TX

The stars at night are big and bright----deep in the heart of TEXAS! I'm in Austin, TX for the week visiting my random freshman roommate turned BFF Lauren Huff. The week before I came out here we went to the beach for a week with some friends. There were about 14 total at some points of the week. We went to the Hangout Music Fest. It was so so awesome. We saw Skrillex, Dawes, Umphrey's Magee, Dave Matthews Band, Jack White, Alabama Shakes, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and the list goes on and on. It was so hot but it was a total blast. The people we went with made it just that much more fun. We got back to Auburn on Tuesday and I flew to Austin on Wednesday. Yesterday was Lauren's roommate Jenni's birthday so we made her a good breakfast and made her a cake. Then last night we went to the live auditions for XFactor! It was pretty fun! I can't lie...being close to Britney Spears made me feel like I was 13 all over again being obsessed with hit me baby one more time. There were some good people but there were some bad too. After that we came back and had pizza, cheese dip, and cake and ice cream with friends. Such a college meal but so fun. Today we went to Lauren and Jenni's studio to see where they work. They make me so jealous that I am not artistic whatsoever. Then we met Amy for lunch at the Salt Lick in Round Rock. Yummy in my tummy. It was so so good. I could have drank their sauce in a glass. I'm here until Tuesday and I'm sure we will be going and doing much more. I'm going to go to church with them at The Austin Stone on Sunday and Jenni is off work so we can play. I'm pretty sure Huffy is trying to convince me to move to Austin because she points out every CVS and says "you can work there!" maybe some day...

6 months of updates

Wow. This post has almost been SIX MONTHS in the making! It better be good then I guess....maybe not. We are finishing up our P2 year. We have exactly TWO WEEKS until we are done with this terrible, dreadful, super hard, crazy year. This semester has  been even more work than last semester. Before you even apply to Auburn's pharmacy school you know that P2 year is the hardest. You hear about tests every 2 weeks and that you have a ton of things all at once but you really don't fully understand what that means until you are smack dab in the middle of it and have pulled more all nighters in one semester than in all of undergrad combined (I'm at a total of 2 so far).  That being said, Josh and I are both doing really good in our classes. By really good I mean Josh got a 100 on our last DAD test which is not easy at all. I didn't make a 100 but I still haven't gotten a C which is really good for me. We have also really gotten to know some people that I would now consider great friends. Its funny how you get to know people when you're all stuck in the same room for 12+ hours a day :) Our class also won Hargreave's Day! Hargreave's Day is like a field day for pharmacy school. All of the classes compete in volleyball, kickball, wiffleball, ultimate frisbee, tug of war, and pentathalon. We take a day off of school and it is always a lot of fun. This year our class, the Blue Barracudas, won the whole thing. We get our name on the trophy and everything! Josh's dad finished up his consolidation rounds of chemo and is leukemia free! He has been back at work for a little over a month now. Since Josh shaved his head for his dad and has kept it shaved his dad has longer hair than he does now! Continue to keep him in your prayers so that this can be the last time he has to go through all of that! Praise the Lord for His incredible healing! I have had a pretty much drama free year with my roommates which for me is almost unheard of. I thank the Lord every day for keeping my sanity over the past couple of years. I did gain my Lauren Huff out of roomies though. I am going to visit her in the great state of TEXAS this summer! I haven't seen her in way too long so I am past due for a visit. I miss my Huffy. Me and Josh also get to go to Utah in June to take a class on Alcoholism and Drug Dependencies. We go to a conference for a week and get to count it as an elective next year so that will decrease our stress next spring! We are going with about 6 other people from our school and staying in a house together. I think it will be so much fun and very interesting. We are also going to the Hangout Music Fest in May. We're going with about 10 other people to the beach for a week and we get to see Dave Matthews, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Skrillex, Switchfoot, Young the Giant, and a ton of more people. It should be so much fun. How could it not be? Somewhere between all of our travels we will be working and doing out 2 week rotations. I have mine at Princeton so besides the long drive to work for free every day I am looking forward to it. They said we may even get to scrub in on some surgeries with the anaesthesiologist! I might pass out but I am sure going to try to see what I can. That would be so so cool. The thing I am really looking forward to the most is being able to go home and hug on my friends and family. Since school has been so crazy, I haven't been home all semester. I really miss my momma! Next week my littlest brother will be SIXTEEN! holy cow. where has the time gone. I miss my whole family and I cannot wait to see them.

I think that is pretty much the main points. Hopefully I won't go another 6 months!

praise

I have written a blog in quite some time. This year is by far our busiest and most difficult year of the four so forgive me. I have a huge praise to share. As you all know, Josh's dad has been undergoing leukemia treatment for a little over a month. He was in the hospital for a few weeks undergoing chemo and preventing infection while his neutrophil counts were basically at zero.  He went home a couple of weeks ago to build his blood counts back up. At that point pretty much all there was to do was wait and pray. We all did both. On Thursday of last week they did a bone marrow biopsy to see if his blood was regrowing with signs of leukemia or if the inital round of chemo had done the trick. He had to wait the weekend and yesterday the results were in. His biopsy came back CLEAR OF ALL SIGNS OF LEUKEMIA! Praise the Lord! He has been so faithful and shown himself in awesome ways through this. It is still far from over but this is a huge answer to the many many prayers that have been going up. Thank you to every single one of you who have continually asked for updates and offered encouragement through this process. Our God is the ultimate healer and there is no greater peace than that. Continue to lift Dennis up in the next few months. Starting today, he will undergo 7 days of chemo followed by 3 weeks of rebuilding blood counts. He will have to go through 2-4 rounds of that and they will continualy monitor his progress. As I said before, this process is not over but to get the news that you have been praying and believing for for a while sure can make you lift a shout of praise. I will try my best to keep up with more updates. We love you all.

many thanks

THANK YOU! I have been completely overwhelmed at the amount of texts, messages, emails, calls, etc. that me and Josh have both gotten in the past week. We are so encouraged by every single one of you! We serve an awesome God who knows exactly what we need. Today at school at bible study Callie read a verse that was so incredibly applicable for anyone going through anything tough.

Psalm 94:18-19 When I thought, “My foot slips," Your steadfast love, O Lord, held me up. When the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul.

The cares of our hearts are many but the Lord's comfort, peace, love, and encouragement can cheer our souls. I am so thankful that we serve a God who we can put all of our hope in so that we do not have to rely on the things of this world. Kari Jobe's song You Are For Me has been such an encouragment to me so here is a special edition music monday.

Kari Jobe--You Are For Me

So faithful. So constant.
So loving and so true.
So powerful in all You do.

You fill me. You see me.
You know my every move
and You love for me to sing to You.

I know that You are for me.
I know that You are for me.
I know that You will never,
forsake me in my weaknesses

I know that You have come now,
even if to write upon my heart.
To remind me who You are.

So patient, So gracious,
So merciful and true…
So wonderful in all You do.
You know me. You see me.
You know my every move.
You love for me to sing to You

Lord, I know that You are for me.
I know that You are for me.
I know that You will never,
forsake me in my weaknesses.
I know that You have come now,
even if to write upon my heart.
To remind me who You are.

pray

Today my heart is very heavy. Josh's dad, Dennis, is being admitted to the hospital today to start treatment for leukemia. He went to a hematologist about a month ago and they discovered he had anemia. They gave him a B12 shot to try to eliminate the anemia. They gave him a shot that last a month and decided they would see how that worked. He went back on Tuesday and the B12 had not worked near like it should have. They decided the next thing to do was to do a bone marrow biopsy asap because his blood work seemed to indicate leukemia. We spent a huge part of Tuesday night talking and praying and hugging. Yesterday morning they did the biopsy and last night they confirmed that his dad does indeed have Acute Myeloid Leukemia. Josh drove home last night to be with his family. They are admitting him for a month right now to do the necessary treatment. Please keep Josh and all of his family in your prayers. Pray for God's miraculous healing and the peace that can only come from Jesus Christ. Pray specifically for Josh that he will be able to focus enough to do what he needs to do with school also. This is a rough time for him and it has got to be so hard to even think about anything other than his dad but school does not let up. I am here going to class and getting notes so that he does not get behind so that he can focus on what really matters right now. The next couple of months are probably going to be the hardest, most trying times of this family's lives so continue to lift them up. There is such a power in believers coming together and believing miracles.

A day in the life

I saw this a few years back and it is still so applicable today. It is from a blog called The Angry Pharmacist. This is what happens every single day without fail at CVS. Sinnce school has gotten so crazy I don't have time to write blogs myself so I am sharing this little gem.

WARNING: This post may be painful for those in the profession to read.

While many topics have been covered here, and you have been provided with ample evidence of how drugstore workday life does indeed warp the mind, the question of why it took 2 hours for you to get 20 Vicodin has remained unanswered. I offer the following prescription scenario:

You come to the counter. I am on the phone with a drunk dude who wants the phone number to the grocery store next door. After I instruct him on the virtues of 411, you tell me your doctor was to phone in your prescription to me. Your doctor hasn't, and you're unwilling to wait until he does. Being in a generous mood, I call your doctors office and am put on hold for 5 minutes, then informed that your prescription was phoned in to my competitor on the other side of town. Phoning the competitor, I am immediately put on hold for 5 minutes before speaking to a clerk, who puts me back on hold to wait for the pharmacist. Your prescription is then transferred to me, and now I have to get the 2 phone calls that have been put on hold while this was being done. Now I return to the counter to ask if we've ever filled prescriptions for you before. For some reason, you think that "for you" means "for your cousin" and you answer my question with a "yes", whereupon I go the computer and see you are not on file.

The phone rings.

You have left to do something very important, such as browse through the monster truck magazines, and do not hear the three PA announcements requesting that you return to the pharmacy. You return eventually, expecting to pick up the finished prescription.....

The phone rings.

......only to find out that I need to ask your address, phone number, date of birth, if you have any allergies and insurance coverage. You tell me you're allergic to codeine. Since the prescription is for Vicodin I ask you what exactly codeine did to you when you took it. You say it made your stomach hurt and I roll my eyes and write down "no known allergies" You tell me......

The phone rings.

.....you have insurance and spend the next 5 minutes looking for your card. You give up and expect me to be able to file your claim anyway. I call my competitor and am immediately put on hold. Upon reaching a human, I ask them what insurance they have on file for you. I get the information and file your claim, which is rejected because you changed jobs 6 months ago. A jerk barges his way to the counter to ask where the bread is.

The phone rings.

I inform you that the insurance the other pharmacy has on file for you isn't working. You produce a card in under 10 seconds that you seemed to be unable to find before. What you were really doing was hoping your old insurance would still work because it had a lower copay. Your new card prominently displays the logo of Nebraska Blue Cross, and although Nebraska Blue cross does in fact handle millions of prescription claims every day, for the group you belong to, the claim should go to a company called Caremark, whose logo is nowhere on the card.

The phone rings.

A lady comes to the counter wanting to know why the cherry flavored antacid works better than the lemon cream flavored antacid. What probably happened is that she had a milder case of heartburn when she took the cherry flavored brand, as they both use the exact same ingredient in the same strength. She will not be satisfied though until I confirm her belief that the cherry flavored brand is the superior product. I file your claim with Caremark, who rejects it because you had a 30 day supply of Vicodin filled 15 days ago at another pharmacy. You swear to me on your mother's'....

The phone rings.

.......life that you did not have a Vicodin prescription filled recently. I call Caremark and am immediately placed on hold. The most beautiful woman on the planet walks buy and notices not a thing. She has never talked to a pharmacist and never will. Upon reaching a human at Caremark, I am informed that the Vicodin prescription was indeed filled at another of my competitors. When I tell you this, you say you got hydrocodone there, not Vicodin. Another little part of me dies.

The phone rings.

It turns out that a few days after your doctor wrote your last prescription, he told you to take it more frequently, meaning that what Caremark thought was a 30-day supply is indeed a 15 day supply with the new instructions. I call your doctor's office to confirm this and am immediately placed on hold. I call Caremark to get an override and am immediately placed on hold. My laser printer has a paper jam. It's time for my pharmacy tech to go to lunch. Caremark issues the override and your claim goes though. Your insurance saves you 85 cents off the regular price of the prescription.

The phone rings.

At the cash register you sign....

The phone rings.

......the acknowledgement that you received a copy of my HIPAA policy and that I offered the required OBRA counseling for new prescriptions. You remark that you're glad that your last pharmacist told you you shouldn't take over the counter Tylenol along with the Vicodin, and that the acetaminophen you're taking instead seems to be working pretty well. I break the news to you that Tylenol is simply a brand name for acetaminophen and you don't believe me. You fumble around for 2 minutes looking for your checkbook and spend another 2 minutes making out a check for four dollars and sixty seven cents. You ask why the tablets look different than those you got at the other pharmacy. I explain that they are from a different manufacturer. Tomorrow you'll be back to tell me they don't work as well.

Now imagine this wasn't you at all, but the person who dropped off their prescription three people ahead of you, and you'll start to have an idea why.....your prescription takes so long to fill.

provider

I have been pretty stressed this summer. Between being really broke and having a CrAzY roommate (who on top of being crazy won't pay bills adding to my broke-ness)  Right now I feel like I can barely relax. And in less than a month we start back school. The 2nd year is the hardest year out of all 4 so I need to be relaxing right up until August 17th because after that date I won't be able to relax again until May 2012. This is the third year in a row that I have had a roommate refuse to pay bills in the summer. I just do not understand why people think that it is ok to make someone else pay for things like that. Yes the bills are in my name but you lived here too. It drives me absolutely bonkers. I can't wait to be married and not have to worry about whether my other roommates are going to pay me for their part.

On a better note, the Lord has provided funds for me when I need them. I have a job so I get money but after not working for 4 weeks due to family vacation and rotations, I was down to my last few dollars. I was almost empty and then came my birthday so I got birthday money. I even got an extra paycheck that I wasn't supposed to get. I let CVS know and they still haven't corrected it so that was extra money for me until I get my paycheck (THIS FRIDAY!) Even though my roommate owes me nearly $200 God has provided money from different ways that I have everything that I need. It really has made me much more thankful for all that he has blessed me with. He has blessed me with a job, a house, wonderful and generous parents, and even the power and cable that I can barely pay for at the moment. I have learned to just trust the Lord and praise Him when he provides. He promises he will provide. God cannot break his promises and there is so much comfort in that.