea for competition that puts people with all different abilities on the same playing field.  FF adds a level of competition as it has been doing for several years now and could be a functional yet fun activity to possibly work into therapy one day down the road.  

There is many executive functions (ie planning, working memory, attention, problem solving, verbal reasoning, inhibition, mental flexibility, multi-tasking, initiation and monitoring of actions) as well as social factors (sportsmanship, competition, dealing with stressful situations) at work here .  As an OT we must think of 'functional activities' to elicit the therapy that patients are in need of and helps meet our goals.  FF might not be that therapy for everyone, but I feel that it is thinking in the right direction to meet the client in the goal planning. As of now, it is just my leisure activity.

Good luck this season (if you have a team), and make sure to not let FF or football overrun the focus on the semester. Thanks again for reading.