First Day Activities

Hello lovely people!

I cannot believe I am already writing my first SRP update. Everything is happening incredibly fast, but I am quite excited to share my first day with you all.

My day started early when my mother and I left the house at 6:30 am for the two-hour drive to Tucson. The drive was uneventful, and (with most long drives) I spent most of my time as the designated DJ in the car. I figured it would be fun to share with you all 15 of the songs I played this morning:

So as you listen to those tunes, I suppose I will describe the rest of my day. We arrived at St. Mary's around 9 and I immediately headed to the volunteer services center. One of the things I have already learned about working in a hospital is that there are a lot of official papers and details that go into the process. This morning I filled out a form to have a background check done and found out I still have to get a drug test done. I suppose it's better to be safe than sorry.

But despite the technicalities, I was still able to shadow Ms. Endreson. At 10am we met in the hospital lobby and headed to the second floor, where the Bridges GeroPsych Unit is located. Group therapy wasn't scheduled to start until 2, so we spent the first hour or so in a casual lecture setting. Ms. Endreson gave me a number of awesome articles and papers to read, eagerly helped me differentiate between creative arts therapists and visual arts therapists, and even outlined the goals of group therapy. I learned a great amount in such a small period of time (and I have even more to read about over the next couple weeks). One of the things I found most interesting was a set of pieces done by one of Ms. Endreson's previous patients. Ms. Endreson explained the process that specific patient went through, noting the changes between each piece.

Crazy messy notes from today's short info session

After our short "lecture," we grabbed a quick lunch and headed back to Bridges to educate ourselves on the patients of the day. Today, we had eleven patients to work with, but I learned that that number changes quite rapidly. In fact, two patients discharged today and another is scheduled to leave next week. I'm sure it will be interesting to see how the change in patients affects what art activities we will do over the next couple months.
Once Ms. Endreson and I briefly reviewed the backgrounds, special needs, and goals of the patients, we had a quick meeting with the other nurses, supervisors, and main doctor, Dr. Hancock, who came in to check on the patients' progress.
Then group therapy finally started. We scanned the halls and encouraged patients to attend a 50 minute session of simple sharing and speaking. Only around five patients took us up on the offer. During the session, Ms. Endreson encouraged the patients to symbolically "leave" something negative and "take" something positive. The overall theme, however, was the idea of finding a " pleasant place were you aim to be."
Art therapy started after a quick break. We decided to leave the options very open for the few patients who attended; we covered the activities table with paper, oil pastels, colored pencils, and markers. We encouraged patients to create visual versions of their "places," but many of them seemed rather unmotivated. Depression and dementia were definitely hard to overcome today. One patient, however, did create a lovely colored pencil scene of what he called his "cabin in heaven" and was rather pleased with the concept.
I left the hospital around 5:30 after a quick debriefing with Ms. Endreson. We even brainstormed some special Valentine ideas for tomorrow's art therapy session! I'll be sure to keep you updated!

Talk to you soon!
Tia