The "My Training Still Comes in Handy", edition.

iPod shuffled to The Time, "777-9311".  80's on the house!!!  "You know I got to be better than this cat you're sitting with".  When I worked for the City, I received a cart load of training. I don't remember all of it.  I do remember CoD Supervisor training.  That included some leadership training and City policies.     We spent a week or so on Steven Covey's "Seven Habits".  I had massive training in Project Management.  Then there was Business Process Reengineering.  I spent a month in a Leadership and Mentoring program.  These are the ones I remember.

"April in Paris", Count Basie and Quincy Jones and His Orchestra.  Dad had me listening to this...the ending lasted about a minute and a half.."Let's try it one more once". Lol. It was also in my most favorite movie of all time. To this day, and even though I've watched Blazing Saddles well over 100 times, seeing Cleavon Little (Bart) on his horse decked out in Gucci stroll out into the country side and seeing Count Basie and his band playing "April in Paris", makes me laugh. (Sorry for the long tortured sentence). 

I facilitated business process changes for both the police and fire departments. I led the implementation of project management in my department. I also consulted on on the implementation of PM in other departments.  I eventually managed project managers.  I mentored City employees on how to evaluate their staff, including department executives. I mentored my own staff to the extent that the most are now City executives or have moved on to leadership positions in other companies. <3.  In other words, I put my training to use.  

So here I am retired and in dialysis.  I have gotten better and am ready to do something, other than focus on getting dialysis, trying to walk.....   I receive a letter from the company of my dialysis provider.  I've been asked to be a part of their peer mentoring program (!).  I noticed that one of the employees on the RSVP list was a social worker at my site.  Note that I didn't say my assigned social worker.  This one of the three social workers.  I've mentioned the lead one who gets me to walk in walk-a-thons.  I've mentioned my assigned one, who helps me with travel and does assessments.  The third one is the one who caught me weeping while I was listening to a song.  She came over to talk.  We talked about music, playing the piano and shy I had a reaction to the song I was listening to.  She asked for the name. I gave it and the composer to her. She listened to it when she got home!  Lol. She was responsible for submitting my name for the programming.  

So I'm playing it cool, but peer mentoring is right up my alley!  I'm just wondering why I was selected.  I've never mentioned my training to anyone.  I don't think I'd even mention my work background to anyone.  The introduction to the program was Sunday.  Apparently the company is starting the peer mentoring program.  I'm part of the inguaration group.  I'm excited!

So now you say, "Well Pat, that's nice, but what is peer mentoring in this context"?   Well no one really knows what being on dialysis is like more than a dialysis patient.  At the very least the peer mentor can listen.   We can a answer questions someone new to dialysis may have, from the perspective of a current patient. This is the short answer.  I belong to a dialysis group on Facebook. We mentor each other. Questions asked, questions answered.  Experiences shared.  It's nice that there are people who experience what you experience.  You are not alone in your dialysis experience...like almost all of experience periods of depression and hopeless.  We can shares our fears.   We can vent and there are others who can commiserate and offer you support and encourage the venting.  The peer mentoring will share some similarities, but it will be more personal, with real live people, face to face. I'm thinking the training I received in my previous life will be quite useful!  :-)

I'm looking forward to this experience and will keep you updated on how it progresses.  Have a great "Hump Daaaaay".  Signing off with (again and so what - lol). "Grapevyne", Brownstone.  I was telling Brian that I have over 400 songs on the iPod and it will repeat some songs over and over,  and the surprise me with songs I forgot about. Silly thing.  Lol.