A whole new adventure...

An expression of my thoughts and feelings on my OT journey, both personal and professsional.

Wednesday 26 June 2013

First two weeks at work

Weekend at K + M's

So prior to starting my new job I drove up to stay at K + M's until I found my own place. Managed to cram a fair bit in that weekend, mainly eating out in restaurants and viewing properties on right move. Michael took me around the town and I had a look around, it was nowhere near as bad as I was imagining, in fact it has it's own charm – but very similar to Ryde, just with some decent shops!
We drove around the two next towns, smaller 'market towns' to get a feel for the area. Whilst we where there we popped into an estate agent who's boards we had seen up around the town quite frequently – and viewed a property that afternoon. It wasn't what I was looking for, but it was a starting point, and we booked to see 3 other properties in the week following.

That Sunday night was possibly the worst night sleep I have had in ages!!!!!!

My first week
On Monday morning Michael dropped me to work, like it was my first day of school, so sweet of him, it helped calm my nerves as I didn't have to worry about traffic, parking or getting lost. I got into the office and met the other new starter, band 5 Claire. From there we both headed down to the training venue. Monday – Weds we had training all day, covering the various mandatory topics and trust introductions. Thursday afternoon I got to go down onto the wards with an OTAP and got a chance to get my head around how things worked at this hospital.

On the Friday I had training until 12:30, so after lunch I went down onto 'my' wards with the OTA and was introduced to all my new colleagues, and attempted to remember as much as possible about the wards, the paperwork and the policies and procedures.

I was absolutely shattered after my first week of work, get I was not used to the routine, or being on my feet for 7 hours a day!

My second week
So on Monday I was just...sort of...thrown into the deep end of things – I was taken down on the my wards, and re-orientated before being given my ward book and left at the handover. I just sorta bumbled about, trying to get a grip on my caseload but I spent the day just treading water, feeling pretty out of my depth if I am honest. The day flew up, and before I knew it the day was over.

On Tuesday I was anxious about feeling like I was just treading water, but once I had planned who I had to see that day and what assessments needed doing I felt a but less useless and a bit more productive.

By Wednesday I was thinking back to the #OTalk on the transition from student to practitioner and all the advice that I got from it, I remembered how many people had said they felt out of their depth and expected too much from themselves, wanting to be able to do everything straight away. I had supervision in the afternoon and fed this back to my supervisor who said that I just needed to get orientated to the wards, the caseload and the role, and that no one is expecting me to be perfect just yet.


Thursday was the day I felt like I got it together and was a productive member of the team – I'd imagine the OTA was glad I was a bit more together at this point. I was able to organise the OTA's and my time well to mange the tasks required on the ward. I was also able to write a list of things for the OTA to complete on the Friday as I was heading home for the festival that afternoon!