Humor is the Best Medicine – Activity Version
January is when we celebrate Activity Professionals. We have many hats that we wear. One of them is Entertainer. I have always used humor to deal with difficult situations. Here are some of the antics my residents and family members have done over the years.
I had a resident that was so depressed she never came out of her room. Nursing had recently changed her meds and she actually came to one of my crafting activities. After we finished with our craft, I had the residents either sign their name or put their initials on their work. She informed me she was not signing her project. I told her it would be fine to put her initials on it. She looked at me with a smile on her face and laughing said “I don’t think you want just my initials on this.” I asked puzzled, “Why not?” She answered, “My initials are MF!” Everyone burst out laughing. No, I guess we don’t.
I took the residents to a Cincinnati Reds game. They had a blast. The next day I got to work, and I overheard one of the Residents telling staff about the game. She told the aides standing by “The Reds played the Rams yesterday and Pete Rose pitched the 7th, 8th and 9th innings. I can’t wait to call my daughter and tell her I saw Pete Rose pitch.” The funny thing is the staff actually asked me if I got to see Pete Rose.
Every December I take my residents to see the Christmas lights. There is one town that over does it every year. This is of course before GPS on the phones. So, we headed to see the lights. We had a vehicle that passed us on a blind corner with oncoming traffic. We were almost in an accident, then a deer ran out in front of us, thankfully we missed it. Then the driver takes the wrong road, and we end up in the wrong town. We finally got to the town with the lights and apparently the owner that usually puts them all up was unable to do it that year so we didn’t see any lights there. We decided to stop for ice cream at McDonalds since we didn’t get to see all the fancy lights. And wouldn’t you know it, their ice cream machine was broken. So we went to Dairy Queen, which did have ice cream, but it was a small serving size. When we got back to the facility, the staff asked them if they liked the Christmas lights. Several of them answered oh is that what we went out to see and then they laughed.
One of my residents was coming down for bingo one afternoon. The nurse was walking by and the resident says “Are you gonna give me a depository later?” Moment of Silence, Nurse: “Yes I will.”
One day I answered the phone at the facility. The person on the other end asks for the floor and nurse for a resident. I paused for a second thinking we don’t have floors in the facility. I get ready to transfer her to the nurse for that resident. I paused and called her by name and she said yes that is me. I said you just called the facility. She said this isn’t the hospital and I said no. It would have been pretty funny if I had transferred her to herself.
We were stuffing plastic eggs for the annual easter egg hunt. I usually tape the eggs shut so they do not pop open. One of my residents asked for some scissors. I told her I didn’t have one and asked her what she needed it for. She said it’s ok I’ll make do. I was taping the eggs shut and one felt really light, so I opened it to add more candy before taping it. And there was one naked candy bar. She needed the scissors to cut the wrappers off. I then started checking all the eggs. Some of the candy bars she had also tasted to make sure they were safe for the kids.
When I call bingo, I usually put those hard of hearing and those needing help at the same table to I can help them. One day I was calling bingo. I would call the number and the resident sitting next to me would say what? I would repeat the number. She would then say, do I have that? I would say look and see. Then she would say I don’t have that, or I have that. Then I would call the next number. She would say huh? I would repeat the number again and even show her the number. She would ask if she had that, and I would say look. Then she would tell me whether she had it or not. This went on for an hour.
Took the residents to the fireworks on the fourth of July one year. After the fireworks were over, we were directed to take a route I did not know, nor did I want to go. One of the Residents said oh don’t worry I can get us home. She gave me directions on where to turn. It took over an hour to get back to the facility because of traffic. I turned on the radio and several of the residents were singing to the music. One resident said their singing was getting on his nerves and wanted to know if I had a nerve pill. When we got back to the facility, the one resident giving me directions told the staff I got them lost but she got us home.
One of the times we took the residents fishing we did not catch a thing. It was terrible. They blamed it on me and said I was talking too loudly, scaring the fish away. We got back to the facility and the staff asked how many fish they caught. They had practiced what they would tell the staff and other residents when we got back. They answered oh we caught several big ones, and we hated to throw them back, so we fried them and ate them. That’s our story and we are sticking to it.
Another Christmas lights drive we went on; we had to stay in town due to weather. One of the residents in the back says how far are we from the Manor. I said about 8 minutes. 10 minutes later the same resident says how far are we from the Manor now? I said about 10 minutes. He precedes to inform me that I had said 8 minutes about 10 minutes ago and that I must be going the wrong direction. I guess he was ready to go back.
I had a resident that was late for every activity, every meal and every function. I told her one day when I was trying to help get her ready for an outing, “You are going to be late for your own funeral.” She laughed and said “I have been late my whole life so that would just finish it off.” When she passed away I went to her funeral, she had been one of my favorites. Her funeral was supposed to be at 10am. At 10:15 am, the Priest came up and said I am so sorry we are running late, we are waiting for the body to show up. The hearse is currently sitting at a railroad crossing waiting on a train. I turned to her family I was sitting with and said, “There you have it, she is even late for her own funeral.” They laughed and said, “she finished life like she lived it.”
One year at the fair, we were sitting down to eat. We go through the line, and I help everyone pick out what they want to eat. I always make sure they see the desserts. I had gotten a piece of rhubarb/strawberry pie, and it was sitting next to my plate. One of my residents leaned over and said are you going to be able to eat that? I asked him if he wanted a piece of pie and he said no, but if I didn’t have enough room for my pie, he would be more than happy to eat it for me. He got my pie.
I was in my office, which was a glorified closet, working on paperwork. One of my residents wheels by and says, “Oh Wow, if I had a closet this big, I could do all kinds of things. I said, “this isn’t a closet, it’s my office.” She looked surprised and said, “I could hardly tell the difference.”
This same resident months later, wheeled up to my office and said, “Hey, do you know when you are going to die?” Surprised I wheeled around and asked, “uh no, do you know something I don’t?” She said, “No, but I was thinking you could leave me your closet in your will when you die.” I said, “No kidding, would you like me to leave all the things in it to you as well?” She responded, “Well I guess you could, I could probably find a use for all this junk!”
I had a mother and daughter sitting outside my office one day. The Mother reaches over and grabs her daughters skirt, pulls it up to her noise and proceeds to blow her nose in her daughters skirt. The daughter says, “Mom what are you doing, that’s my skirt!” The mother responds nonchalantly, “I didn’t have a Kleenex and your skirt was closer than getting a Kleenex.” The daughter responds, “Why didn’t you use your skirt?” Mom responds, “I didn’t want to get my skirt dirty.”
One day I was paged that I had a phone call. I had been waiting for an entertainer to call me back, I was walking really fast to my office to get the call. I hear one of the residents yelling hey stop I need to talk to you. They kept yelling. I get to my office and am writing in my calendar when I heard this beating on my door. She was yelling “Open up I know you are in there.” I finish up my phone call and open the door. There is one of my residents standing there. I asked her what I could do for her. She very calming says “This is the dry-cleaning office right?” Dumbfounded I answered, “Sure”. She says I would like to pick up my blue, green and black slacks. They look just like this one I’m wearing, just different colors.” I said “I will see what I can find.” She said she was getting ready to go on vacation and wanted to get them packed. Laundry made sure she got her clothes back.
I had a resident that was on the welcoming committee. She was in charge of welcoming all the new residents to the facility. She made sure they got a calendar and a welcome packet. One day I was walking past the room of a new resident. This lady was a younger lady and her parents were in the room with her. I happened to notice that the father was on the floor looking under the bed. I stopped and asked if I could help find something. Oh he said, “I’m just helping this lady find her glass eye.” I looked at my resident and said what glass eye? He responded by saying, “This lady said she dropped her glass eye.” Puzzled I responded “she doesn’t have a glass eye.” She started laughing and said “Oh that’s right, welcome to the facility.” Everyone busted out laughing.
One of the facilities I worked at had a Ponderosa out our back door. The last Friday of every month we would wheel anyone who wanted to go out the back door of the facility into the back door of Ponderosa. The residents loved their buffet. One of my residents would always change purses on this day. I never knew why. I paid the bill and put the amount on their facility bill. One Friday after we had been to Ponderosa, I was leaving and I saw this resident taking her purse around to the residents in the dining asking if anyone wanted wings. I asked her what she was doing and she told me to mind my own business and continued passing out the wings. She is the same one that lost her glass eye. I noticed she had lined her big purse with plastic, and it was full of wings from the buffet at Ponderosa. The next week I went to Ponderosa to let them know and ask if I needed to pay for them. Their response to me was. “Oh, we know she does it, we always restock the wings before you leave so she has plenty to take back.
One day during morning meeting, the DON was telling everyone what had happened over the weekend. One of the residents had fallen. He was clear down the hallway and the staff heard him yelling man down, man down. They ran down the hallway to see the resident sitting on the floor. They couldn’t figure out why he was yelling that. I just laughed. I said he was in the NAVY and when they had someone go down or get hurt they yelled “man down”. It was to call attention to everyone on the ship that a sailor needed help.
If you think peer pressure ends at high school guess again. I was getting a list together of those interested in going to a pumpkin patch. My assistant was also getting a list together to take them to a scary movie. One says I’m not going; I don’t care about pumpkins. Another one says you have to go. She says no I don’t. She says if you don’t go, I won’t go. They keep going back and forth. I rolled my eyes and put her name on the NOT going list. 2 hours later I’m told she is going, and the other Resident now must go to the scary movie with her in return. Oh, and by the way she loved the pumpkin patch and the ride through the woods to the pumpkin patch. Sometimes I don’t have to convince them to go, they do it to each other.
We were unloading the bags from shopping day from the van to carts. We pushed the button to open the doors to wheel in the 3 carts full of stuff. There sitting in the front is a Resident in a wheelchair just hugging herself. I said Hi and she says: “That sure will cool your atmosphere off.”
One of the residents came up to the nurses station one day and ran her hands through one of the nurses’ hair. The nurse had short hair that was kind of spiked out and hair sprayed in place. The resident told the nurse you need to get to the beautician and get this mess taken care of. The nurse said I just had it done. The resident said oh my, I’d fire her and get a new one she really messed your hair up.
One of our residents loved to ask questions. The Case Manager came in one day and this resident stopped her and asked her if she was married, she informed her that she was not. The resident then asked if she had a boyfriend. The Case Manager answered no she did not. The resident then says well you don’t have anything then do you. The case manager responded by saying, I have three beautiful children. The resident then stated shortly, “I thought you said you weren’t married.”
My parents tried to keep my grandmother at home as long as possible. This required changing things to keep her safe. They had to turn the temperature down on the water heater since she didn’t have feeling in her hands and was burning them with the hot water. A lot of times they would have me make the changes because she didn’t get as mad at me. Her hot pads must have been family heirlooms. They were so old and super thin. You had to use 2-3 pads just to keep from burning your hands when you pulled something out of the oven. Well, she thought we were all nuts, she didn’t have any issues with them. My mom had bought new ones and wanted me to swap them with the old ones. We put a plan together to make the switch. My husband had them in his coat and I distracted Grandma while he made the switch. Then he was to take them out to the car and hide them in the back of the car. The operation went off without an issue. My grandparents never called me. It was long distance and they weren’t paying for the charges, this meant I always called them. Imagine my surprise when my phone rang a week later, and it was my Grandmother. I quickly answered the phone thinking something was seriously wrong. Grandma informed me she had been robbed. I said what? What did they take, are you ok? She announced the only thing they had taken was her beloved hot pads. It took everything I had not to start laughing. I said, “oh that is awful grandma, did you tell mom and dad?” She said “the worst part is they put new ones in their place.” I said, “I wish someone would break into my house and replace some of my stuff.” She then asked me If I knew anything about this, I replied “how could I, I’m in Ohio and you are in Nebraska.”
We have National Activity Professionals Week in January. I want to share this awesome story. Every place I have ever been or any activity director I know has that Resident that REFUSES to come to activities because they are dumb or they aren’t staying long or family is coming or whatever the story. Well, as I was gathering people for an activity one day, I stopped to invite that one Resident. What I found almost made me cry. There was a note taped to the door of her room telling her family where to find her if they came while she was out. (“Keep going straight down to end of walk and you will find me.” Grandma.) Activity Directors are making a difference in someone’s life daily. Keep it up!
Tammy Point – NAAP Leadership Team
