Salty Sal

Salty Sal here, I haven't posted in awhile. It's not that nothing has pissed me off, its just that I've been busy. A girl has got to make a living, you know. I've kept quiet about things at the workplace because I need my job now that the old man doesn't have one. 61 years old and I've supported men most of my life. What's wrong with me? I've got to say this latest man has been the best. He's got gumption, unlike some of the other dead beats I've brought home the bacon for. I'm a fixer and a caregiver and I've had enough therapy to know I'm doing it for the wrong reasons, but how do you stop? More therapy, maybe? But if it hasn't taken by now, it probably never will. Just a waste of good money I could play the slot machines with and have more fun. 

Anyway, enough of that. My mental health is boring. Well, maybe not boring, but predictable anyway.  What has been getting my craw lately is the trend at the healthcare outfit I work for that wants to force me into "scripting". Like I don't know how to be polite to people. What a frickin' insult! I have to be told to say "Thank you for choosing ____Health for your healthcare needs".  This is what I'm supposed to say after I've had a discussion about death and dying and what happens to the body in between the stages of getting to the death part. Really?? Do these people in their offices with the panoramic windows and the espresso coffee machines and the catered lunches know what they're talking about? Healthcare isn't usually a pretty, slick, sleek, marketable package of beautiful people on their way to the gym. It's disease, it's death, it's putrid infections, it's amputations, it's mental and spiritual anguish, it's terror and it's ugly. Give me a script for that, because my tongue gets tied with the pain of it all. 

I will speak kindly to patients. I will speak compassionately. I will speak with the utmost respect, with the competence and skill that a 40 year career in nursing brings. Don't ask me to say fake, canned, pretty scripted phrases and then base my annual evaluation and puny salary increase on how well I complied with that phony business. THAT pisses off Salty Sal and brings her out to speak her piece! 

(Oh and,by the way, thank you for choosing to read Salty Sal!)