An Inauspicious Start to Summer

Wow! Summer has finally arrived. Without a doubt, my absolute favorite thing about substitute teaching is summer. What can I say, summer break was the best thing about going to school. Now it's the best thing about working for a school.

I really expected that Monday, May 18, would be my last day to work this spring. But the district's scheduler called me to work both Monday and Tuesday at the middle school. The first day I subbed for the theater arts teacher. I've subbed for her several times this year. The problem with subbing for her is that she NEVER leaves a lesson plan. I just have to "wing it" to keep the kids busy. I got through the day by showing a movie, which is what most teachers were doing for the last couple of days of school anyway. The second day I subbed in the gymnasium for one of the coaches. Since it was the end of school, there was no equipment and the students didn't dress-out. That day was AWFUL. Imagine two substitutes and 75 to 100 students with nothing to do for an hour. Now imagine that seven times. We let those who were interested organize their own games. The rest of them spent their PE class sitting in the bleachers talking. It was very loud and very dull.

I've been looking forward those first few days of summer. I planned to spend the first day in my pajamas, watching television, reading, mostly doing nothing. Needless to say, when Wednesday morning came, there were other things I had to do. I was out running errands when my husband called to ask me to meet him at the emergency room. His mother had fallen and broken her hip.

Photo credit

She was in the emergency room for 14 hours. I was there 13 of those hours. They finally got her a room at approximately 11 p.m. Wednesday night. We spent the entire day with her on Thursday hoping to catch the surgeon when he made rounds. She was scheduled for partial hip replacement on Friday at 3 p.m.

I stayed home to get a few things done on Friday morning while Patrick went to the hospital. He called around 10 a.m. telling me to come right away because they were going to take her earlier than they planned. The surgery went smoothly and she was in recovery by 3 o'clock. They placed a prosthesis in the top of her femur with a new ball-socket similar to the illustration shown.

They got her out of bed and started her therapy the next morning. She's having a rough time with quite a lot of pain. She gets therapy three times a day which really wears her out. They keep her out of bed around four hours every morning. She's not eating or drinking very much. The doctor said he expects to keep her in the hospital for approximately 10 after surgery so she can continue to receive therapy three times daily.

We've cut back our visits to a couple of hours each day. We are just in the way when they are doing therapy. Patrick will be visiting either at lunch or after work every day. She has not wanted any additional visitors and refuses to answer the phone in her room. She doesn't want to talk to anyone and she certainly doesn't want anyone to see her. Personally, I think it's because her hair isn't done. We're going to check with the hospital and see if there is someone who will come in and do her hair. I think that will make her feel a lot better.

Today was the first day I was really hoping to sleep late and laze around this morning. Unfortunately, a couple of my husband's employees felt that it was necessary to call and text him around 6:30 this morning. So I was up early once again.

Hopefully, summer will get better.