OH MY GOSH!!!

I know I forgot to blog yesterday, but Sunday too? I swear, I'm such a dork.

So I've been on-call for Code R's Sunday and Monday until this morning at 7am. I do not sleep well when I am on-call. I keep waking up and realizing I haven't been paged. It's kind of like having a baby and waking up all night expecting the baby to wake you up. You end up sleeping just as poorly as if the baby had woken you up several times during the night.

Yesterday I went to a meeting with Code R people: detectives, Rape Crisis volunteers, lawyers, police officers and Women's Crisis volunteers. Our director, Sue, was in charge. After the meeting, I told her a little about Emeli and how I wanted to know how to help her cope better. She gave me the name of a woman who coordinates an adolescent victim's group here in Utah County. They get together and talk about how to stand up for yourself, how to work on your self esteem, and not just the gritty details of what happened to you. They also do activities. Last year they built a dollhouse for a community event sponsoring homeless children or something like that. Emeli took a little bit of convincing. Her fear is that she joins this group and she gets labeled as different. That's when Brett jumped in. He told her about how he was part of this support group called Gay Straight Alliance. He loved being with people who had the same struggles as him. He told her they didn't sit around talking about how they were gay, but they talked about how to be okay with it and how to cope with a society that doesn't always accept them. I told her that there are groups for all kinds of people: parents of twins, people who have addictions, parents of children who have been molested, people who take care of their aging parents (a group my mom belonged to), etc. She was more receptive after that. She said she would give it a try. So, on Thursday, when I have a half day at work, I will call the lady. I don't want to call her when I work all day because I wouldn't be able to talk to her. On Thursday, I will have time to chat. I'm very excited. I have been wondering how to help Emeli through this. It is usually around this age that the effects of molestation start to flair up and cause girls to really struggle with things. I feel so blessed to have found this group. I don't know if I would have found this group any other way. I see how Heavenly Father works in ways that help His children. I feel very blessed that he cares enough about Emeli to put me in this path.

Today one our patients had the last name Norris. I jokingly asked him if he was related to Chuck Norris. He said that Norris is not really Chuck Norris' last name. He said that his son has a dog named Chuck, so in a way he is related to Chuck Norris. We laughed about that one. Now I have to look up online and see what Chuck Norris' real name is.

I'm going to bed early....