My name is no longer Bridgid. It is not B’OB, nor Notorious B’OB, nor Bob, nor Bridgidobrien, nor just plain B. My new name is Faah-siigh.
As I expected, Thais are not very good at saying ‘Bridgid’. Due to their completely different alphabet, the ‘br’ as well as the ‘dg’ sound is very hard to say. Instead of being called ‘Bleest-cheed’ all year, my Garden community members and I decided I needed a Thai nickname that was easier to say. It was then that Sr. Pranee, one of the Good Shepherd Sisters here in Nong Khai, named me ‘Faah-siigh’, which means ‘bright sky’. I don’t exactly know how, but the next morning suddenly everyone, including the patients I work with and my co-workers, knew my new name was Faah-siigh. So for the next eleven months, I will be Faah-siigh. My reaction time for turning around upon hearing ‘Faah-siigh’ is not great at the moment, but I’ll get it.
This past week was my first week of work at the Care Center and also the first time I learned exactly what it is I will be doing this year. My official title is ‘Patient Care Worker’. I will be working Monday through Friday (and the occasional Saturday) usually from 8:30 a.m. – 4:15 p.m.
My everyday routine looks a little like this:
8:30 a.m. – 9:00 a.m.:
Patient rounds – visit each patient room to greet and chat; check comfort and bedside amenities (water, trash) of all bed-ridden patients.
Catch up with night staff to learn about any problems with the patients during the night and learn of any hospital appointments for patients for that day (I will be doing hospital accompaniments when my Thai is more concrete)
9:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m.:
Guided meditation with the patients (Led in Thai - I just listen right now and hope that I open my eyes when I am supposed to)
Help with any morning activities (Monday- food and nutrition; Tuesday – art therapy; Wednesday – usually a game; Thursday – music therapy)
10:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.:
Return to rooms to fill water jugs/ clean trolley table/ tidy locker/ check bathroom supplies/ empty waste bin on trolley table
Sort medicine for each patient’s day with Crisdad (surprisingly my favorite part of the day – it’s extremely relaxing)
Shadow Bon (one of the nursing staff members) and assist with changing pampers and dressing any wounds if needed.
11:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.:
Assist two of the assisted living patients with tidying and cleaning their home. Time is used as a lesson on activities of daily living to teach about how to properly clean, do laundry, fold blankets, do dishes, etc.
11:30 a.m. -12:20 p.m.:
Help Bon cook lunch, if needed.
Serve lunch to patients.
Spoon-feed lunch (usually a rice or soup) to paralyzed, bed-ridden patient.
12:20 p.m. – 1:00p.m.
Staff lunch (lots and lots of rice and spices)
1:00 p.m. – 2:30 p.m. (for first month only):
Thai lessons with my community member Tamarah with one of the women that work at Hands of Hope and lives in the Garden of Friendship.
1:00 p.m. – 2:30 p .m. (second month on….):
Activities with the patients (on 1-1 or group basis, varies depending on day)
Working with new physical therapist, Gert, to learn each patient’s individual exercise plan.
2:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.:
Bed bath (plus brushing teeth, shampooing hair, changing diaper, dressing wound on back, and changing sheets) of paralyzed patient with Crisidad (registered nurse at center).
This is my normal day schedule of when I will be working at the Care Center, a nursing/ health facility for patients with HIV/ AIDs and many with TB as a result of the disease. The patients at the Care Center are primarily able-bodied so they are not sick enough to go to the hospital but need extra medical attention or do not have anyone to look after them in the villages where they are from. However, at the moment there are three bed-ridden patients who were not receiving appropriate attention at the hospital and have been moved to the Care Center.
I will also be doing two over-night duties a month starting next month in which I will sleep at the Care Center. On those days I will work from 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. then return at 4:15 p.m. , spend night at Care Center to attend to any patients needs during the night and move any bed-ridden patients whose positions need to be moved through the night, start at 6:00 a.m. and then work until 4:15 p.m. Those are definitely going to be long days.
When written out, it looks like I do a lot of things at the Care Center, but one of the things I had a really hard time with this week was feeling like a had a lot of free time to myself. I have been so used to going-going-going in working situations, especially with my work last year. This year I don’t have to keep my elbows up at all times and I certainly don’t have to worry about if today is the day I am going to get punched in the face. This past week, especially during the hours of 10 a.m. to 12:00 p.m., there were many times where I was not needed or there was just nothing to do and my staff team and I would drink coffee and eat kanom (snacks) in the kitchen or I would sit outside on a picnic table studying Thai until someone needed me for something. The Thai work environment is very different from that of the United States and I have to get used to that and becoming okay with just being still sometimes. This is probably that last time ever that my co-worker will tell me to take my time drinking my coffee and then hand me a sweet cracker. I need to cherish it.
As well as working in the Care Center, I will also be doing Village Outreach on Mondays. I am not exactly sure what I am going to be doing because I will be starting next Monday, but I know that I am assigned to a team that focuses primarily on children and families of the impoverished villages in the Nong Khai province who are infected or affected by HIV/ AIDs. My understanding is that I will be going with two other staff members to the homes of various families on our caseload to assess current living conditions and any known medical concerns, to check upkeep of daily medicine regiment, to weigh the children and collect other body measurements to make sure they are growing properly, and to do some rudimentary medical attention like dressing wounds and taking blood pressure. My team also supplies the families with milk for their homes.
On Tuesday afternoons, I will be working in the Outreach office with another staff member to help type various documents and case notes from the Village Outreach program into English.
And to close out my week, I will be spending my Friday afternoons at Hands of Hope, another Good Shepherd Sisters program that is an income-generating paper craft project produced by individuals living with HIV/AIDs. I really like my time spent at Hands of Hope because I get a lot of joy out of being creative and especially being creative with my hands. Being at Hands of Hope is a much different atmosphere than being at the Care Center but I really enjoy the change of scenery. It is very relaxing working with the men and women there and they are all so talented at the things they produce. I love being an extra set of hands for the producers but I am often very scared I am going to completely mess up the crafts they have just spent hours working on. Therefore, I like to stick to tasks I know I can’t completely mess up on, like packaging the crafts into sleeves or gluing producer bios on to the back of cards. I’ll leave the actual crafts to the professionals right now. Especially those quilling ladies – they’re intimidating.
I definitely have my work cut out for me here, but everything about the environment in Thailand is relaxed and stress-free, and I have felt that even in the two weeks I have been here. After work, my evenings consist of playing with the children that live in the Garden, reading, cooking dinner, reading and journaling some more, and going to sleep.
I do not have Internet in my home and instead I must go to Hands of Hope, which is about a 5-minute bike ride away, to use the Internet. I truly forgot how much more peaceful life was before the Internet. This year I have decided that in order to be most present to my experience and the people I am serving here in Thailand, I will only use the Internet once a week (usually my Sunday mornings, U.S. Saturday nights) to Skype, post pictures, blog, and check my emails. I have also dedicated one more day in the middle of the week to check emails and any Facebook messages. Because the more connected I am at home, the less I am connected here, so I have decided not to scroll down my Facebook Newsfeed at all this year (both to prevent FOMO and to keep myself here in Thailand).
Therefore, if anything big happens in any of your lives that you think I should know about that would be something you would post to Facebook, please let me know because I will not see it on Facebook. Please and Thank you.
Keep sending your love and prayers.
Missing your beautiful faces,
Faa-Siigh
