Today was the longest visit I have had with Zoralei. I got a solid six hours of time with her. I arrived as she was finishing her second at home workout. I did a few of them with her. It consisted of exercises like one arm planks for a minute each, pushups, situps, lunges, regular plank, running around the hall (quickly adjusted to walking when the nurse said that was dangerous), wall squats, jumping jacks, and jumping squats. I think there was a couple of more, but that is the basic idea of the exercises. She does them 90 reps each time. It was tough. During the one arm plank, she collapsed a couple of times, immediately paused her timer, got back up and started the timer again. I was impressed with her determination and her integrity to make sure her 'homework' got done. She was to do this workout once Saturday afternoon even though she did nearly a full day of the usual workouts and twice today (Sunday). There are some stretches they have her do as well. She says yoga is one of the things she is learning as well. If you are familiar with Shaun T's insanity type workout, many of the exercises she describes are similar to what you do in that program as well as a variety of animal walks. This girl will be so buff when she is done this program!!
I asked her about whether they were encouraging her to write. She said they had not asked her to write. It was something she did to ease the loneliness of being in her room, because the characters help her to feel like someone is with her. Since it was Sunday, several of the other teen hospital patients on her floor had the weekend at home and she was very much looking forward to reuniting with them as there wasn't a lot of people to keep her company all day Sunday and we were only allowed a six hour visit. She took advantage of face time and skype to talk with a friend and her older sister, but even at that, she had a lot of time left to pass.
I asked her a bit more about the program. How was counseling going? She said all they have talked about was some unusual fears that she has, how she typically responds to stress, and her background. She says in counseling they have not talked about how she feels about the program or the response of the staff to her crying or anything pertaining to her current experience. Perhaps that will change, but she goes days between sessions and sometimes it is just a few minutes when the counselor talks with her. For such an intense program, I am actually surprised there is not more emphasis on counseling. I would think that might be an important coping skill and outlet for her to deal with the rigors of the program. It sounds like it is another outlet for ultimately providing suggestions for dealing with stress, which several different specialists described as part of their job description.
For the most part, the staff has been nice to Zoralei. There is only one staff member who seems to not want to be around during any of the exercises and Zoralei even joked to the staffer that maybe she (Zoralei) was the reason the staffer kept leaving. We reason that having to be so emotionally detached to a person's suffering must very difficult for the staff members too. It is not the usual human response to ignore someone's tears.
Zoralei said that she doesn't mind the pain as she knows that it will help. What bothers her is the lack of individual consideration for the patients. It is a very regimented program with no give at all and sometimes individuals need something different to thrive. She, being extroverted, has managed to make friends at the hospital, but there is always that underlying concern that the staff, having made it clear that they do not want outsiders visiting and are weary of relationships made within the hospital, may decide to take the privilege of hanging with those friends away if they hinder her progress. So she works as hard as she can to show them it does not prevent her from succeeding in any way.
One nurse had signed Zoralei's paper that Zoralei did the exercises as directed and she told her that she keeps seeing how hard Zoralei is working. Zoralei and I both thought it was nice to have the kind words. My daughter told me her therapists do not respond to any indication of pain or discomfort, but some of them will tell her when the exercise or session is over that she did well or worked hard. She overheard one conversation between staffers where they were talking about how well she was doing. I was grateful there are some kind words, even though they exhibit very little compassion for her pain.
Zoralei , myself, and a nurse were just making small talk and feeling yukky premenstrually. The nurse said it was ok to have a bad day now and then, in reference to a woman's monthly. Zoralei looked at the nurse and said, "I am not allowed to have a bad day here." The conversation ended quickly after that as the nurses are restricted in what they can talk about. Still, many people have complimented Zoralei how she often seems to have a smile on her face and tries to be cheerful, so she isn't succumbing to having a bad day in this program, but I bet sometimes it would be nice to feel like she could just feel whatever she was feeling. She is doing so well holding it together.
At about 5 pm, Zoralei sighed and said that this was the time of day when she started dreading bedtime (which is 4 hours away), because it meant she has to start the program over again. Tomorrow is two and half straight hours of physical therapy before she gets any type of break and she knew that was going to be 'tough.' They put the schedule up the night before so you have time to worry about it and cope with the anxiety over it or so I assume that is the purpose.
She described how the last time she kept getting the same time as before on an exercise and ended up having to do it 8 times before she beat the previous score and was able to move on to another exercise for the day. She will get the exercise again the next day and have to beat her new time, but at least she could stop redoing it over and over for that day. She rarely talks about how painful it is. Her sole comment in regard to pain levels was that sometimes she prays that the Lord will make it so she faints and because then she would not have to do it again when she did not beat her time.
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