A decade in review
Jan. 1st, 2010 03:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cornerofmadnessSince I'm obviously not going to be allowed the time to post everything I want, let me at least get THIS up.
A Decade in Review
Time magazine called this the decade from hell. I’m disinclined to argue. I have never been as unhappy as I have in the last ten years, at least not since I was in high school in the 80’s.
1999 – I can remember that New Year’s Eve party. I wanted to go elsewhere with my friends but Mom and Dad didn’t want me to, just in case (Now they claim they always knew it was bullshit, Y2K, and honestly we DIDN’T stockpile food or that nonsense but that said neither did they want anyone traveling). Since I could care less about New Year’s Eve, it was easier to just stay here. We put a party hat on my cat and got drunk.
2000 – This was the singular worst year of my life. It really was the end of my world, at least as I know it. I hated my job. The government was getting into my business way too much (if they run national health like they do Medicare & the veterans administration, we’re all boned), a vascular surgeon screwed up and a lady lost two legs and he tried to get the family to sue me instead of him, blaming my treatment of her ulcers (luckily I had not only pictures and documentation of how healed they were when I was treating her but he kept changing my treatment plan so I released her to him MONTHS before the amputation. No way was I to blame) But as a result of this, my boss was on my ass. I was in a bad tail spin. Mom came up to Madison since she was worried about me and my boyfriend dumped me because I couldn’t spend that weekend with him (really, if that’s how you are I was better off without him).
On 7/7/00, the end happened. I was working in an understaffed nursing home (one I actually liked) and a combative Alzheimer’s patient kicked me when I was putting on his AFO (a plastic foot/ankle device used in nerve damage). It ruptured the nerve in my hand and though I struggled on for 5 more months, it was obvious I could no longer be a podiatrist and wound care surgeon. On one hand I was devastated. On the other, I had grown to dislike medicine so I tried to see it as an opportunity. At Christmas I left Madison and my old life behind.
2001-2003 – On very BAD legal advice, I went back to school in case my hand never healed. I loved forensics and got into two programs, Oklahoma and Central Florida. Evil_little_dog really pushed for me to come to FL. And since I knew her, silvrethorn & lunatic_0, and knew no one in OK, it sounded good. Until I saw the sheer COST of living in FL. I couldn’t afford rent. Evil_little_dog kindly invited me to rent a room at her home. It was supposed to be short term. It ended up being full time. Sadly during this time, my diabetes reared its head. FL caused me a lot of health problems directly as well.
Everyone knows I hate FL. I still do. I loved the people there though and I met sita_137 & adelaidedreams as well. School was actually good in some respects. I love being a student. I’d be a student for life if I could. The school did hose me. First off I left my driver’s license in WI in case I healed and went back. They claimed I was never living in FL and charged me out of state rates two years running (did I commute from Madison to Orlando daily?). Then they misrepresented their program. Yes it was 2 ½ years of class work but they neglected to mention the 2 ½ years of lab work. FIVE years to get a masters in forensics for a relatively low paying job one that I realized I couldn’t do because of the hand injury.
I switched to biology masters so I could teach. I should have gotten a doctorate but I had no idea how colleges worked. No one told me. I still feel pretty cheated all around. The insurance company who told me they would pay for this, refused because I refused to act as a secretary at my own medical office as ‘light duty’ to see if I would heal. No lawyer would take my case since in WI a hand injury is only worth 10% of your pay whether you’re a janitor or a surgeon. I was completely helpless and so very angry. The only company to treat me decently in this was my malpractice insurance who let me out of my tail insurance (I would have had to pay 20 grand a year for 7 years after I left medicine).
I hated everything about FL, the heat, the bugs, the humidity, the cost but that’s not to say we didn’t have fun. Evil_little_dog, Silvrethorn and the others and I had a great time and got into all sorts of stuff. I went from a surgeon to working at subways and as a file clerk (though I actually liked that job). I found livejournal and really enjoyed it but not at first. I was always pretty private and now I look forward for a place to rant and share my creativity and share in yours.
2004-2005 I couldn’t find a teaching job anywhere. Nicolet Technical College needed help teaching anatomy because apparently anatomy was NOT part of the nursing schools in the area for a long time and WI said this is stupid. So they had too many students. I was only supposed to help for one semester but I ended up there for a year.
A friend of Evil_little_dog and I, Zog, let me rent one of his houses. I loved it there. Okay so it was usually 20 below and it snowed a foot or more a day but it was so beautiful. The only thing I didn’t like was I think there was a leak in the propane tank since my bill was SO high every month. My boss, K, was the best boss you could hope for. He did everything he could to help me learn to teach. He bought me meals often because I was only making 500$/month and my expenses were twice that. He loved making exams at Wanda’s, a pizza joint/bar near the school, a second home. It was like cheers in that respect. He sure could talk and drink and we worked well together. He helped me get my next job since I couldn’t stay.
My health worsened. My depression got so bad I had to seek help. She wanted to committee me for a few weeks. I learned I’m allergic to most modern anti-depressants. I’m still very grateful to my flist who were very supportive and especially to marenfic who had book suggestions and exercises to help. My student loans sent the cops out after me and sued me but were told I had no money so they were out of luck. I broke my ankle and had to shovel foot after foot of snow in my soft cast. But on the other hand I got to walk in a primordial forest and see bobcats eye to eye. I had koi in a rain filled old swimming pool and they were lovely. I even went back to the Madison and stayed at Canterbury Ale’s B&B on State Street and it was lovely too.
2005-2009 I ended up getting two job offers. One at a college in WV which I did like better than this one. Better labs, anime clubs, pagan clubs, my sorority, something I could have been faculty advisors for. The area was beautiful. However the faculty were arguing with each other and calling each other names in the interview. And since it was a late in the year job replacement, they told me they’d have to do a better search next year (so I was what? Not good enough for them but would do for one year?) Rio Grande was not as nice but the faculty was very friendly. It was closer to home. I never expected I’d still be there.
I have a decent apartment in a place I hate. I have good friends in the faculty and I hate to leave them. I want out but have been too depressed to bother. Points back, notice you don’t see me dating much. I’ve felt too fat, too old and too depressed to bother. (and I've been told this by some men so...) Maybe I should change that but where I am no, it’s pretty pointless.
I do get to go to the OH renn fest and its very good. I like my nano group in Athens. Heck, I like Athens in general. I actually find I like being a professor. I wish I were a writer. I fail badly at it. I have trouble editing things and completing things. I want this to change. I try. I try with others and we fail together and then I get even angrier about it all. That said, 2009 was a good year for writing. I placed into the semi-finals for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel (sadly I have nothing finished to try again this year), I sold two stories. One should be out soon, the other seems to have disappeared.
I’m learning to meditate. I’m trying to be happy again. It’s not easy. My health has completely disintegrated and my student loans are killing me. But I’m alive and I am a fighter. Maybe my 40’s will be better than my 30’s. I have to keep trying. Something better is out there waiting for me to find it. Two days ago I met one of my aunt’s friends for the first time. After a little while, she asked me how old I was. When I told her, her eyes widened. “I can’t believe you’ve done so many things and have been so many places. I’m two years younger than you and I’ve done nothing.” There is something to that. Hard as my life can be sometimes, it’s rarely boring. And that counts for a lot.
A Decade in Review
Time magazine called this the decade from hell. I’m disinclined to argue. I have never been as unhappy as I have in the last ten years, at least not since I was in high school in the 80’s.
1999 – I can remember that New Year’s Eve party. I wanted to go elsewhere with my friends but Mom and Dad didn’t want me to, just in case (Now they claim they always knew it was bullshit, Y2K, and honestly we DIDN’T stockpile food or that nonsense but that said neither did they want anyone traveling). Since I could care less about New Year’s Eve, it was easier to just stay here. We put a party hat on my cat and got drunk.
2000 – This was the singular worst year of my life. It really was the end of my world, at least as I know it. I hated my job. The government was getting into my business way too much (if they run national health like they do Medicare & the veterans administration, we’re all boned), a vascular surgeon screwed up and a lady lost two legs and he tried to get the family to sue me instead of him, blaming my treatment of her ulcers (luckily I had not only pictures and documentation of how healed they were when I was treating her but he kept changing my treatment plan so I released her to him MONTHS before the amputation. No way was I to blame) But as a result of this, my boss was on my ass. I was in a bad tail spin. Mom came up to Madison since she was worried about me and my boyfriend dumped me because I couldn’t spend that weekend with him (really, if that’s how you are I was better off without him).
On 7/7/00, the end happened. I was working in an understaffed nursing home (one I actually liked) and a combative Alzheimer’s patient kicked me when I was putting on his AFO (a plastic foot/ankle device used in nerve damage). It ruptured the nerve in my hand and though I struggled on for 5 more months, it was obvious I could no longer be a podiatrist and wound care surgeon. On one hand I was devastated. On the other, I had grown to dislike medicine so I tried to see it as an opportunity. At Christmas I left Madison and my old life behind.
2001-2003 – On very BAD legal advice, I went back to school in case my hand never healed. I loved forensics and got into two programs, Oklahoma and Central Florida. Evil_little_dog really pushed for me to come to FL. And since I knew her, silvrethorn & lunatic_0, and knew no one in OK, it sounded good. Until I saw the sheer COST of living in FL. I couldn’t afford rent. Evil_little_dog kindly invited me to rent a room at her home. It was supposed to be short term. It ended up being full time. Sadly during this time, my diabetes reared its head. FL caused me a lot of health problems directly as well.
Everyone knows I hate FL. I still do. I loved the people there though and I met sita_137 & adelaidedreams as well. School was actually good in some respects. I love being a student. I’d be a student for life if I could. The school did hose me. First off I left my driver’s license in WI in case I healed and went back. They claimed I was never living in FL and charged me out of state rates two years running (did I commute from Madison to Orlando daily?). Then they misrepresented their program. Yes it was 2 ½ years of class work but they neglected to mention the 2 ½ years of lab work. FIVE years to get a masters in forensics for a relatively low paying job one that I realized I couldn’t do because of the hand injury.
I switched to biology masters so I could teach. I should have gotten a doctorate but I had no idea how colleges worked. No one told me. I still feel pretty cheated all around. The insurance company who told me they would pay for this, refused because I refused to act as a secretary at my own medical office as ‘light duty’ to see if I would heal. No lawyer would take my case since in WI a hand injury is only worth 10% of your pay whether you’re a janitor or a surgeon. I was completely helpless and so very angry. The only company to treat me decently in this was my malpractice insurance who let me out of my tail insurance (I would have had to pay 20 grand a year for 7 years after I left medicine).
I hated everything about FL, the heat, the bugs, the humidity, the cost but that’s not to say we didn’t have fun. Evil_little_dog, Silvrethorn and the others and I had a great time and got into all sorts of stuff. I went from a surgeon to working at subways and as a file clerk (though I actually liked that job). I found livejournal and really enjoyed it but not at first. I was always pretty private and now I look forward for a place to rant and share my creativity and share in yours.
2004-2005 I couldn’t find a teaching job anywhere. Nicolet Technical College needed help teaching anatomy because apparently anatomy was NOT part of the nursing schools in the area for a long time and WI said this is stupid. So they had too many students. I was only supposed to help for one semester but I ended up there for a year.
A friend of Evil_little_dog and I, Zog, let me rent one of his houses. I loved it there. Okay so it was usually 20 below and it snowed a foot or more a day but it was so beautiful. The only thing I didn’t like was I think there was a leak in the propane tank since my bill was SO high every month. My boss, K, was the best boss you could hope for. He did everything he could to help me learn to teach. He bought me meals often because I was only making 500$/month and my expenses were twice that. He loved making exams at Wanda’s, a pizza joint/bar near the school, a second home. It was like cheers in that respect. He sure could talk and drink and we worked well together. He helped me get my next job since I couldn’t stay.
My health worsened. My depression got so bad I had to seek help. She wanted to committee me for a few weeks. I learned I’m allergic to most modern anti-depressants. I’m still very grateful to my flist who were very supportive and especially to marenfic who had book suggestions and exercises to help. My student loans sent the cops out after me and sued me but were told I had no money so they were out of luck. I broke my ankle and had to shovel foot after foot of snow in my soft cast. But on the other hand I got to walk in a primordial forest and see bobcats eye to eye. I had koi in a rain filled old swimming pool and they were lovely. I even went back to the Madison and stayed at Canterbury Ale’s B&B on State Street and it was lovely too.
2005-2009 I ended up getting two job offers. One at a college in WV which I did like better than this one. Better labs, anime clubs, pagan clubs, my sorority, something I could have been faculty advisors for. The area was beautiful. However the faculty were arguing with each other and calling each other names in the interview. And since it was a late in the year job replacement, they told me they’d have to do a better search next year (so I was what? Not good enough for them but would do for one year?) Rio Grande was not as nice but the faculty was very friendly. It was closer to home. I never expected I’d still be there.
I have a decent apartment in a place I hate. I have good friends in the faculty and I hate to leave them. I want out but have been too depressed to bother. Points back, notice you don’t see me dating much. I’ve felt too fat, too old and too depressed to bother. (and I've been told this by some men so...) Maybe I should change that but where I am no, it’s pretty pointless.
I do get to go to the OH renn fest and its very good. I like my nano group in Athens. Heck, I like Athens in general. I actually find I like being a professor. I wish I were a writer. I fail badly at it. I have trouble editing things and completing things. I want this to change. I try. I try with others and we fail together and then I get even angrier about it all. That said, 2009 was a good year for writing. I placed into the semi-finals for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel (sadly I have nothing finished to try again this year), I sold two stories. One should be out soon, the other seems to have disappeared.
I’m learning to meditate. I’m trying to be happy again. It’s not easy. My health has completely disintegrated and my student loans are killing me. But I’m alive and I am a fighter. Maybe my 40’s will be better than my 30’s. I have to keep trying. Something better is out there waiting for me to find it. Two days ago I met one of my aunt’s friends for the first time. After a little while, she asked me how old I was. When I told her, her eyes widened. “I can’t believe you’ve done so many things and have been so many places. I’m two years younger than you and I’ve done nothing.” There is something to that. Hard as my life can be sometimes, it’s rarely boring. And that counts for a lot.
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