I went to a writer’s conference over the weekend. The morning after, I usually wake up filled with ideas about what to do with many unfinished writing projects. Not today. I woke up this morning feeling embarrassed. Why? It took a second to remember. I’d dropped my phone Saturday. More correctly, I’d let it slide …
Continue reading Growing Older: Getting Use to Embarrassment
“Everything is different now,” a friend said last week. At 80, she questioned why she’d had a $400 increase in her car insurance. She wondered if it was worth it yet to invest in granite counter-tops for her kitchen. And she reminded me to be thankful for my husband, that her evenings are still the …
As I look back over my 40-year nursing career, I sometimes wish I were still in the classroom so I could tell my students a few things I’ve come to believe are important on the road to becoming leaders. I say leaders, because we need leaders at this time of transition in our health care …
Continue reading Passing Along Advice to My Younger Nursing Colleagues
According to the American Nurses Association, the US needs 1.1 million registered nurses over the next eight years. If you are, or know anyone who is, interested in nursing, but don't feel you know enough about it to make a career choice or switch, the interviews of nurses conducted by The American Nurse Project are …
Continue reading Nurses Week, May 6-12, 2015 -The American Nurse Project: Interviews
In four days, I only forgot to go potty once, wear my coat once, and fasten my seat belt twice. That’s a great record for this seventy-three year-old Grandma who, along with an older yet Grandpa, just completed our annual four-day babysitting stint with our youngest grandchildren, ages five and four. But, because I could …
Dear Readers, Last Saturday, WordPress informed me that I started this blog five years ago. After resisting for a few years while writing my nursing career memoir, Caring Lessons, and being told by writing teachers that I must start a blog, I stopped Helen Gallagher (teacher and blogger extraordinaire) after she gave a presentation at …
On a flight recently, I spent some time reading blogging friends who have fibromyalgia. Having FM myself, I always marvel at the resilience with which these gals, with chronic muscle pain and oftentimes foggy brains, valiantly face each challenge. Also, on my flight, I read a piece that said we should be thankful for our …
Proverbs 18:26 Friends come and friends go, but a true friend sticks by you like family. Readers of Caring Lessons know I was desperate to find a friend when I was in my early thirties, someone like me, a nurse and mom who wanted to go back to school. That friend turned out to be …
One of our brothers-in-law passed away suddenly last week, and, just like that, many lives stopped to mourn, and we found ourselves traveling across Wisconsin to attend his funeral. We were comforted by the muted colors and tranquility of the changing leaves, splashing across the forested backdrops of fields at this time of harvest. As …
Before you answer yes or no, did you know that the foundational moral principle of all developed countries (around 40 out of world’s 200 countries) is to provide health care coverage to all of their citizens, irrespective of age and financial status? All developed countries, that is, except us. In the past few years, I’ve …
Continue reading U.S. Health Care: Are you happy with your plan?
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