When is it ever time?

When is it ever time? When is quality of life so low that I must let my little girl slip peacefully into an eternal sleep, never to see the light of day again? When is it time to let that dog go?

The dog who is 13 years old and has had Cushing's Disease for over a year;
The dog who has been part of my family for over 12 years, more than half my life;
The dog who walked me to elementary school and was there at the street corner waiting to walk home with me when the bell rang at the end of the day;
The dog who ran around the yard with a toy soccer ball while 8-year-old me chased her;
The dog who I took running when I was in middle school;
The dog who could always play with visitors and friends and be trusted to behave nicely;
The dog who was a member of a secret club with my brother and me in the backyard one summer;
The dog who came to visit me at college my freshman year;
The dog who watched out the front window as we drove away and ran as fast as she could to the front door when we returned home;
The dog who was my very first passenger after I got my provisional license;
The dog who joined our family on a two-day road trip to my grandparents' house when she was 2 years old;
The dog who went to show-and-tell in 4th grade and again when I was a senior in high school;
The dog who has been the quintessential childhood dog...

Mali in the backyard, 2006

Who am I to play God and decide the date of her death? Then again, who am I to let her suffer until her natural death? At what point does senility become suffering?

If she still wags her tail when talked to, does that count as happy? Or does her spending most of her days lying around in the kitchen mean she's unhappy? Does the fact that she can still go for walks constitute quality of life, or does taking twice as long as it used to take to complete the route mean she's too sick? Does enjoying her meals make up for the unpleasantness of bumping into walls and objects because of her blindness and dementia? Is it fair to ask my parents to continue to care for her as her health declines? She's given us so much; what do we owe her: more time, or a comfortable exit?

Mali snoozing in her bed, 2013

This is absolutely the hardest decision a dog owner will ever make.

End the R.I.P.

I'm a typical college student in that I enjoy spending some time each day on Facebook keeping up with friends and acquaintances. While most of what I see is light-hearted and fun, I have noticed that a certain three letters appear too much on my Facebook news feed: R.I.P. By themselves, they can be part of many different words with many different meanings, but together in that order they mean only one thing: Another death of someone my age. They are three letters that a 21-year-old should not see plastered all over an acquaintance's Facebook page at least once every few months. Knock on wood (or whatever other superstition you subscribe to), I have not had a close friend pass away. However, I regularly learn of the deaths of friends of friends, old classmates, and distant acquaintances. The number one cause of these deaths? Drugs, and more specifically, heroin.

Over a year has passed since I learned of the death of a young man I used to know. We weren't friends, but he was a grade ahead of me in school and we had math class together when I was in ninth grade and he was in tenth. He was a bright kid, popular, funny, a star athlete. I learned after his death that due to a sports injury, he had to have shoulder surgery during high school. To cope with the pain, he was prescribed some heavy-duty painkillers. I don't know all the details, but at some point he got hooked. He started heroin not long after when it was offered to him at a college party and soon became addicted to the deadly street drug. He struggled with the addiction for some time before his parents one day found him dead in his bed. I can't even imagine.

After learning of his death and intermittently the deaths of other people I once knew, I became interested in learning more about this drug taking so many young lives. One thing that stood out to me: Many, many kids struggling with heroin addiction or dead from heroin overdose experimented with prescription painkillers before starting heroin. Also, many were good kids and only started taking the painkillers because of a sports injury or surgery. After being exposed to painkillers, their addiction to heroin came much more easily.

About two weeks ago, I was experiencing some pretty intense chest pain. I'm young, so I knew I probably was not having a heart attack or anything serious, but the pain was rendering me unable to sleep, so I eventually visited a clinic. The PA spent some time listening to my breathing, looking in my nose and throat, and squeezing my chest, trying to discover the source of the pain. She even ordered a chest X-ray just to be safe. Ultimately, a specific cause was not found. I did, however, leave the clinic with a prescription for some moderately heavy-duty painkillers. I expected to receive maybe 4 or 5 pills to get me through the next couple days until whatever was going on with my chest was able to heal. I left the pharmacy that night with 20. As I expected, my chest pain went away within a few days so I only used a few of the pills. I had been prescribed at least 15 pills more than I needed.

You see, it seems that this is far from uncommon. Doctors are taught to overprescribe to avoid having to see the patient again for a refill. The unfortunate side effect of this practice is it leaves powerful painkillers lying around people's houses where risk-taking teens and young adults have free access. A portion of them will go on to become dependent on the pills and will do anything to have them. They will eventually realize that buying heroin on the street is much cheaper than pills and will make the switch. From there, their fate is sealed.

Please, please, please, guard your prescription painkillers and take unused extras to prescription pick-ups. Keep tabs on your friends and speak up if you notice changes in their behavior. Hang out with people who find ways to have fun without hard drugs. Encourage doctors to limit the prescribing of painkillers, especially to young people. Educate yourself about this serious issue that is killing our peers and together we can take steps toward ending the R.I.P. posts.

Just What I Needed

I don't usually believe in divine intervention. OK, that might be a little misleading; I don't believe in divine intervention. The God I believe in is not one who swoops in to save one person while simultaneously letting someone else die. People die because germs attack their body or because their car happens to be the one the drunk driver hits, not because God lets them die.

I feel this way about less serious situations as well. I have friends and acquaintances who pray or ask for prayers before a big test or job interview, and while I absolutely respect their beliefs, that's not how I think God works. God gave me a brain that works, but that is the extent to which I believe God is involved in my test outcomes. Whether I study or not is up to me and ultimately that will be the biggest factor in my grade.

Last night, a song came into my head that I hadn't heard in awhile. I typed the line of lyrics that kept replaying in my head into Google and subsequently found the track on Spotify. The tune is catchy and I listened to the song several times before heading off to bed.

When I woke up this morning, my body was immediately pumped full of adrenaline. I had my second astrobiology midterm in an hour and a half and didn't do great on the first one. I got some studying in the night before but was still less than confident. I had trouble getting going with my morning routine because I was so anxious.

image retrieved from http://jewishrock.com/music/

Then I remembered the song I had been listening to the night before:

Where will my help come from?
My help will come from God, maker of heaven and earth.
-Esah Einai by Dan Nichols
Based on Psalm 121

I turned the song on and was amazed how quickly a calm fell over me. Everything was going to be alright. I replayed the song probably four times as I got dressed and ready for school. As I got on my bike and headed to print my homework and then to class, I kept the song in my head. It was in my head as I sat down in class, and it was still in my head as I walked out of class after successfully completing the exam. The combination of soothing melody and comforting lyrics was just what I needed this morning.

This line from Psalm 121 is something I can believe in. In his book When Bad Things Happen to Good People, Rabbi Harold S. Kushner suggests that one's belief in God should not go against their common sense. My common sense tells me that if I don't study, no amount of prayer is going to make me ace a test. But this line doesn't say God will ace the test for me; it says God will be my help. God will be there with me as a take the test, not doing the work for me, but just being there, cheering me on, calming me down, helping me focus. I like that idea.

P.S. I have been checking online almost neurotically looking for a spot in a certain mini-semester class that filled before I was able to register. I kept waiting for a spot to open from someone dropping the class. Today when I logged onto my student account, there was one spot available. The randomness of the universe was good to me today.

The World's Best Babysitter

I watched from the driver's seat of my car as the 8-year-old I was babysitting trotted off toward the public restrooms at the park. I had driven him there for soccer practice when he suddenly informed me that he needed to go to the bathroom. Second guessing my decision to let him go all by himself, I got out of the car and followed him. As I got nearer, I could tell the gate surrounding the restrooms was locked.

"Is it number one or number two?" I yelled to him. He held up one finger. "Just go right there," I said, gesturing toward the many bushes surrounding the locked gate.

"Everyone will think I am weird!" he countered. I assured him nobody would even notice and, after some persuasion, I turned around as he did his business behind one of the bushes. When he was done, he jumped back into my car and I drove him down to his practice at the other end of the park. "Chau!" he called back to me as he ran off to join his teammates.

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image retrieved from www.facebook.com

My Favorite Teachers

This is a paper I recently wrote for a class.

When I am a teacher, I would like to be a combination of some of the awesome teachers and coaches I had as a K-12 student. I was fortunate enough to have enough quality teachers that it would be difficult to choose just one to write about. When I graduate in May 2015 with a degree in elementary education, I will be certified to teach elementary and middle school, or kindergarten through eighth grade. I have a lot of experience with elementary-aged children and am comfortable with them, but I plan to gain experience working with middle school students to better decide if I would like to work with them in my career. So for now, I just know I will teach elementary or middle school.

All of my favorite teachers had a respectable attitude. None demanded respect; students simply respected them because of the aura they gave off. There is a big difference between demanding respect and just being someone who is naturally respected. These exemplary teachers and coaches came across as respectable by having realistic but high expectations for all students and being strict in a fun, motivating way. They did not allow disruptions to distract from teaching or coaching. They hovered on the borderline of scary; I knew that they were caring and eager to help, but they were not to be tested and their cheerful demeanors were not to be taken for granted.

Their teaching abilities were unmatched. They were smart, sometimes brilliant, but able to explain concepts in age- and ability-appropriate terms. Their high expectations kept everyone motivated and working hard.

I really did not notice the appearance of these favorite teachers, at least not consciously. This must mean that they did not wear anything weird enough to catch my attention. They dressed professionally and did not wear flashy styles or other attention-grabbing outfits. They were there to teach or coach, not to show off their fashion sense.

I learned a lot of subject matter from my teachers, but besides my parents, my best teachers and coaches were probably the ones from whom I learned the most life lessons. I was always one of the brighter kids in elementary school but at some point I started telling myself I was stupid. Looking back, I think this was at least partially due to being bullied because I was smart. I was talking to my eleventh grade physics teacher about this outside of class time and she responded by saying that I could either be dumb and be teased or be smart and be teased. She implied that I might as well be smart if I might be teased either way. She saw right through my “stupid” act to the capable student I was and pushed me to excel, and I have always remembered that.

Another act of wisdom was from a basketball coach. During my high school years, the girls’ basketball team at my school was among the best in New Mexico. Still, I had hopes of making varsity, but was cut from the program at tryouts my junior year. I had played on the C-team as a sophomore and had worked during the summer and all fall to be ready for the tryouts, so I was devastated. I decided to talk to my former C-team coach who would be coaching JV that season. After assuring me that cutting me from the team was an extremely difficult decision, he arranged for me to be a sort of team manager, sitting on the bench at all the JV games, keeping stats on a little clipboard. It occurred to me sometime later that he did not need me there; nobody cares about the stats of the JV team, and I had lousy accuracy anyway because I was often distracted. He had me be there because he knew how upset I was over not being allowed to play that year and he made an effort to keep me “part of the team”.

My third and final example of wisdom as an intangible comes from second grade. I was a good writer from a young age, and my second grade teacher noticed this. She told me about a citywide writing contest and gave me the information to enter. I not only entered, but won first place for my age group. My family and I were invited to an awards banquet for the winning writers and my teacher attended. Her job did not require her to encourage me to enter a writing contest, much less show up at an evening banquet to support me, but she did. Placing first in that contest gave me an abundance of confidence in my writing abilities. Thirteen years later, I still have the first place ribbon in my bedroom at my parents’ house.

These instructors had teaching styles were engaging and unpredictable. My physics teacher had us rolling down handicapped ramps on chairs with wheels, running up a flight of stairs as part of a lab calculating power, and dropping objects off a ledge into the courtyard of the school. My basketball coach in tenth grade let us practice making cuts in the gym by playing ultimate Frisbee sometimes during afterschool practices and we bonded as a team when he had us play Frisbee golf around the high school campus just for fun. I hope to also be an exciting, enthusiastic teacher.

Some teachers in my years of school tried to act like counselors and solve everyone’s problems. My favorite teachers were generally not among them. These exemplary teachers cared deeply for their students but did not attempt to intertwine themselves with the teenage gossip that surrounded them. Their number one priority was the education of their students and they expected class time to be used for learning. If approached outside of class time, however, they were happy to interact with students on a more informal basis and even help with personal problems when appropriate. My favorite teachers were approachable but strict, brilliant and engaging, demanding and kind, and I hope to exhibit many of these traits in my future career as a teacher.

Right Where I Belong

I sometimes wonder if changing my major to elementary education was the right decision, especially after my summer job working at an overnight camp was much harder than expected. And then I receive notes like this one that assure me I am right where I belong. This came from a parent of one of my religious school students.

Thank you Sarah, we really enjoyed the video. (Child) asks me everyday when I'm going to go out so you can come over and babysit. We haven't gone out yet, but we will call you as soon as we do. I guess since I'm taking so long (Child) is now just asking if you can just come over. I guess he is really excited to have you come babysit. 

Thank you for all you do with the class.