I am a slacker.  I know I haven’t dropped a few lines since Thanksgiving.  So to catch you up, December has been slow.  We did get some snow a few weeks ago and I took the liberty of catching a few snowflakes on my tongue.  It was exciting and festive for a brief period of time.  We really have been trying to make the most of spending Christmas in a combat zone.  We have a beautiful six foot tree with all of the trimmings and stockings hung and Christmas movies/music each day.

I might not get to fight the crowd at the mall, but I do get to fight the slow as snails internet as I browse my favorite online stores selecting gifts for the babies.  We’ve had numerous packages abundant in peanut butter fudge, molasses cookies, caramel corn, white chocolate dipped pretzels, rocky road, peanut butter cookies, banana bread, pumpkin bread, and so many more goodies to count.  I’ve certainly had my fair share of coffee and tea and cookies.  So all in all we’re keeping our scrooge factor at bay.

 Two days ago we got the first group of replacements in.  It was exciting knowing we’ve begun the first step of our redeployment process.  A few of our new ER technicians will start work tomorrow so I’m sure the next week will whizz by with training and orienting them to the ER.  There are several more groups projected to arrive between now and sometime after Christmas.  The infiltration has begun!  We’ll soon be vacating out of our rooms and be moving into a transitional tent and our work space at the ER will become crowded with twice the people waiting for patients to treat.  The laundry room will be harder and harder to find open washers, there will be lines to the showers and dining facilities, and the BX will be a mad house with the new arrivals purchasing sundries that they forget to bring with them.  Give us the strength to be patient with each other and make it through this crazy time as the light at the end of the tunnel is getting so bright I’m going to need to find myself a pair of sunglasses.  We’ve coming home!

 May your Christmas and New Years be filled the peace and love of the season and y’all enjoy some well deserved down time with your families.

Dandy wants you to have a mug of egg nog for her Aaron

 I hope this finds you all fat and happy and enjoying your extended weekend.  And for all of you brave souls venturing out on Black Friday, have a free donut hole and cup of coffee for me!  Lord knows my pocket book will thank me for missing out on Friday’s sales and JW thanks me for not getting him up at the butt crack of dawn!

 My out processing briefing is this Sunday!  Finally a light at the end of my sandbox tunnel.  As my time winds down here, I’m super excited to get back home to JW and the babies and make the transition into our new chapter in Idaho.  I look forward to seeing most of you early next year for some great food and visiting. 

 I really don’t have a lot to say right now except I’m honored to be spending Thanksgiving with my brothers and sisters of the Armed Services and to be serving with them.  It’s been such a humbling experience interacting with such an outstanding slice of humanity pie. 

 Happy Thanksgiving!

 Love Always,

Dandy 7.2 miles to go Aaron

 So here’s the scoop.  I’ve been up for 23 hours with 4 more to go and I’m on the verge of slumber so instead of playing “head bob” in my boss’s office, I’m going to write you fine folks.  I start day shift tomorrow.  One of my co-workers had to head back early due to child care issues so we had to shift people around to fill in the gaps.  You would think with two cups of coffee, chocolate pudding, grape tootsie pop and watching “Sea Biscuit” in addition to listening to the Cheetah Girls’ song “Cheetah-Licious Christmas” from my IPOD I would be set, but I’m not.  If I were to lay my head down on the desk, I would be out in seconds flat.  So let’s get on with it!

I told you what I like here and that was very positive of me wasn’t it?  But now it’s my turn to wine a bit.  I don’t like packing all of my toiletries all the way down the hall to the shower room.  I’m clumsy and I often drop shaving cream cans and hair brushes and then cuss under my breath.  You’re probably thinking “why don’t you just get a shower caddy?”  Yeah well, that would be too easy wouldn’t it?  I don’t like packing my weapon around everywhere.  I think it’s really just for show, but it’s not my decision to make so press on little airman.  I don’t like watching children roll through the doors of our trauma bay with injuries of war.  It’s not cool.  I especially don’t like being in the middle of a trauma and not being able to anticipate the medical supply needs of the physicians before they ask for it.  I just hate it when I’m in an IV starting rut.  It’s enough to give you a case of the “Montana Red Ass” when you miss three or four times in a row.  I’m so dag gone tired of walking in the dirt and on the rocks!  I don’t like the BX.  It’s so small and crowded all of the time.  You would think the merchandise was free with all of the people there.  I’m not particularly fond of the location nationals’ body odor.  I desperately want to give them a bar of soap and some pit stick. 

 I’m not looking forward to saying “so long” to all of my co-workers.  We’ve been through so much together and have grown as a team.  Experiences like this bond you for life.  Lastly, I hate it when U.S. service members come in severely injured with missing limbs and wounds because I know their lives will never be the same.  If you want to pray for them, pray for a speedy recovery, but also pray for them to develop the coping skills for dealing with their life altering changes.  I’m sure there are plenty more annoyances I could think of, but I am rest assured that you get my point.

 You may now return to the rat race!

 Dandy 44.4 miles to go Aaron

 Today’s topic is about what I like about being deployed here.  I’m quite sure twenty years from now my memory will be limited on it’s ability to recall fond memories of my Bagram deployment, so if I capture them in the literally world, I’ll always have them to reflect on.  Not to mention it will give y’all a brief five minute pause from your crazy rat race lives.

 I like being submerged into medicine every day.  The opportunities that I have had to grow clinically have been truly amazing.  I love working with the ER physicians, Trauma Surgeons, Orthopedic Surgeons, etc and the way they break down xrays, labs results, and injuries for me to understand without making me feel stupid.  Not all people are cut out to teach medicine, but these guys are top notch in my book.  They have the ability to take a mangled body and patch it up.  The thought of being responsible  for that is bind blowing to me, but they do it over and over again giving these patients another shot at life.   I’ve also got to perform/assist with various procedures from suturing to chest tube insertions and spinal taps that I wouldn’t normally get the opportunity otherwise.

 I absolutely love the job satisfaction here.  It’s through the roof!  It’s the most job satisfaction that I have encountered in my 14 years of service.  The U.S. service members that come through here from the battle field are so appreciative of our help.  Being touched by our American war fighters has been a humbling experience.  I live like a queen compared to some of them out there surviving on field rations and taking daily baby wipe baths.  My showers are hot and twice daily if I like.   Who could complain?

 I like being able to show up at the dining facility and have my limited choice of hot food.  I didn’t have to pay for it, shop for it, cook it, or clean up the dishes after I ate it.  Breakfast is my favorite meal here.  It’s an extravaganza of fresh fruit from watermelon, honey dew, cantaloupe, pineapple, grape fruit, kiwis, and grapes to omlets made to order, hot fruit cobblers/crisps, french toast sticks, pancakes, pastries, pop tarts, biscuits and gravy, bagels, and assorted cereals.  You’ll never leave hungry.

 I love the friendships I’ve made here. The Department of Defense is one of the only organizations in the world where they send people from all over the world to one location to perform a mission.  I’ve gotten to work with Army radiology technicians, Navy lab technicians, and of course my own Air Force medical counterparts.  I’ve gotten to experience diversity like no other from eating my Filipino co-workers cuisine to eating fresh bread from the local Afghan housekeeper to taking care of the Coalition Forces (Polish, Afghan National Army, etc).  I absolutely enjoyed learning the farm animal names in the local language from the housekeeper.  I would “oink” and he would teach me the name and then I would “whinny” and he would teach me another name.  It was international communication at it’s finest.

 Lastly, I’ve enjoyed having the luxury of time to go to the gym and submerge myself in fitness.  I’ve researched plenty of programs, methods, and exercises and applied the knowledge to the test.  It’s been great being my own guinea pig and watching the dividends pay out.  The human body is truly an amazing piece of machinery and I think we seldom allow it to accomplish the physical feats it’s capable of.

 I’m sure I could go on and on, but I won’t.  My time here at Bagram has been a memorable chapter in my book of life.  Thank you to all of you out there that have shown your support to not only me, but the rest of troops out here during this deployment through emails, pictures, and packages.  I appreciate knowing there is a reality waiting on me to return to.   

 Dandy thank goodness it’s finally November Aaron

 So what the heck is with the phrase “The time!  The time!  Who’s got the time?”.  It came from the Disney animated feature “Alice in Wonderland”.  It was the white rabbit who wanted to know the time.  Now, Dandy, crazy silly, can’t figure out how you connect the dots Dandy, what does this have to do with you?

 You’re about to find out.  I left home with a perfectly good functioning wrist watch and when I got to Norfolk, VA., the band broke as I was heaving heavy military issue bags out of the back of a bus.  So I cut my losses and carried the face in my pocket for weeks until I could buy another one.  I went to the BX where all they had were watches the size of Hulk Hogan’s wrist- not going to work on me. 

 Finally, a guy a work with had a big zip lock bag of watches for sell.  So I picked out a really nice “Folex” (you know fake Rolex that’s black market) for twenty smackers  and I loved my Folex.  It was silver and minimally pinched the hair on my arms.  It was a dish of a watch and I couldn’t be happier.  Then one day I went to take a shower and took my watch off to hang on the towel hook, but I got a case of the dropsies and dropped my precious watch.  In slow motion I watched it hit the tile floor and swiftly bent over to save it only to find my Folex had a shattered face.  It wasn’t even slightly cracked- it was shattered to the point that I couldn’t make out the time.  So I chucked in the trash!

 Then I had to go back to my stopwatch without the band, but I couldn’t remember where I left it.  I asked my sweet hubby to buy me another watch and he happily obliged me.  He purchased a watch and put it in the same package as my brand new laptop.  If you know my laptop story, then you know the package never arrived and vanished to the black hole with my watch.

 I finally found my broken watch and life was good for a while.  Then my $10, battery operated alarm clock that I just bought on my journey here stopped waking me up.  I woke up late- not late for work, but late for me about three times in one week.  Feeling a certain amount of anxiety because as you know I hate being late, I made a trip to the BX to buy some new batteries for the old alarm clock and a new alarm clock just in case.  I got my bag of treasures back to my room and set out on a “Wake me the heck up on time” mission when I put the new batteries in my old alarm clock and still the little alarm clock icon wouldn’t turn on.  I moved the switch back and forth with such fury and vigor thinking I could get the stinking thing to cooperate.  No luck!

 Now even more peeved, I tore my new alarm clock out of the package and realized the clock didn’t come with batteries!  I had bought AAA batteries for the old one and the new one required AA.  Imagine that!  At that very point, I had to take a deep breath and just sit there and fight the urge of breaking into hysterics.  Was this really happening to me?  Then I collected myself and realized I had bought AA batteries for my digital camera a couple weeks ago.  Now, where were those batteries?  I had just moved wall lockers and moved all of my stuff around.  I rifled through my drawers feverishly about at my wits end and with no luck as I couldn’t find them.  A few minutes later, I gathered myself and calmly search my drawers again and find the batteries.  I fumbled with the back of the alarm clock trying to pry the battery door open without breaking the cheap plastic.  By this time being rational was something I was finding extremely difficult to accomplish.  Finally I got the back off and with three of four tries, got the battery shoved into the slot, but couldn’t get the cover back on.  I said “to hell with the cover”!  I did a operation check on the new alarm clock and at 10:00 am, it went off as planned. 

 For good measure I set the old alarm clock, the new alarm clock, and my broken wrist watch.  At precisely 4:45 pm, brace yourself- all three alarm clocks went off!  Now who’s got the time?  By golly, I got the freakin’ time!

 Dandy 74.2 miles to go Aaron ]]> http://ladygreen.com/Dandy2/?feed=rss2&p=37 1 http://ladygreen.com/Dandy2/?p=35 http://ladygreen.com/Dandy2/?p=35#comments Thu, 08 Oct 2009 17:34:45 +0000 admin http://ladygreen.com/Dandy2/?p=35 Hey Gang,

 So I know it’s been a couple weeks since I last wrote.  I think I was off last Thursday.  Hopefully by now most of you have heard that JW and I got orders to Mountain Home AFB, Idaho!  We are super excited!  I’ve already done some research on Boise and it sounds like the perfect town.

Plenty of shopping and dining opportunities and the outdoor activity list is pretty much unlimited.  We are really looking forward to our new chapter.

 Now on to a typical day.  So what is my typical day?  I get up at 4:45pm and take a shower and then I head to the dining facility (DFAC) to get food to go to take back to work to eat.  But after I get my food, I have to stop by my room and pick up my backpack and walk to work.  I eat my dinner in the break room watching “The Brady Bunch” or sometimes “Days of Our Lives” or whatever else may be on.  Then I change out of my PT gear into my scrubs and start our checks.  We check our equipment to make sure it works, and the oxygen tank levels, and make sure the supplies are set out accordingly to accept up to six traumas at a moment’s notice.  Then we have shift change- basically a quick five minute report on what patients we have what we are expecting.  We have four medical patient beds and six trauma beds.  If I’m the shift leader I make assignments.  If I’m not, then I get an assignment.  So for example if I was given bed 7, I’d introduce myself to the patient and find out if they need anything done. (i.e.- labs, xrays, IV fluids, etc.)  I follow that patient until they are discharged and then I get the next patient that’s put into bed 7 and the process starts again.

Some nights I have a full room all night- others I may not even get a medical patient in my room.  Then we’re also assigned to a trauma bed.

We’re either on the primary trauma or secondary trauma.  If you’re on primary trauma, then we get all of the one patient traumas throughout the night.  If you’re on the secondary trauma you’ll get a patient if there is more than one patient coming in.  If we get more than two traumas then we get help from the other departments in the hospital.

Some nights we’re get up to 13 traumas total and other nights we’ll have no traumas.  Every day if different. 

 At 11pm we send a first group of people out to the DFAC to get food.

And then when that group gets back we send the second group.  If we have traumas between 11pm-1am we don’t get hot food.  We go to the DFAC and get cold sandwiches, fruit, etc once we slow down.  Then at about 5:30 am we stock our rooms and get ready to day shift to come in and start working at 6:30am.  Once I get off of work I go to my dorm room and drop off my weapon and backpack and head to the gym.  I spent anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours there depending on my schedule for the day.

After my workout, I go back to my room to get my weapon and back to the DFAC to get some food.  If my roommates are sleeping I eat at the DFAC, if not I take it back to my room.  Then after I’m done eating I take a shower and go to bed.  And then ground hog’s day starts again!

 Dandy 99.1 miles to go Aaron

 What the heck is “Molasses Express”?  It’s a phrase I heard today during a trauma involving a two year little boy who had fragments to his head from an improvised explosive device (IED).  It’s amazing when the little ones come through how the stress level triples among the surgeons, nurses, and techs.  My logic is that most of our patients raised they right hand and swore in to protect and defend our country or their own country, but the children did not.  They are often caught in the cross fire and are consequently injured.  One minute they are playing outside and the next thing they’re hit with fragments of an IED.  There is absolutely nothing common or normal about that, but yet it happens and they roll through our trauma bay doors on litters with tubes down their throats, bellies open, legs broken, or whatever else may happen to them.  We work feverishly and swiftly to get the child the best care possible because we know they still have an unfinished life to live. 

 So what did the trauma surgeon mean when he said “Molasses Express”?  He meant pick up the pace so we can get this baby to the CT scanner and to the operating room.  I asked the flight surgeon if seeing the four year old little girl with an infected right arm and fingers dangling by deadened tissue “does she make you miss your kids?”  He says “it makes feel lucky that they are safe at home with my wife”.  And then I think of Laney and Jake and wish I could hug their little bodies and plant a big, wet, smacker on their foreheads.

 Mommy misses you!

 Dandy 124.3 miles to go Aaron

A couple nights ago the Egyptian hospital on base brought in a Local National who had fallen from a date tree. This was at seven in the evening and the fall had occur ed at eight o’clock that morning. He was an older, thin, frail looking man probably in his sixties with a full salt and peppered beard and longer white hair.

He was in poor shape with broken ribs and air in his left lung (pneumo thorax). When we were working on him he started spitting dates out of his mouth and almost hit the ER doctor in the face and hit one of the ER techs in the arm. We rolled him on his side and one of the surgeon’s said “will someone do a blind finger sweep and clear his airway?” The ER doctor at the patient’s head said “no, don’t do that, he’s got sharp little pointy teeth.”

They ER doctor put a chest tube in him and we got him stabilized enough to bring him to the CT scanner. He was squirmy and I had to hold his left hand down from getting into the sterile field where they were doing the chest tube. It was just the funniest thing that he had all of this dates in his mouth and he started spitting them. I don’t think he was trying to be mean and intentionally spit on the doctor.

Anyways, I thought you’d enjoy that little story about the date muncher.

Dandy 147.3 miles to go- can you believe I’m half way to 300 miles Aaron

This week’s topic is about picking up the pieces after a comrade or loved one is injured or worse killed in action. Every patient we’ve seen come through the ER was part of a team of some sort. Much of the time the team was put together well before they arrived here. They trained together preparing for their year long tours and once they arrived here they forged a brotherhood that goes deeper than most. They ate, slept, played, trained, and fought together.

Now imagine your typical Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) mission where there is usually at least four to five soldiers assigned. If the MRAP is struck by an Improvised Explosive Device and one is killed and two are severely injured and the remaining two are mainly injured- that team just ended.

Think about the two that were left behind. One of their buddies is dead and the other two are fighting for their lives in the operating room and eventually headed back to the U.S. where they may face a much different life. Now they have to mesh with a new team and feel the void of their missing teammates, not to mention grieve the teammate that was killed. They may place blame or guilt on themselves for the situation and question if they could have done something different in the situation to change the outcome.

Then think about the two severely injured guys. One minute they’re riding along in the MRAP and the next minute they’re coming to in the recovery room at the FOB being told that they lost both of their legs. Then after they are stabilized they’re flown on a helicopter to the Bagram ER where they undergo more surgeries and then eventually flown out to Germany. Once they arrive in Germany they are evaluated again and then flown back to the states for more rehabilitative care. It must be a lonely journey. Many of them ask if they will be able to come back. They don’t want to leave their team. Just a week ago, they were bench pressing 250 pounds with their buddies talking about how many beers they were going to drink on their R and R and how much they were looking forward to seeing their wife and kids. Now, they’re sitting in a wheel chair going to physical therapy twice a day wondering what the heck they are going to do with their lives.

Sometimes they heal and find new ambitions in life to conquer. They get new prosthetic legs and set out on unimaginable feats. They run marathons, down hill ski, get educations, open their own business and never let the unplanned turn in the road get in their way. But other times, it’s just too much. They have too many demons to face and find unhealthy ways to cope. Many of them end up turning to alcohol, drugs, and violence in attempt to heal the psychological scars of war.

Lastly there is the family of the solider killed in action. It’s the phone call that no parent should ever have to hear, to find out that your child paid the ultimate price for our country’s freedom. Or to hear that your husband’s been killed in combat and now you have to raise four small children alone. What does she tell the kids and how does she face each day?

The next time you’re having a crappy day, I encourage you to reflect on the men and women of the Armed Services who gave their lives and pray for their comrades and loved ones left behind picking up the pieces.

Dandy 161.4 miles to go Aaron

Happy September to all of you. Fall is rapidly approaching and y’all are probably looking forward to rolling up your garden hoses and stowing them in the shed and mowing the lawns for the last time this season.

This week’s topic is the Clamshell gym. You’re probably wondering why the heck is it called the Clamshell. Well simply put, it’s a massive tent with exercise equipment it in. and it’s shaped like a clamshell. It has all of your standard exercise equipment; treadmills, bikes, eliptical, stretching mats, weight lifting machines, etc. It’s the place I spend two hours a day for six days a week. It’s like a bee hive with bees buzzing around from bench press to dumb bells to the bike making their contribution to the queen bee. One day I counted 37 men and 4 women there. Yes, women are quite the minority there.

We have the regulars, the drop ins, the staff, and the local national (LN) workers. I’m a regular along with three of my co-workers. There is one regular that is worth mentioning.

“Fe Fi Fo Fum” – A tall, heavier, bald, civilian who always wears colored sweat pants with cargo pockets. I think he may be Turkish and he only ever rides the bike. He pedals so vigorously that I’m afraid he might just pop his hips off one day. By the time he’s done, he climbs off of the bike and walks around shaking his hands and kicking his legs out loosely as he walks around. He looks like he has a corn cob stuck up his bum. He’s quite comical to watch.

I know what your thinking. Now, Dandy that’s just wrong. But I probably have my own description too. I’m the clumsy Air Force girl with the flippy hair that trips on her towel on the treadmill and can only brench press 45 pounds. I know I’m not “Miss Shape 2009″, but that’s exactly why I’m there.

The drop ins are they ones I’ve only seen one or twice here or there. The staff wear jeans and various colored polo shirts with “MWR” embroidered on them. They give the LNs their tasks for the day. There must be at least eight LNs doing various jobs around the gym. Some of them wear their traditional linen man pajamas and others wear jeans with tee shirts, but they all wear top dollar kicks. I’m talking about them wearing Nikes, New Balance, you name it, they’re wearing it. It must be like the first thing they save up to buy. Most of them are short in stature and slim in build with dark black hair and a minimum of at least a mustache for facial hair. They keep pretty busy stocking the triple door water cooler with bottled water, folding towels, taking out the trash, and wiping down the hard surfaces of the gym. Watching them work helps pass some of the 45 minutes I spend on the treadmill.

Good Day!

Dandy 198.1 miles to go Aaron