144

It was fascinating to google that number. For example:

144: the 12th fibonaci number

144: the number of years that Nevada has been a state

144: also termed as “gross” which is dozens of dozens

144: the approximate number of contact ours I had for October. You might ask what this means.

At work there is a particular number of contact hours we are expected to have to show that we are being productive, serving clients, and not just sitting in our offices staring at the walls and picking our noses. Contact hours are made up of individual sessions, group sessions, intakes, case management (phone calls, probation reports, generally any time a client is spoken to by us), and preparation of court reports (drug court reports for me). The general number they want us to hit or at least be near is 100.

Since I started at THS I have never taken the initiative to run this report for my hours. Today with the help of a valued coworker they were ran (allegedly they are run monthly by supervisors). 144. This number would be even higher if I hadn’t missed a few of days this month (in my defense two of those days I was absent were the ones spent wasting away in Kent in a jury waiting room). It would also be even higher if I was perfect about documenting every single little interaction I have with clients; I’m pretty good at doing this, but obviously not perfect.

Good sweet heaven above, I am overworked. Officially.

After that number was added up today I recalled a recent issue that came up regarding the transfer of clients. One of the clients I had chosen to transfer was deemed to have case management needs that were ‘too high’ by a coworker. Really? You’re going to talk to me about case management needs that are ‘too high’ when I have over 60 hours total spent case managing? I don’t think so.

It all became crystal clear today after seeing that number on the calculator as to why I end up a few times a month screaming in my head “I can’t handle it”. If it was just work it wouldn’t culminate that way periodically; but I’ve added school and a second job on top of it. Not to mention trying to have a personal life jammed somewhere in there too. I’ve done this to myself, I know.

The other day my Kait sent me a text message that essentially said ‘I’m so proud of you that you have all these things going on and that you’re doing them, that you’re not quitting any of it’. I know, she’s sweet and thoughtful, it’s why she’s one of my best friends. It was nice to hear it because I often think of just giving up on things because it gets hard. It was also nice to hear it because it helped me realize that I need to spend more energy and foresight on actually taking care of myself because failing to do so will result in me giving up.

So, I’ve started actually thinking about making sure I eat during the day rather than hurrying off in the morning totally negligent of any of that. I’ve started trying to go to sleep earlier in general because when I’m tired I perform poorly at work and I’m just not as good as I know I am. I am not afraid to say that I am awesome at my job, but I know that if I am piling on all this other stuff in my life and failing to adequately care for myself I will end up quitting, and it will all be a result of my lack of foresight.

144. I am ever so fascinated to see what it will be this month.

That’s completely it…

I’ve had it.

I’m fed up with feeling overwhelmed; I’ve grown miserably tired of feeling as if there are five thousand plates in the air that I can’t quite keep hold of; I can’t handle feeling so stressed out all the time. I think this is part of what this past Sunday helped me to realize. When I was at the women’s gathering this past weekend I realized that I couldn’t remember a time before that when I felt calm, peaceful, relaxed.

I can’t take it anymore. I can’t even answer text messages when I get them because it’s just too much. How pathetic is that? At work, there are various huge piles of paperwork on my desk and when I try to focus in order to sit down and take care of it all I get overwhelmed and weird and end up not being able to do a single thing. The fact that work is so busy at this time wouldn’t be so bad if when I got home it was calm and peaceful. But because there are a thousand things I have to do at home too, it’s not so peaceful.

For instance; I get overwhelmed when it’s time to walk the dogs. Ridiculous. I do not want the walking of my dogs to be the bain of my existence because, well, I love them.

When I come home and look at the various piles of personal/apt managing paperwork I have here, the same thing happens here that happens at work. I get so overwhelmed that I just can’t do anything. And then I end up where I’m at now…too much stuff to do…all at once.

For the next few weeks I am cancelling plans that are purely social. People may get upset, or annoyed and I realize that. But I just can’t do this any longer. It’s gotten progressively worse over the last few months, the whole trying to have two jobs, going to school, seeing my family, and seeing friends. It’s all piled up and now I have to sort it all out, and designate where I fit in again.

If I fail to do this I anticipate that I will probably get to the point where I get so fed up that I walk out on my job (NOT a desirable outcome in many ways), quit managing the apartments, and slowly become homeless. Not to mention giving up on school, which I refuse to do at this point. I’m too close to being done with at least this level.  

I do not wish to go crazy, and that’s why I have to slow down for a bit.

It was a good day

And I didn’t actually expect it to be considering what day it was. It was Jen’s day.

• I chatted with my mom for a few spells today and it was nice, just to chat about this and that. I got to hear about something that made her really happy, and really smile, and that made me feel peaceful and happy too. There really are some men out there that are wonderful (okay, I knew that already).
• I learned that I received an A on both of the assignments that I did last week. Week four, it was, of my online class (bold and italic because it is a serious struggle to me each week that I make it through in college cyber world right now).  Out of six prior assignments I had only received one A. Really, it’s as if I have two classes in one. I received the following comments on said assignments (I’m “getting the hang of it” after four weeks…great):

Great job with the paper!  You writing style, APA formatting, and depth of content was quite good.  I look forward to more like this one!

Good job!  I think you are getting the hang of this.  Half of making a good grade in this class is knowing what is expected of you and being able to provide that in an educated manner—you are getting that part down nicely! You are meeting the learning objectives for the course.  Overall, very well done!

• I remembered my Jen on my own, and I think that was what I needed to do. There was a memorial for her this evening and circumstances were such that it didn’t work out for me to go. I’ve been sick and couldn’t really leave work early because there are things that must be done regardless of what I have going on personally so I didn’t get out of there until almost 6 tonight. Multiply that by my recent lethargy from dodging significantly worse symptoms than I could have ended up with had I not stayed home for a bit, and it equals not being able to sit there and cry for hours with others. I will admit that a few times today when I thought about what day it was and then thought about the fact that I didn’t even know what happened until the next day, I teared up and got upset. Thankfully I had weeks before blocked today out for paperwork/catching up not even thinking about what actual date it was so I was free to be teary all on my own at work. I think you never stop missing people and I think that they get carried with us; it’s something that doesn’t go away. Selfishly I wish that it hadn’t been time yet for me to learn that lesson with a close friend lost; I’ve learned it with family (granted, not immediate family), but obviously if it had been up to me it wouldn’t have been time yet to learn it about someone like her.
• People close to me thought of me today because they knew what day it was. I am so fortunate and sometimes I’m not quite sure how I became so when it comes to the people in my life. I started seeing my therapist a year ago when I was struggling with how to deal with losing Jen; I remember her asking me very directly whether I was having any thoughts at all of doing the same thing (because some people after losing someone close by suicide have thoughts of doing the same thing). I’m glad she asked because it forced me to think about it. I wasn’t having any thoughts like that but when I had to think about it I realized on an even deeper level my gratitude that the feelings of love and pleasure that I got out of life outweighed any sadness or pain to the point where I would continue to choose life; to where I couldn’t imagine not choosing it because what I would miss out on are the fabulous people that are in my life.
• Today just made me grateful for pretty much everything; and it was the seemingly small things about today that did it.

Numbers

21: The number of pages my math homework ended up being when I was done with it. Seriously…I don’t joke about math.

84: The approximate number of times I ended up erasing something while doing my math homework over the past week (this is not too bad considering there were over 100 problems due).

1: The number of times today that I ran into someone that I went to high school with, didn’t know what to say, and well…felt awkward. Also the number of times Lucy peed on my floor (which is disappointing because she’s been doing so well).

500: The approximate number of stairs I climbed throughout the day at work while chasing down information for my stupid weekly court reports (because every time something is printed/faxed I have to go upstairs)…it’s all the fault of a f-ing fax machine that no one felt like fixing for a few days. It will be like this for a couple of more weeks too (2).

3: The number of times I had to move my car today because my work does not provide parking for anyone lower than a supervisor or medical staff. Also, oddly enough, the number of times I honked at morons while driving around today.

10: The number of times I cursed the heat today (mainly because I made the poor choice of wearing pants).

2: The number of biology tests I’ve had to take this week and do poorly on because I was behind a week (normally it would have only been one). Also the number of showers I will have taken by the time I go to sleep.

0: The number of times I’ve thought about being officially single again (well, until now I suppose), because I didn’t want to think about it and spent the day counting everything else.

Yes, I wait until the last possible millisecond

But it works for me. One major school thing for this session down…two to go.

I got an 84% on my anatomy final which thankfully, is 40% of my grade. 84% is actually a stellar grade in science for me. Here is the breakdown of that experience today:

• 30% of my answers were obtained through a google search…sad isn’t it (because 611 pages of the human body was just way too much to fully absorb in seven weeks). The other 70% were obtained by first consulting the index and then searching for the most appropriate answer.
• At least 30 different times I could have been heard yelling “WHY?” in my apt.
• It took me 195 minutes to complete it (I know this because they time it…I had five hours to finish it).
• I hate anatomy.