Tomorrow is Friday!

Yeah, this working 5 days a week stuff kinda stinks. I sure miss having the weekend, plus Friday and Monday off! This week has gone really fast though. On Monday, I had a scheduled intake and did a crisis walk-in, before driving to San Bernardino to finish up my child testing case. I am glad to be done with that kid, I have to admit! On Tuesday, I did two walk-in intakes and went to an FSP (full service partnership) meeting. Wednesday, I worked on putting together a cache of referral resources for all the intake clients I'm seeing. I also had Child Treatment Team meeting and a medication and symptom support group and then worked on my testing report. Today, I was at the Perinatal clinic, where I co-led the Co-Occurring Group (for clients who have both drug/alcohol addictions and a mental illness), did a couple of individual client sessions, and participated in the All Staff/All Client group. My Perinatal day is shaping up to be my favorite day of the week, but boy am I exhausted when I get out of there! I also had testing supervision with Dr. Thorn today at lunch, so it was a packed day. Tomorrow is our relaxing intern day, which is kicked back and we get out early.

Rebecca has been having a simply wonderful week with her Grammy this week. On Monday and Tuesday, they did all kinds of art and craft projects. Yesterday, they went to see the movie Hotel for Dogs and then got pizza and ice cream afterward. Rebecca told me she didn't like the movie but she did like seeing all the dogs. Today, they went to McDonalds. After enjoying her Happy Meal, Rebecca played in the Play Place. Unfortunately, it was overrun by some rowdy older kids so they didn't stick around too long. Rebecca has continued to tell us about the bad kids who were throwing things. She's prepared for next time, because if one runs at her, she's going to say, "Stop it, kids!" Even though she's little, she's not afraid to stick up for herself! Tonight, we went to the park after dinner, and Rebecca enjoyed some time to swing and slide and run around.

My aunt Margaret will be having coronary artery bypass grafting surgery tomorrow, so please pray that everything goes well with her surgery and in her recovery.

The girl has attitude

Craziness

Is it a full moon? They all came out of the woodwork today, let me tell you! I fielded an intake, a drug/alcohol referral, and a crisis intervention all before lunch. Then I headed off to San Bernardino to finish up my testing case. I have to say, I realized, yet again, why I don't do therapy with kids. Glad to be finished with this case, at least with the face-to-face part of it. I already have a referral for another testing case, this time for a neuropsych assessment. So things are going well.

We are blessed to have my mom here with us for a little while longer than initially expected. Nanny Rebecca is going to be out this week; we needed my mom to stay with us an extra week to help us out in a pinch, and she was willing to do it. We're lucky to have Grammy! Rebecca and she have been having a fine time, playing and doing arts and crafts projects. Last night we went to Ruth's Chris for dinner, and Rebecca enjoyed eating "steek" (steak) and tonight had "peet-stah" (pizza). She has enjoyed getting to go to her favorite fine dining establishments the last few days, as well as to perform various song/dance routines. Our Rebecca is certainly a card!

Saturday night

Having a great weekend with Grammy. Last night we went shopping and did some damage at Gap and Janie and Jack and had dinner at Cheesecake Factory. On the way home, we stopped to get ice cream. This morning, we ate breakfast and then headed out to the circus! It was a lot of fun, and I'll be posting pictures of it soon. This afternoon, Rebecca and Daddy stayed at home and napped, while my mom and I went to South Coast Plaza to shop for me. Then we met up with them again for Italian dinner.

Friday

I still haven't finished editing pics from Adelaide's birthday party almost two weeks ago. But I've done these two, so I thought I'd post them. We miss Miss Julie and Addie! I redeemed Gymbucks this week at Gymboree and it was strange not to have my wingman (Julie) with me for consultation and approval! Hopefully they will soon be settled in New York.

My mom arrived safely on Wednesday evening. She flew in to LAX, so Ramy and Rebecca picked her up at the airport (thus, no pics, because I wasn't there). Rebecca did a squeal, clap, and dance routine when she saw her. Rebecca was so hyped up over Grammy's arrival that she didn't sleep well at all Wednesday night. She woke up at 12:45 wanting to watch television and then was awake again at 2. Unlike her, so I'm thinking it was just all the adrenaline she had from so much excitement.

Yesterday, my mom and Rebecca hung out at home and did an arts and crafts project and basically just had a good time. Last night, my mom and I had tickets to see Fiddler on the Roof at the Pantages. It was a great show, especially since it was starring Topol on his farewell tour. My aunt Margaret had an arteriogram yesterday and we learned that she will be having bypass surgery sometime soon. So please say a prayer for her.

Yesterday, I had my first day at the Perinatal clinic. WHEW! That place is going to be a real education for me. It is definitely a step outside my comfort zone, but I think I will get a huge amount out of it. I was just introduced to the clients yesterday in the free-for-all called an all-staff/all-client group session, and I had young women standing in line to talk to me to ask if they could get an appointment. So there's definitely no shortage of clients, and I have a full caseload and waiting list already. It's going to be a challenging environment, but I'm really excited about it. I also got another referral for neuropsych testing on a schizophrenic suspected to have Alzheimer's. That will be one hell of a testing experience, I have no doubt!

Today is Ramy's day off, and everyone else in my home is still sound asleep. I'm off to Rialto (unfortunately, not the one in Italy) for my intern day and looking forward to getting to come home after lunch!

Concerts in the park (and my typical rambling)

So I finally got around to editing some pics and putting together some digital scrapbooking pages this past weekend. hence the Concerts in the Park pages above.

It's only Tuesday night, and it has already been a crazy week! Yesterday was the first day I've had at County where every single minute of my day (and I actually worked over) was billable. Yay for my productivity! It also made the day go by lightning fast. I got to work at 7:30 (shocking!) to prep for my first session with a new client. I'd met him and done his plan development on Thursday, so I kind of knew what I was getting into, or so I thought. He came in at 8 and visibly seemed to be a different person. To make a long story short(er), he had cooked up a hairbrained scheme in his mind about something I could make happen for him and the confrontation with reality was a bit jolting for him. I was briefly concerned for my own safety (okay, that's putting it mildly - I actually hit the panic button to call security) and moved the session to one of our other offices near the front. By that time, he was freaked that he was going to get "in trouble" and started cowering and covering his face with his hands, apparently being flooded with evoked memories of past trauma. From that point on, the session turned into a crisis intervention and I called in reinforcements to get the guy calmed down and put back together. This ended up being a two and a half hour process. Needless to say, he was not an appropriate candidate for doing actual therapy and I won't be seeing him again...at least until he's stabilized on his meds and has gotten through enough of a trauma training group that teaches self-regulation to be able to handle some sort of introspection.

By this time, the intake scheduled for me had been waiting on me for an hour and a half. (It's a community mental health clinic - there's a big sign that says, essentially, if you're a walk-in, we don't know how long you'll have to wait, so take a seat and chill). Fortunately, although this client had a string of involuntary hospitalizations and drug charges, his mental health issues were fairly straightforward. Even so, because he was scheduled to see the psychiatrist at noon, I did the fastest intake paperwork in the history of the clinic. Then I had to hit the road, because I had to drive to San Bernardino to do psych testing on a client at another clinic. Much to my delight, my client was a very hyperactive kid who crawled on the floor, tried to climb out the window, and generally whined about having to do his testing. Somehow I got us more than halfway done with his eval and we all survived. Then I got a bit lost in a less than stellar area of San Bernardino (not a place to put on your list of top places to visit, I assure you). I had a splitting headache when I got home, but then Rebecca was "hiding" (she announced this to me) and was grinning from ear to ear when I came in and "found" her. So that, along with the long snuggle time I had with her, salvaged my day.

Today I had another intake and got caught up on charting from yesterday morning's adventure, and I had supervision. It was a quick day too. Tomorrow, I've got to go to our main office in Rialto before heading back to San Bernardino to finish up my testing case. With all this driving, I'm pretty excited to get my travel reimbursement! It's going to be a nice supplement to my actual pay!

When I came in, Rebecca announced to me that she was hiding, and then I found her, so there was more hilarity. Rebecca had told me yesterday, "I need a haircut. My hair is messy." As she told me this, she was attempting to smooth her hair back and looking woe-begone. So tonight after dinner, she got a haircut. She's so perfectly good for it and likes to look at herself in the mirror. She proclaimed at the end, "I look pitty!" She is also looking forward to another movie tomorrow. I think it will be a hit, unlike last week's! Rebecca seems to have noticed that I'm gone more than usual. She's been a little more clingy and has said, "Don't go!" very sadly when I get ready to leave in the morning. However, she's easily distracted and goes back to her breakfast as soon as I walk away (before I'm even out the door). So hopefully that will be short-lived. Tomorrow evening, my mom will be arriving for a visit with us, so we're looking forward to that.

Sunday

Things have been good here this week. Rebecca is doing incredibly well with the potty-training. She rarely has accidents at home, and even when we're out and about, she will tell us she needs to go to the bathroom. The car is the most unreliable place. She's quite proud of her pretty panties! We're so proud of our big girl! This Wednesday's movie was Kit Kittredge: An American Girl, about which, Rebecca told me, "I not like it. I not like that movie. I wanna go home!" Apparently, that was indeed what she'd told Nanny Rebecca midway through the movie - that she didn't like the movie and wanted to go home. So that's exactly what they did! We've been having really hot weather this week...and this weekend...and into next week...and we've probably still got three more months of hot weather. Rebecca has enjoyed being able to swim almost every day.

Two and a half weeks into my internship and things are going well. I'm building up a caseload, as well as doing intakes and crisis interventions. I'll be starting a testing case tomorrow. It is, indeed, a far cry from the way I've spent my clinical time for the last two years. At Casa Colina, all my patients were insured, most had double coverage, plus some long-term care insurance that was footing their bill. The community mental health model is quite different! All of our clients are severely or persistently mentally ill and indigent. We're essentially slaves to the Medi-Cal system. It is great experience, and there are few other environments in which I'd have so much exposure to really gritty psychiatric diagnoses.

I'm particularly excited about a new opportunity that I get to be a part of. All the kinks haven't been worked out yet, but it looks as though I'll be spending one day a week working in the Perinatal program. These are all moms who have either been court ordered to attend the program or who are voluntarily participating as a part of their reunification plan to get their kids back after having them taken away by CFS. These women get a LOT of services for the five months that they are in the program - transportation to and from the program, childcare for their children while they're doing the program, hands-on parenting classes, group therapy, individual therapy, medical care, drug/alcohol treatment, and intensive case management. When I was meeting with the director, she asked me if I knew much about street drugs. I can honestly say that was the first time I'd ever been asked that question on an interview, and it was especially odd that my lack of awareness of drug lingo was actually a drawback! I'm sure that I'll be getting quite an education from these women! I will only be working with the mothers - even though the kids are there in childcare, I won't be doing anything with them. That's a good thing, because not only is child psych not my forte, just seeing some of the fetal alcohol syndrome and drug exposed babies during my brief tour was quite enough for me, thank you! Assuming things work out the way they look to at this point, I'll be doing intakes and testing on Mondays, crisis intervention and individual therapy on Tuesday and Wednesday, at the Perinatal program to do group and individual therapy on Thursday, and then Friday is our intern training day.

Yesterday, we met up with Vincent, Madeline, Paul, and Ashley and Rachel for lunch at Cheesecake Factory. Rebecca talks about Ashley and Rachel as though she sees them all the time, and she was delighted to spend some time with her older girlfriends. They're so sweet with her too! They ended up at another table next to ours to eat their dessert. Ramy had followed them to be sure Rebecca didn't fall out of her chair or whatever. Rebecca told him to "go sit down." I think having adult supervision was cramping her style. Afterwards, we shopped a bit at Santa Anita Mall and then went to Ikea. This morning we went to 7:30 a.m. mass and had Bravo Burger breakfast quesadillas afterward. So a pretty relaxing and fun weekend.

My dancing girl

We went to the concerts in the park again tonight. Hopefully we will make it to all of them this summer, because we all have a good time and enjoy them. Rebecca certainly enjoys the concerts more than anyone, however! I am still trying to get pics from last week edited so I can upload them. Last week, I took still pics, so this week, I took video.

A couple of prayer requests

Please, please say a prayer for Laura Beck today. She'll be undergoing extremely risky brain surgery today. Please pray that God will use her surgeon's hands to bring about a miracle for this sweet young woman. Also please say another prayer for her family. I can only begin to imagine the agony they are going through and will experience as they say goodbye to her before she goes into surgery and while waiting for news.

Also, please say a prayer for my father-in-law. As most of you know, Ramy's dad had a stroke in December 2004, which left him quite debilitated and strongly affected his speech. He then had another stroke in January 2008, which was even more devastating and left him with essentially no ability to communicate and seemingly little awareness of or interaction with anyone who might be around him. He's also had other health problems which have complicated things, and he has steadily declined in the last several months. We expect that he will likely not survive for very long. Although the father that Ramy has known all his life has been gone for quite some time, this will be a very difficult time for him, his mom, and his sisters.

Finally, say another prayer for my good friend Julie. She and Adelaide left yesterday for New York City. Derek still hasn't found a job in NYC, so Julie and Addie will be bachelorettes in the Big Apple until he finds a job and can join them. Julie has to quickly find a place for them to live and childcare for Adelaide. It's a really stressful time for her to be getting settled in a new place without many contacts, starting internship, taking care of Addie alone, adjusting to working full time/Addie being in daycare full time, and still being on job search mode for Derek.

What happened to the weekend?

Here's a picture of Rebecca in her furry Dora slippers. I got these for her a few weeks ago and I'd forgotten about them until I found them in a bag in my closet. She's so pleased with them and was quite happy to model for me!

Wow, weekends certainly do seem to fly by, now that mine are only two days long like everyone else's! We've had a lovely time of it though. Ramy was off on Friday, so he got a jump-start on getting the laundry done while I was in my intern meeting. (I know, what I say is true - he really is a saint!). My Fridays are actually very relaxed. I am never at my clinics on Friday, because we have our intern training day, where we handle a lot of the business of the internship, as well as having a countertransference group, case presentations, and some sort of didactic training as well. We get out around 1:30 and call it a day, which is very nice. We decided we would take turns bringing breakfast for the group to nosh on, so I volunteered to go first this week. I'm trying to decide what I'll make. I have to set the bar pretty high, right?

After I got home on Friday, we hung out for a bit and then took Rebecca to the park. She had an awesome time, as did we. I snapped 265 pictures while we were there! Don't worry, I won't inflict all of them on you! But as soon as I get them edited and in some semblance of order, I'll definitely be posting a lot of them. Saturday was a relaxing day for us, mostly chilling at home and doing things like going to Target and Costco. Yesterday morning, we went to 7:30 mass and then drove up to Apple Valley to attend Adelaide's first birthday party. I can't believe she is a year old! They had a cute little sprinkler/splash pad thing, and even though Addie wasn't such a fan of the cold water, Rebecca certainly got Julie's money's worth out of it! I've also got tons of pics from that event, as you can well imagine.

So, I'm off to work this morning. Because I finally got log-in information in to my computer, I can finally start seeing clients. Thank goodness! It makes the days go by a lot faster when you have something to do, especially when there's a waiting room full of mentally ill people who need services. Last week, there was a triage done of a guy who was supposed to wait for his intake appointment, but he took off. Because he had revealed suicidality in the triage, everyone was panicked, they had to call the police to do a wellness check, etc. There's truly never a quiet day in a community mental health clinic!

Miracles

The 9th/10th of July always makes me pensive...Seven years ago tonight, I was teetering perilously on the brink between life and death. I had just undergone emergency surgery to attempt to repair the gastric leak that threatened my existence. While I was actually mercifully out of consciousness for this battle, many of the people who read this were certainly warriors on my behalf. At the time, no one on earth knew what the outcome would be, but so many people prayed unceasingly for me that night and over the next several months.

It was a terrible time, and certainly it was a path I would never have chosen. However, I have seen that God can use for good what seems at first to be senseless or evil. Although I'd never wish such an experience on anyone, I do wish everyone had the same opportunity I did to witness the outpouring of love and support that I did at that time. I certainly learned more about my faith during that time than any other, and the lessons I learned are ones I've returned to many times since. Indeed, God tells us, "I will give you the treasures of darkness, riches stored in secret places, so that you may know that I am the LORD, the God of Israel, who summons you by name." (Isaiah 45:3). I'm so thankful to have received a miracle.

I wonder if, when we get to Heaven, that there will be a roadmap or a timeline that God will show us so that we're able to see how He used what seemed to be struggles or roadblocks or even tragedies in our lives for His greater purpose or so that we can understand the way in which miracles are delivered. I suspect so, because some things just don't make sense here on Earth. Why do some people who, by the estimation of most, are essentially wastes of cells and oxygen, seem to be cats with many more than nine lives, while innocent children, young mothers, or pillars of faith and good deeds endure such gross suffering? One of my favorite patients at Casa Colina, which has as its motto "where miracles continue", had her claimed Bible verse on a sign on her walker:
“Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory. I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us." (Romans 8:17-18).
One day in group, one of my frontal-lobe-injured patients asked her in a jeer how she could believe in God when there were so many tragic stories around them (he didn't phrase it quite so politely). She said, "How can you see so many miracles here and not believe in God? And these are just the miracles we get to see...there are so many more we don't get to witness...Besides, if you didn't have God, how could you stand it?"

This evening, I learned terrible news of a girl I grew up with who battled and was believed to have beaten cancer. She learned today that its' evil has become exponentially more ferocious. Next week, she will be undergoing a desperate surgery likely to be debilitating (in the best-case scenario) or fatal (in the worst-case scenario). The suffering she and her family have endured through the last year and a half of her battle are mind-staggering, but it is simply unthinkable that she has just been given this most terrible of news about her prognosis. I hope everyone will join me in praying for a radical miracle for Laura.

On Saturday evening, Rebecca discovered a true American classic. The movie Grease was on television, and she fell in love with the singing and dancing. She was so inspired by the ending, where Sandy comes out in her slut clothes and finally gets the guy and they dance through the school carnival and ride off into the sunset, that Rebecca picked up Pedro the Penguin and danced with him. She tried very hard to imitate the moves of John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John, but Pedro wasn't quite as adept. Nonetheless, she was swinging around with Pedro, dipping him, shimmying, slinging him through her legs... Rebecca was quite sad when the movie ending after such fun and asked to see it again (thankfully, it wasn't coming on again!).

Splash Park

Last Friday, we met up with Julie and Adelaide at Victoria Gardens in Rancho Cucamonga, which has been the site of most of our shopping/playdates. I realized when we left on Friday that this very well may have been the last time we have a day like that! Julie and Addie are moving to New York City week after next. Although we'll be seeing them this weekend at Adelaide's first birthday party, I don't know whether there will be another shopping opportunity. Baby Gap and Gymboree at Victoria Gardens may not survive!

We made our usual rounds to Gymboree and Baby Gap, checked out all the sale rounders, ogled the new fall things coming in, and schemed as to our buying strategy for them with respect to upcoming sales and rewards opportunities. Then we went to CPK ("see-kee-pay", as Rebecca calls it) and had lunch. Afterwards, we changed the girls into their bathing suits and let them cool off in the splash fountain with all the other little kids enjoying a hot summer day. Adelaide bravely wandered in, and Julie didn't even have to get wet, because she was happy to splash in the perimeter by herself. Rebecca has no fear of the biggest spouts in the middle of the water park, but tried to squelch the shoots of water by holding them down or sitting on them. Both girls had a great time, and we, of course, enjoyed watching them play together in the water.

Jumping and Dancing and an update

If you're feeling kind of tired and draggy, this video should either lift your spirits or make you long for the energy that is so abundant in toddlers that they have to burn off the excess!

Nanny Rebecca called me at lunch today to ask where our thermometer was. Although Rebecca had been happy and playing all morning, when she got ready to go down for her nap, she felt really hot to the touch and was crying inconsolably, wanting me or Ramy, which is completely uncharacteristic (generally, when I leave and Nanny Rebecca is there, I barely get a goodbye glance!). Her temperature was 99.7 under her arm. I talked to her on the phone, and she was just crying. When asked if she felt bad, she would say yes but could say what was bothering her, but Nanny Rebecca noticed she was quite gassy. Because Rebecca is currently fascinated by her newfound body parts discovered during the process of potty training, I was concerned about a possible UTI (as well as thinking about possibly ears, throat, what have you). I scheduled an appointment with her pediatrician this afternoon. Ramy picked her up and then she was feeling much better apparently - not hot, singing and laughing, acting like nothing was bothering her. Dr. Jeng was concerned about a possible UTI as well but also reported that there is a recent outbreak of a stomach virus that seems to be starting with gas, progressing to vomiting for a couple of days, and the working its way out with a week or more's worth of diarrhea. So he wants us to watch her over the next day or two and see if/what other symptoms develop. In the meantime, we're washing hands frequently and spraying lots of Lysol!

To give an update on my internship...last week, I had intern orientation at the Behavioral Health Resource Center (which is in another location from where I actually work) on Wednesday and Thursday. Two full days of information overload...and yet, I definitely had a leg up on my comrades, because I'd at least worked in the county DBH system before and was familiar with 90% of their paperwork. A few things have changed (mostly for the better), but I feel pretty up to speed with the charting and documentation stuff. As I'm sure everyone knows, California's economy is...well, in the toilet. As a result, drastic cuts are being made in all kinds of services, and mental health services are often first to be on the chopping block. They are tightening access to Medi-Cal (California's Medicaid system) and cutting tens of thousands of people off the rolls. In addition, they are putting further restrictions on mental health services that are offered. It seems as though even though mental health services aren't going anywhere (there are more insane people than ever in San Bernardino County!), there are almost daily changes in what kinds of things we can do for clients. So there's a lot to keep up with on that end.

On Monday, I started at my actual clinic assignment. I went to a couple of meetings and then never saw my supervisor again. She isn't exactly a warm, fuzzy kind of woman, but I have a lot to learn from her, because she is the guru of leading therapy groups (an area that is a weakness of mine, in my opinion). The rest of my day was pretty boring, since I didn't yet have my computer log-in, so I couldn't do any of my online trainings and I don't yet have a caseload. So I basically introduced myself to all the psychiatrists in our clinic and gave them a spiel about the fact that one of my purposes is to do testing while I'm there and to try to drum up referrals. Although testing is something that is apparently very valued in the County system, and it's a niche that solely falls within psychologists' realms, almost none of the staff psychologists actually do testing. Not sure why that is! Today, I was in San Bernardino for another full day of training. This time it was general county Department training. A full day of hearing about things that really don't pertain to us, as we're not regular employees. However, I did learn that I can get reimbursed for all the travel I'm doing from my clinic to the BHRC and the admin offices for trainings and meetings and such. So that made my day worthwhile. Tomorrow morning, I'll be back at BHRC for a chart documentation and HIPAA training and then in the afternoon, I'm co-leading a medication support group. So...I'm off and running!

Independence Day fun

To celebrate the 4th of July, we slept in, had a leisurely breakfast, and then went over the Big League Dreams park to take in the Chino Hills Old-Fashioned Independence Day celebration. They had a wagon parade where people decorated wagons and entered them in a contest, lots of different games, face painting, and contests for eating the most marshmallows, watermelons, pie, pizza, etc. They also had giant inflatable slides, bungee bouncing, and a maze where kids can shoot each other with water guns, but Rebecca is still too small to participate in those kinds of activities. It was also scorching hot out, so we didn't stay too long after we ate some lunch.

In commemorating our nation's birth, my husband chose to eat Chinese food. I had a hamburger. True to her heritage of being a hapa, Rebecca ate some of each.



In the evening, we took advantage of the fact that we live in Chino HILLS and drove over to look out over the hills to a whole valley of fireworks. We took snacks and drinks and the dogs with us and were able to take in fireworks from about 20 different fireworks displays. It was also nice, because we weren't so near the loudness of fireworks, which are sometimes frightening to Rebecca.

Girlfriends

On Monday, we met Julie and Adelaide for lunch. Then they came over to our house so that the girls could play for a bit, while Julie and I exchanged sale finds and caught up on everything that had been going on in the previous couple of weeks. Both girls loooovvvee blackberries and were happy to snack on them. They play together so sweetly. Rebecca likes doing things to try to make Addie laugh at her, like bending backward over the arm of her chair. Addie rewarded the entertainment by giving Rebecca kisses. It was such a sweet moment!

Later, I'll be posting some more pics from another get-together with the Woltils.

First day

My first day of internship went well. I was just at the main office for orientation, as I will be again tomorrow. I'm off Friday, then will be at my clinic on Monday and then have another department training on Tuesday. But essentially, I'll be at the Upland Clinic on Monday-Thursday, and then we have our intern training stuff on Fridays. The first thing we found out today was that our jobs should be insulated against the dismal state of California's financial situation. BEcause of the way our jobs are classified, however, we could technically be on the chopping block in a showdown between the county and the union. However, our salaries come out of a protected class of funds that can't be used for anything else, so eliminating us wouldn't save the state any money or the county any jobs. San Bernardino County has been pretty Republican, so they've never really allotted any money for mental health services, so all our department's funding has always been state (and federal). That is actually good for us right now (although probably underserves the general population), because we aren't having to absorb the double blow of cuts from counties and the state, as is the case in Riverside County. The rest of the day was basically just getting to know each other and our training director, who has the most interesting background of almost anyone I've ever met. He's just incredible, so I feel really lucky to be training under him, even though there will be a bit of chaos, as this is his first year as the director of the internship training program. He's been involved in the program for years and worked closely with the outgoing director, who is retiring after having been there forever. We found out more about the requirements of the internship, which is pretty rigorous, as well as about the different training opportunities we have. Tomorrow will be more of the same, probably more in depth policies and procedures, of which the County of San Bernardino has no lack. I came home with two 4 inch binders of stuff on the department and specific to the internship.

Rebecca had a great day. She went to see Madagascar 2 at the movies and apparently had a blast. Nanny Rebecca sent me a text to say that she was cracking up at our Rebecca in the movies, because she was laughing and having such a good time. The next thing I heard was a picture message of Rebecca asleep in her highchair, with her fork in hand and a half-eaten plate of lunch in front of her. Apparently, she was worn out from the movie fun!