Professional thank you.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank my colleagues for opening up their lives and sharing their thoughts and life experiences.  As the end of the course approaches I think of the relationships I built and how much I’ve gained from each and every one of my classmates.  It has been a wonder journey, one that I will treasure for years to come.

I wish everyone success in their future endeavors as they continue their studies in Early Childhood Education.

Saying Good-bye…

Several years ago while working at a college I had the opportunity to work on team to develop a mentors program. We developed a website where the students could log onto to sign-up for a mentor, we recruited members from both the private and public sector, such as attorney, physicians, bank managers, marketing directors, human resources managers, just to name a few.  The programs was designed to match the students’ career goals with a person who was working in the same career or possibly even retired.  For instance if we had a student who was interested in a career as an attorney or a pediatrician then that student would be assigned a mentor in those particular career fields.  Several of the mentors were fellow alumni’s of the college and often recommended and recruited other professional colleagues or friends to join the mentor association.  I had the privilege of working with a pretty outstanding group of people, some of which up to this day, we still keep in contact with one another.  Letting and saying goodbye was very hard, because of the close relationships that were developed over the course of the year while implementing the program.  The great thing about the mentor association is that each year a banquet is held for students, their mentors, and the founding committee, the president of the college and other dignitaries and members of the community to celebrate and to close out another successful year.  Many of the students continue to a close bond with their mentors well after graduation and into their adult lives.

Conflict Resolution

Until the recent death of my father in law my husband and his siblings had a huge disagreement about whether or not to place their father in a nursing home due to his illness.  Their father had Alzheimer, he was in the final stages of the disease where he no longer recognized several of the family members.  There are ten siblings, seven of the brothers thought it best to place the dad in a nursing home, believing that it would be in the best interest of the Dad and would help their mother being that she was the primary caretaker, on the other hand the other three siblings believed that it would best to leave the dad in his familiar surroundings and try to make him as comfortable as possible.  They suggested home health care which would alleviate the fatigue and stress that the mother was enduring by being the primary caretaker.  The sibling constantly disagreed about this matter until several of them did not want to speak to one another.  I suggested to my husband that maybe they could have the mother and father move-in with one of the siblings that lived next door to the mom and dad’s home, that way the dad would be close enough to his home and he could still sit out in his garage like he did everyday as well as walk around in the yard.  At the same time the mother would have around the clock help while living with her son and his wife.  Also, each one of the siblings could assist the dad at night by getting him washed-up and put to bed.  And perhaps since its ten siblings they all could rotate shifts to help care for the Dad.  This was a win/win resolution because the Dad did not have to be placed in a nursing home and at the same time would receive around the clock care for those who loved him.  This arrangement worked until his death last week.  But at least the family was able to make his last days comfortable by being around family.