I was going to try and load pics 5 at a time... and then came to my senses when I realized that I had over 50 pics I wanted to share... So I loaded them on slideshows to save time and space on here...
The trip was amazing... When we arrived there, Friday and Saturday seemed to be very long days, but after that, the days flew by and the next thing I knew, it was time to come home and I was sad that I wasn't able to stay the whole week.
We all met at Loma Linda at 430 am and piled into the car and headed to LAX.. We got there around 7am, and our flight wasn't until 11am!!! So needless to say we waited around a while... We all finally checked in and eventually got ont the plane... The flight was 3 hours and 15 minutes long... We arrived at Guadalajara airport on Friday evening and it took us over an hour to get all of our baggage together and onto the bus we were going to be traveling in... Then we had to rent the minivans that we would be driving around town for the week... Finally, we were on our way to El Ranchito which was 3 and a half hours away from the airport... I slept most of the way there, because it was dark and there were not really many street lights, and I was so tired... We stopped about half way to grab a bite to eat.. And then more driving...
When we arrived at the house, we all tried to find a place to sleep and got comfy and ready for bed... Sherie and I decided to sleep outside on the hammmocks... So we all went to bed. Saturday morning was church service. Last year it was held outside of an open building under a tarp tent... This year they held it inside a disco club building.. (Every year they seem to upgrade, the first year it was held under a large tree...) After service, they had a huge potluck meal and we all just chatted. I brought candy bracelets and Valentines pencils for the kids and handed them out.. They loved them!!!! It melted my heart.
After church we all went home to pack an overnight bag because we were going to stay at the cabins on the beach as a bonding night... It was beautiful there... We laid out at the beach, had dinner as a big family, and just hung out till we went to bed... Unfortunately we suffered 2 incidents this night... One was our coordinator Dianna who fell in a little ditch and sprained her ankle really bad. The other was one of the docs that fell into a bunch of sea urchins at the beach and got spines in both of his hands, his side and legs. (He later got them taken out of his hands and there were over 300 just in his hands) We slept 7 in our cabin that night.. There were 2 beds with 2 people on each, and 3 people on the floor... But it was great!! I enjoyed it...
The next morning we had breakfast at the top of the hill and then went back to the house to get ready to sort the medical bags and organize ourselves at the hospital. We went there and unloaded all the bags, then headed off to the clinic to do some minor procedures.
Monday we headed to the hospital. Where I would soon find out that I would not be scrubbing as much as I thought I would since Dianna was hurt and couldn't really walk around, she asked me to take over for her. So I ended up admitting our patients to the hospital (yes all the paperwork was in spanish and had to be written in spanish), write orders for them, take their history and physical, take them to the Operating room, and even recover them... Wow... Dianna does so much work behind the scenes... I was amazed and exhausted!!! So this is the reason I wasn't able to get as many pics as I did last year. I was way too busy. We admitted 3 patients so I had to write orders for their overnight stay, and then do rounds on them in the morning. I felt like a doctor!! The staff from the hospital even asked me what kind of doc I was, and were surprised when I said I was just their right hand woman doing all the leg work..... We were at the hospital from 630 am until 1 am this day.. By the time we got home and took showers and got in bed it was nearly 230!!!! Just enough time to get some sleep and get up again around 6am....
Tuesday we had 2 septoplasty cases (noses) and then called it a day because both of our plastic surgeons were leaving. That was an easy day for the OR crew, but I did paperwork for all the patients for wed and thursday.... Since I would be leaving on Wednesday. After work, we headed out to a beautiful beach called La Privada (the private one) here we hung out for a few hours then went to a different beach to have dinner. It was a great last night in Mexico...
On Wednesday, I got up at 430 in the morning with the other tech, and we went to the hospital to sterilize instruments for the day. We threw trays together, pulled our supplies for the day, then went back home for breakfast... We returned to the OR around 8am to do a vaginal hysterectomy and a circumcision, and then it was time to go... I stopped by our patients room (the latissmus graft) and said goodbye. She started to cry and made me cry because she was so grateful for what we had done for her. We stopped at the clinic to say goodbye to that crew and the dentists... Then went home to gather our stuff and off we went.
It took another 3 and a half hours to get to the airport (10 of us squeezed into a suburban) and we were 3 hours early so we just walked around, took pictures, grabbed some hot chocolate at starbucks and waited!!! I slept on the flight home and was sooo happy to see Mark when I got to LAX.... I missed him so much!!!! We didn't get home until nearly 2am, so I was glad to have the next day off.
So that's it... The run down on the trip. We helped a lot of people, I met a great group of new people, learned some new stuff, had a great time, and well...It was just amazing.
So these are some of my pics. As soon as I get more from the other people I will load them up.... Thanks for reading.... Here they are.....
The trip was amazing... When we arrived there, Friday and Saturday seemed to be very long days, but after that, the days flew by and the next thing I knew, it was time to come home and I was sad that I wasn't able to stay the whole week.
We all met at Loma Linda at 430 am and piled into the car and headed to LAX.. We got there around 7am, and our flight wasn't until 11am!!! So needless to say we waited around a while... We all finally checked in and eventually got ont the plane... The flight was 3 hours and 15 minutes long... We arrived at Guadalajara airport on Friday evening and it took us over an hour to get all of our baggage together and onto the bus we were going to be traveling in... Then we had to rent the minivans that we would be driving around town for the week... Finally, we were on our way to El Ranchito which was 3 and a half hours away from the airport... I slept most of the way there, because it was dark and there were not really many street lights, and I was so tired... We stopped about half way to grab a bite to eat.. And then more driving...
When we arrived at the house, we all tried to find a place to sleep and got comfy and ready for bed... Sherie and I decided to sleep outside on the hammmocks... So we all went to bed. Saturday morning was church service. Last year it was held outside of an open building under a tarp tent... This year they held it inside a disco club building.. (Every year they seem to upgrade, the first year it was held under a large tree...) After service, they had a huge potluck meal and we all just chatted. I brought candy bracelets and Valentines pencils for the kids and handed them out.. They loved them!!!! It melted my heart.
After church we all went home to pack an overnight bag because we were going to stay at the cabins on the beach as a bonding night... It was beautiful there... We laid out at the beach, had dinner as a big family, and just hung out till we went to bed... Unfortunately we suffered 2 incidents this night... One was our coordinator Dianna who fell in a little ditch and sprained her ankle really bad. The other was one of the docs that fell into a bunch of sea urchins at the beach and got spines in both of his hands, his side and legs. (He later got them taken out of his hands and there were over 300 just in his hands) We slept 7 in our cabin that night.. There were 2 beds with 2 people on each, and 3 people on the floor... But it was great!! I enjoyed it...
The next morning we had breakfast at the top of the hill and then went back to the house to get ready to sort the medical bags and organize ourselves at the hospital. We went there and unloaded all the bags, then headed off to the clinic to do some minor procedures.
Monday we headed to the hospital. Where I would soon find out that I would not be scrubbing as much as I thought I would since Dianna was hurt and couldn't really walk around, she asked me to take over for her. So I ended up admitting our patients to the hospital (yes all the paperwork was in spanish and had to be written in spanish), write orders for them, take their history and physical, take them to the Operating room, and even recover them... Wow... Dianna does so much work behind the scenes... I was amazed and exhausted!!! So this is the reason I wasn't able to get as many pics as I did last year. I was way too busy. We admitted 3 patients so I had to write orders for their overnight stay, and then do rounds on them in the morning. I felt like a doctor!! The staff from the hospital even asked me what kind of doc I was, and were surprised when I said I was just their right hand woman doing all the leg work..... We were at the hospital from 630 am until 1 am this day.. By the time we got home and took showers and got in bed it was nearly 230!!!! Just enough time to get some sleep and get up again around 6am....
Tuesday we had 2 septoplasty cases (noses) and then called it a day because both of our plastic surgeons were leaving. That was an easy day for the OR crew, but I did paperwork for all the patients for wed and thursday.... Since I would be leaving on Wednesday. After work, we headed out to a beautiful beach called La Privada (the private one) here we hung out for a few hours then went to a different beach to have dinner. It was a great last night in Mexico...
On Wednesday, I got up at 430 in the morning with the other tech, and we went to the hospital to sterilize instruments for the day. We threw trays together, pulled our supplies for the day, then went back home for breakfast... We returned to the OR around 8am to do a vaginal hysterectomy and a circumcision, and then it was time to go... I stopped by our patients room (the latissmus graft) and said goodbye. She started to cry and made me cry because she was so grateful for what we had done for her. We stopped at the clinic to say goodbye to that crew and the dentists... Then went home to gather our stuff and off we went.
It took another 3 and a half hours to get to the airport (10 of us squeezed into a suburban) and we were 3 hours early so we just walked around, took pictures, grabbed some hot chocolate at starbucks and waited!!! I slept on the flight home and was sooo happy to see Mark when I got to LAX.... I missed him so much!!!! We didn't get home until nearly 2am, so I was glad to have the next day off.
So that's it... The run down on the trip. We helped a lot of people, I met a great group of new people, learned some new stuff, had a great time, and well...It was just amazing.
So these are some of my pics. As soon as I get more from the other people I will load them up.... Thanks for reading.... Here they are.....
2 comments:
Looks like you guys had fun! Sounds like you had a fun valentines too :) Hey we need to go out soon!
Love ya,
Brandie
AMAZING! i loved every picture. :) you guys do SUCH a great thing. it really looks like a lot of fun too!! i can't imagine how tired you were...but you seem to run off of adrenaline. ;)
i know your boys are glad to have ya back! i gave Obi some extra snuggles for you while you were away (when the boys came over last weekend). mark forgot his sweater and i said..."if kathy were here she would've never let that happen". ;) at least he didn't disagree! ha ha!
love ya,
mel
Post a Comment