Public Health Care 101 Coverage

2/9/19

The smell of diesel fuel seeped through the open window. It mixed with the cold air and although we were eleven stories up staring at the wall as the compactor truck crunched metal from the never-ending construction at Houston and Broadway. I was sick from the smell and the noise inside my head and outside of our building. This is the way we sit meditation with everything going on at once. In the city there are no peaceful mountains.

I think about it all. My patients, my breath the other person’s heavy stuffy nose breathing. I hope I don’t get her cold. People are pigs. Oink it is the year of the Pig. People put their dirty hands into the snacks and walk around the table munching. That makes me slightly sick too. If they only knew biology or public health realities. Some of them would be the first to argue or comment on who should pay or how expensive health insurance is. Others sit on the side lines watching, others gingerly select without touching what they don’t want. Leaving nothing behind. Nothing left behind like germs. Cough, cough.

My job is to care for people. I know that Health care coverage is a big topic. I have heard it called Universal Coverage, Medicare for All and a host of other hybrid names. The 2020 election will revolve around this.  I urge myself not to get caught up in the side shows that will take us away from the every day reality of what it costs to get medical care.

I am a clinician among other things in life. I study human relationships in health, body, mind, self, living and dying ad nauseum. Remember the petrol fumes? As a clinician it is like being in the fumes of the living and dying cells, of self and others. Put on your mask and get up and go.

Now I must do that and urge others to go out there and get those votes and voters signed up to charter the things that will help us all. The first is to be able and healthy enough to lighten the load of suffering for those who are ill and put all our shoulders together to do it.

Get ready. Get up and go. Do something and even though we all have our favorite social projects, vote and keep your senses open and your mind clear from the offense of chatter that poisons the well in wellness. Because it is an offense, a move to distract and destroy. Sitting on the side lines is not an option for those who want to live. There is a hierarchy in the needs of humans. The first one is to be taken care of or we will not survive. Or as I like to call it, Public Health Care 101.

Diana Ji Fu Lakis

Returning, always

11/24/18

In the last few weeks I have resumed working in a rehab department inside a nursing home.  I am reminded why I continue to be a clinician. Here are two brief accounts of two patients I have been assigned to treat. There are no names just initials and only an outline of each to protect their patient privilege.

First there is the woman who had a disfiguring oral facial cancer for the fifth time. She is amazing and much loved by a very large family. Her business is in the food industry although she can no longer eat, taste food, or talk because most of her tongue has been removed. She is running her business successfully during her treatment. She helps mentor others through her spiritual faith. She had her laptop on the tray table, but she insisted on writing all communication with caregivers. She had a lot of energy and a lot of pain. We walked the halls together. The three of us, the physical therapist, myself and Ms. T. It was a slow mindful light- hearted walk. She also used to be a dancer and it showed in her delight of movement during the walk.

B. was a tough guy to handle at first. When we entered the room, his gown was in disarray and tattoos covered his upper body. I guessed he had been either in a gang or in prison. Maybe both. He was argumentative and in pain with part of one lower extremity newly amputated. He was verbally combative, so we just let him have is say and rant and rave as we bore witness to his suffering and call for help.  Eventually he relented and said he would show up for therapy at eleven in the morning tomorrow. I checked back with him a couple of times and the last time he called me over to his bedside and asked if he could shake my hand. I said, “yes of course.” Then he asked if he could say a prayer for me. He began, and it was so eloquent I was blown away. The argumentative, aggressive, angry person was no longer there. Since then, when he is anxious, we flow into a prayer that I ask him to initiate. It is quite moving to hear him because he is so gifted.

Round Robin of Harm

Round Robin of Harm.

The first section of this particular blog is called an Introduction, the Second is called Round One:

This one as noted above is called Round Robin of Harm.

I was not surprised to read today that Israel has asked D.T. to intervene on their behalf. Here are a few of the things that I have heard and experienced. "Hillary Clinton gave away 500 million dollars of my money." I was non plussed considering the source I said "Really? I did not know you were worth 500 million dollars. He sputtered and said, "my tax dollars. She gave to the Palistinians" I could have said many things. Like yeah and what did D.T. pay in taxes didn't he owe a lot in taxes? I guess we may never know. Oh, wait I vaguely remember it was for humanitarian aid and she did not do it single handed. Maybe I am wrong about that. But a friend said to me "how about all the financial aid we have given to Israel?" Yeah, I thought since its inception, I am sure it is much more than 500 million. I decided he was so stupid I could not respond to that.

Or this gem "Hillary is going to take away our guns" this from the russian american dudes. Yikes.
I thought "yeah she will come up to you on the streets of Brooklyn or wherever you live and with her bare hands take those guns right out of your hands. My oh my what will you do then. Sit down on the corner and cry? I continued with my computer billing.

Then there was the porno graffiti  of Hillary that my co-worker saw and when she did, she told them point blank...that is not appropriate and you have to shred it immediately.

There was so much other verbal rubbish strewn about I felt like I was in a cesspool, a swamp, a rhetorical sphincter of  pseudo analytical thought that was meant for shot gun reactions. Fits and sharts they would be. Get your adult pampers for this crap. Except that it harms. These are thoughts like C Difficile Aureus the latest permutation on the disease state that is resistant to antibiotics to such a degree that CDC and others have issued guidelines and warnings to be notified.

On the way home tonight, up the stairs on the walkway to the other train and I heard a gang of people coming up behind very loud and did not know what the heck was going on. Right next to me a Muslim woman in garb. I did not notice her at all until then, maybe I sensed her fear. I instinctively grabbed her by the elbow and said let's go fast keep going move fast lets go straight. She had head phone on but heard and listened  and looked at me. I turned to see they were either drunk or something. I said to her they are goofing around but I suggest that when you hear that kind of stuff ...just keep going fast and away. You never know. Oh I was wearing the pin thing on my hat which means I will help out. Maybe she put herself next to me for safety.

May I have compassion on myself and take heed.

Evolution of Harm End of Round One

How do I put into words the most perverted rhetoric I heard in that facility? I really can't do it justice.
I heard grown men yodel about what a good leader Putin was. I heard those same men banter and defame Hillary. These were colleagues in health care. Not the ranting or raving of demented patients.
I overheard such crazy stuff as I tried to concentrate on my notes, my patients and the billing.
It was so off the charts that I could not wade into that morass of ugliness. The two young men I think were born here but their families are Russian. They were standing up for Putin when out of the blue one woman who was born in the Soviet Union started shouting them down. Then another. It was beyond belief in a way. Such  different factions in a small room and it was about our U. S.  elections which were coming up.Those born in the former Soviet Union were telling the boys who weren't that "you don't know what it was like. You don't know what you are talking about. Why don't you go there and live for a while and see." Oh it was bad.
Throughout this ugliness I  did not tell anyone who I would vote for. Even though I was asked. My reply was "that is my business. It is a private matter." That still did not keep me safe from the roiling turmoil of emotions that were just all over the place. Keep in mind this is a place of work. I am there part time but during the electioneering I had a more extended period there.
I wish I hadn't. It gave me a window into blue collar thought about this country. I have always been a blue collar worker. Those shouting matches cracked open the background of grievances that I had heard in other parts of this country. I knew we were in trouble.

This is the country I was born in and I have not other to go back to. Nor do I owe allegiance to another country. Or would I use my vote to bring into power someone who I think would fulfill my single pointed agenda for another country if it proved unhealthy for the whole of this land. I wish that ethos was at work for those whose primary agenda is to will power to a foreign land. Even if they never lived in those other lands, but think or were otherwise propagandized to believe that they need to please those around them by getting on a bandwagon either in religious or other sanctified ways to feel they belong to something powerful.

Donald T. knew this angle and worked it. He opened the gates so that some oaf at work who prays every morning and wears a yamulka can look at my crotch and shout "dirty rotten stinking Hillary"
over and over until I turn look him in the eyes and ask him if he has any daughters.




 

TO UNDERSTAND HARM: Introduction

I am here with you post election. It is the so called holidays, the end of the year thankfully. But no one knows what the new year brings except uncertainty. Harmful things have happened to me and others during the run up to the poisoned election. The runoff of that ill tasting emotional turmoil has continued to spawn more plots and twists than could have been imagined in some of our worst nightmares. Many try with varying degrees to unwind the ball of yarn, peel back the layers of onion,
look back and forward in attempts to make sense of the non-sensible. The things I know for sure are the things that happened to me in one work situation that lasted for one year and a few weeks before the election. And like others, I am unraveling what appears to be preposterous but has a resonating truth that I was not aware of even though I knew that something very odd was happening.

So here it goes. I worked in a nursing home in Queens which serves a lot of ethnic Bukharan Jews. There is a day care center for people from that community. I loved watching the dances, parties and enjoyed the good nature and old world friendships over backgammon. I often wondered about the wars and other experiences they had back home in the former Soviet Union. I did not work with them as they were bused in from their homes just for adult day care. On occasion one of them was a patient on my roster.  I found they were a somewhat closed community and I did not intrude. It was like an invisible line that would not be stepped over. In my research I found that the Jerusalem Post carries articles on the Bukharan community here in NYC.  It also has articles of fake news regarding Hillary Clinton and others. Which helps me to understand some of the hate filled rhetoric I heard in that facility.

The entire facility was kosher and they fed everyone including their employees which is a rarity these days. I felt a sense of being taken care of because of that. It is run by Ashkenazi Jews. This is important to know. Two separate Jewish groups who are sometimes at odds with each other were there. I didn't understand what really was going on. One ran the facility and the other rented a place for adult day care within the larger facility. It all seemed to work. I noticed the Bukharan group did not seem to be overly religious. I live in the lower east side of New York City and am used to religious Jews. So to see these two groups together was novel to me. I knew nothing but love. I don't know why I wrote that, but compassion is the default for myself and others.

 TID BITS in the Ever Changing Field of Health Care

Have you ever wondered when researching a prospective job opportunity at a  nursing home whether there were lawsuits against them? And have you noticed there was no information about that? Well, there wasn't. Because people who put relatives in nursing homes signed contracts that would bind them to mediation and arbitration rather than be able to sue in a court of law or even file a law suit.  Therefore, there would not be any public record. 

That will change on November 1st. I encourage you to read the article below which explains the importance of having the ability to do that. I do have to add here that there will probably not be nefarious lawsuits initiated. One reason is that it is expensive another is that any self respecting judge will not accept lawsuits that have no merit. For a number of years I worked as a para legal and saw how court cases are initiated and handled.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/29/business/dealbook/arbitration-nursing-homes-elder-abuse-harassment-claims.html

SUBTLE EASE

Cognitive Ease could be a subtle taste of Samadhi. A vision, a realization of the dharma of every day things which in themselves are miracles. This release into ease removes obstacles created by our belief in our own thought fallacies. We cling to our beliefs and won't allow ourselves the whole picture. This bias stifles creativity when our thought processes are poisoned by too much shotgun thinking and not enough reasonable thinking and vice versa. Out of balance there seems no middle way for us. No matter what, to some, they will not listen to reason if it does not align with their beliefs. Those beliefs exist as distractions because they are considered expedient. They are easy to remember, categorize, repeat and adhere to. These adhesions are scar tissue that impede movement to balance. There is no ease of thought, movement, creativity, consciousness. We are anchored perhaps mired in thought processes with closed doors, or partially opened ones that we slam shut in fear, maybe we are ignorant and walk right past the door not listening or seeing that little sliver of light. We strain our sensations with garbage and overload our thoughts to believe fallacies are true. We suffer and create more suffering. Emotions created by this poverty drain the cognitive bank account. There is no ease and we are exhausted, tired by the fight we have inherited from the karmic thought fallacies.  We have destroyed the knowing of ease in every day life by accepting and promoting the lazy orientation to all things for the subtle nature of every day being.