Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Volunteering

I thought finding a job was going to be really easy for me out here. In my mind I was going to immediately get a job at the sports medicine and orthopedic clinic that's literally three minutes up the road from where we live. It was going to be great. It turns out that my job field is very limited up here, not a lot of jobs, and many of the places want an x-ray tech who is also certified in CT and has worked at least three years. I had only worked a year and a half with my license before we moved. And in order for me to do CT I would have to go back to school and probably commute an hour to go to a teaching hospital.

I'm done with school. I payed off all of my school loans over a year ago. I don't like CT. 
I never heard back from any other job I applied to. I even applied to random stores like Barnes and Noble and Hobby Lobby but I'm over qualified. 

I took the job hunt pretty hard. I felt like I was suddenly a worthless tech who no one wanted. They didn't know me but they knew enough apparently to not want me. 

I finally decided to just start doing some volunteer work at a hospital to help keep me busy and maybe get a foot in the door. 

Best idea ever.

I chose to help out on a couple of the patient floors answering the phone, patient call lights, helping out where I can and also working on the comfort cart. Oh yeah. I take this cart around to every single patient and pass out coffee, tea, juices or water. It's actually really fun and people here in the south are the best. "No thank you sugar." "Thanks so much sweety!" "Oh thank you baby." They really do call everyone and anyone things like that. 

I was also introduced to the radiology manager on my first day who told me to bring her my resume and she would look into things for me. There's a hiring freeze right now though at that hospital which is a bummer but she totally gave me a hug when I gave her my resume. That's how friendly people are here!

Now I should have realized this but for some reason it didn't cross my mind, but all of the volunteers are at least 70 years old. And then there's me, little young looking me who they all think is 18. The old volunteer men like to make the joke that I brought down the average age of the group to 50 now. I've had a couple doctors even do double takes at me, they have a confused look, "Wait, why isn't your hair grey?! Why are you volunteering? You're not 80!" They're normally really impressed actually when I tell them I'm keeping myself busy with volunteering until I can find a job. Just the other day I had a surgeon sitting by me and we went through the routine about why I was volunteering and how I'm a certified rad tech when suddenly he pulls out his prescription pad and writes me a "letter" of recommendation to take to another hospital! It blew me away! He also told me he was going to talk to the radiology manager again for me.  I'm grateful for kind people like that in this world. 

I took his prescription to the other hospital and talked to the HR department. They only have an opening for an MRI job so no luck there. But I'll keep looking. The HR girl was completely confused about the prescription letter of recommendation. haha It was so great. I doubt she's ever seen anything like that! 

I don't know when or if a job will come out of all this, but I'm enjoying my time volunteering. It's good to socialize with all these people of different backgrounds. I love the southern black women, all of their "mmhmmm!" It's just fun to make some friends. My favorite is an old lady named Margaret who is a volunteer and trained me on the comfort cart. She's a retired nurse from England. Her mother was a nurse as well and a midwife! (If you've seen the tv show Call the Midwife, then you know that I was dying to find out that her mother was one of those women!) She's a hoot and her England accent is the best thing to find in the deep south. I love it.

Anyways, I'm glad things are happening the way they are. I know it wasn't how I wanted but guess what? Heavenly Father knows way more then I do! So I'll just keep going along with his plan.

1 comment:

Kristin DiCristofano said...

What an amazing experience. I hope you find a job soon but until then, you're awesome just the way you are :)