Buses, dogs and seizures. Oh my!

Can't seem to shake yesterday out of my head. You just never know what a day is going to bring. I'm getting use to the fact that my job is at a pretty fast pace and can be described in one word: multi-tasking. (That is one word. See the dash!) But yesterday.....

School starts at 8:30 with the doors opening for the kids at 8:00. I usually get there about 7:50. At 8:15, I got a call from a mom saying that her son had called her and his school bus had been involved in an accident. She said that the police were there, evidently there were more cars involved, and she expected a full report. I called the bus company, who didn't know much more at the time. In a few minutes, they called back and we had three students on board, but everyone was fine and they would do parental notifications. Oh, and I forgot to say....this was a special needs bus. That brings on a whole other set of worries. Then I had the cocky police officer from the school at my elbow informing me - in his best NYC officer tone - that there had been an accident (I knew), to call the bus company (I had), and to notify the parents (they were).

After that calmed down a little, I had a woman call to say that there had been a dog hit by a car on the busy street behind the school. She went into great detail about how she always tries to help hurt animals but this one limped away on to the school property only to lie down next to the tennis courts and die. Great! Tennis classes were to start soon. As much as my heart is touched by animals, we had a large class of students going out there that I didn't want traumatized by a hurt and probably dead animal. I call animal control and ask them to come check on it.

Then the boys from the bus accident come in. Of course, being 12 and 13 year old boys, they thought it was awesome. Everyone is fine; they have great stories to tell and we take care of their tardies and send them off to classes.

Finally find the tennis coach who takes a golf cart and surveys the school property. Can't find the dog. We are not sure whether animal control was on the job or if the poor dog decided to drag off somewhere else to die.

By this time, it's about 9 a.m. I've also seen about 30 students that were late to school; taken at least the same amount of parental calls; won another satellite dish (that's what the recorded voices always tell me); accepted forgotten lunches, football pads and assorted things brought up school by their parents.

Then I hear from another employee that the school "I-can't-be-happy-so-no-one-else-can-be-happy" nurse at our school has started something about me. She told this employee that everyone (meaning she and one other) were upset over an office staff meeting last week where the principal presented a project that I and (2) assistant principals had worked on. The principal gave me full credit (thanks a lot) and the procedures stepped on some toes. Namely hers. I had been warned about this lady before (by both assistant principals who want her gone)but had never been the object of her spew. Anyway, this person also hinted that someone had been in my e-mail. I don't think there is anything to find, but that fact is such an invasion of privacy and disturbing. Someone has to cover my desk at lunch and I have to have quite a few programs open during the day. I have come back and found their e-mail open and have been careful to stay out and close it. I expected the same consideration. Well that is a lesson!

My day was the usual busy and the next big hit came about 4:45. (Of course, I get off at 4:00.) A student came banging on the office door saying that someone was having a seizure. One of the band directors happened to be leaving and she and I got out at the same time. Here is a 12 year old down on the ground next to a fallen bike at the end of a seizure. I told her to call 911 and ran down to him. He was breathing, I got his backpack off of him and put it under his head and tried to talk to him. He had been riding his bike home, had a seizure on the bike and fell hard hitting his head. I found a rather large abrasion on the side of his head. Anyway, in what seemed like forever but was probably about 10 minutes, I tried to keep him calm and awake. The ambulance got there and started getting his vitals. He seemed confused and slow, but he could tell them where he was and who I was. They were waiting for his parents to get there before transporting him and then he went into another seizure. They scoop him up onto the gurney and run for the ambulance. Just as they are loading him into the back, mom and dad get there. I found out later that he has epilepsy and that is the reason that they moved here. They are from London and weren't getting the treatment he needed so they came here. By this time it was 5:15 and I thought I had better get out of there quickly. Went home and found myself on my neighbor's doorstep going "Got wine?". I tried to call a couple of hospitals to see how he was, but couldn't find him. We have so many close hospitals.

Anyway, I woke up at 3:30 this morning not being able to shake all of this out of my mind. I went to a first aid class just last week but I kept thinking what else was I suppose to do. So I did what anyone would do. Got out of bed and started to google. Actually, I did pretty well. I had him on his side, but he wanted to roll over on his stomach. He wasn't having trouble breathing so I just left him that way and stayed with him. I know that Nurse Cratchett will be interrogating me this morning and will find something that I did that could of killed the kid. Ay-yi-yi.

Last night my husband came home and wanted to know why I hadn't gone to the grocery store. We'll miss that man!

Later.