Blog

Jul 18

A year ago, today, Mary L. stayed home from work to help with Mary B. Mary B was sleeping more but kept waking up and asking for pain medication. The amount of morphine she was prescribed was 2mg every 6 hours. She was suffering, and it tore my heart out.

Mary L suggested a hospice service and got on the phone to find one to cover this area. Because she is worked with Duke, she started there. She found out they did not cover Person County. She soon found a service out of Burlington who would come that day and could prescribe higher doses of morphine.

The hospice service came quickly, did an assessment and order the drugs. Mary L went to get them and as soon as she got back, we got meds into Mary B to stop the pain. The hospice doctor increased her morphine to 20mg as needed. The difference for Mary was profound. I finally felt she was not going to suffer in her last days.

Thank you, Mary L. Mount

Later that night, I asked Mary B how her pain was on a scale of 1-10. She finally was out of pain and it showed. Her face was so much more relaxed.

It was one of the hardest days of my life. It was the day I had to shift my selfish thinking from wanting to desperately save Mary, to concentrate on helping her transition from this life. You can see it in my face in this picture.

Letter of Recommendation

To Whom It May Concern:

This is to confirm that Mary Frank has been a valued employee in my catering department at the Dundas Golf and Curling Club.  Mary has taken on added responsibilities whenever called upon and has made herself available at short notice.  She has shown strengths in being a team player and often assists in services the head table during special events.  Mary can be counted upon to look for other areas in which she can be helpful.  She assists other servers whenever possible.  Mary is very capable and cooperative both in a group environment and individually.

I would recommend Mary for any endeavor that she might choose.

Sincerely;

Tracey Hall

I helped Mary put together a work resume in 2001.  She had already accomplished so much in her life. I am so proud of her.

Mary Elizabeth Frank

17 Fieldstone Rd.

Guelph, ON

N1C 1A6

519-823-2686

Objective:

*To obtain knowledge and experience to aid customers in an efficient and professional manner.

*To have a greater understanding of people and how best to meet their requirements.

*To gains superior skills in clerical and financial matters.

Education:

1996-present        Centennial C.V.I

Guelph, Ontario

Grade OAC

*Area of concentration is in physical education and science

*Personal Life Management course

*Kinesiology Course

*Physical Education Co-op

McGregor Secondary School

                        Waterloo, Ontario

Grade 7-8

*Honour roll status both years

*English, mathematics, and French award received

*Volunteer secretary assistant during lunch and after school

Experience:

January 2001- Present                        Fitness Instructor, Customer Service Representative

                                                                Exclusively Women’s Fitness Center

*Designed fitness programs for clients

*Motivated clients to achieve their personal  goals

*Planned and taught aerobic classes

*Trained new staff

*Handled complaints

*Clerical work

 

1996-Present                                        Child Care, Miscellaneous Families

Four times a week

*Planned and organized activities

*Prepared meals and snacks

*Supervising and assisting with homework

*Cleaned and Tidies

March 2000- January 2001               Sales Representative, Joggers, Stone Road Mall

*Customer service

*Trained new staff

*Motivated staff to meet store goals

*Cleaned, stocked and organized product

*Key holder, open and closed store

*Balanced cash

 

Summer 1998                                      Sales Representative, Kandy Korner, St. Jacobs

*Customer service

*Handled customer complaints

*Cleaned, stocked, and packaged products

*Designed gift baskets

*Balanced the daily cash receipts

Volunteer Experience:

 1992- Present                                        Cystic Fibrosis Foundation

*Public awareness presentations.

*Organize fundraising sales and activities.

 

1996-Present                                        *Participated and raise money for Terry Fox Run

* Participated and organized Heart and Stroke Fundraiser

 Personal Achievements:

S.P.I. Personal Training Certification,            I.F.F Fitness Instructor Certification

Nutrition Certification,                                       NFLAC Fitness Instructor Certification

Bronze Cross Lifeguarding Certification        Babysitting Certification,

Fluent in: French

 Working knowledge of:                     *Windows 98

*Microsoft Office 97 (Word, Excel)

*Maximizer.

Hobbies and Interests:

*Hip- Hop, jazz and ballet dance,                    *Fitness classes and working out

*Yoga,                                                                   *Reading

*Cooking

References:

Available upon request

When Mary reached her 25th year, I sent this note to her.

Hi Mary;

I remember when I turned “a quarter of a century”.  It was a very exciting time in my life.

For your birthday, I thought I would put some thoughts down about what it meant to me at that time, and since, and some of the things I would do differently if that were possible.  You can save this to remind you of your DAD in the future.

The first thing that comes to mind is that I was only 23 when my DAD passed away.  Right off the bat, I really wish that I had been able to spend more time with him before he passed away, because for years, I wished that I had been able to talk to him about so many things.

There have been so many times when I wanted him to be there to be proud of me for my achievements.  There have also been many times when I wished that I could call him up to ask for guidance or suggestions, or to just listen to what was going on in my life.

I had far more time with my mom than my DAD.  When I think back, one thing that made a really huge difference for me was when I was 17 years old.  I remember my brothers hating our father for so many reasons, he was too hard on them, he wanted them to be the best they could be, and he wanted them to succeed – probably many of the same things that all parents want for their children.   Because he was older than most parents when he had me, 59 years old, he wanted to try to keep us from experiencing some of the same painful things that he had encountered in his life-time.

So when I was seventeen, it dawned on me one day that I could stay angry with him for the rest of my life, like my brothers and sister, or I could change how I felt about him and not be angry.  I remember that it was a conscious decision.  I realized that I didn’t have to like everything about him, but I could still love him because he was my father.  I began to look to him differently, with love and admiration, because I realized that he was as much a product of his upbringing as I was.  Then I realized that his parents were the result of their parents, and their parents, etc.  So many of the things we all do are just learned behaviors that have been passed down from generation to generation.

One of the things that I decided was that just because I had learned certain things from him that I didn’t agree with didn’t mean that I had to continue acting the same way.  I could change that too.  I could stop certain behaviors that had probably gone through many generations without question.

Some things happen at an unconscious level that we don’t even know about.  I remember being asked why I wanted to become a doctor during interviews for med-school.  When I really thought deeply about it, I realized that I first got the idea when my “pop” as we called him, was diagnosed with prostate cancer at the age of seventy-two.  I was twelve at the time.  In those days, cancer was a very scary word, and nobody walked around saying that they were a cancer survivor.  I remember the look of fear on my mom’s face when it was first learned that he would have to have surgery and the results were not known whether they could remove it all.

I must have picked up on the fear in the family, but because I was the youngest, I was most likely kept the most in the dark about what was going on.  Looking back, I realize that I wanted to somehow save him from dying.  That childhood wish turned into a strong desire later on to study medicine.  When I talked to others who pursued medicine, they almost always had a similar event in their life that led them in that direction.

Because I started down that path, I ended up becoming a respiratory therapist, and treated many children with CF.  Little did I know that would be of benefit later on in my life.

My parents had divorced when I was nineteen.  I struggled with my mom’s decision to leave my father when he was almost 80 years old.  Obviously, she had her reasons, which I never asked about.  It must have been a very painful decision for her to make as they had been married for over 30 years.  It’s funny how emotions can build up and finally take their toll, like the proverbial hair that broke the camels back.  I know that my dad never got over it.

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