Journal #31

On Wednesday I went to Memorial Medical Center and job shadowed a physical therapist.  While there I also ended up shadowing an occupational therapist and another doctor.  I watched as the physical therapist helped people who were staying at the hospital as well as people who just come for therapy and then leave.  It was really interesting to see how they help people regain mobility and help them build up their strength.  I liked how with this job you get to work with people and really get to know them.  Although I really liked it, there is a downside to it.  Seeing the patients struggle so much just to do the stuff I do not even think about is really upsetting.  Something as simple as sitting up or moving a leg is a hard task for a lot of the people I saw at the hospital that day.  It was really cool to see how much effort the patients put into helping themselves get stronger, and also the effort the physical therapist put in to help motivate them to do so.  I think that this is a really interesting career and it is a possibility for me in the future, but I want to keep my options open and see what else is out there before I make a decision.  One thing about this that I really liked was that some patients were very appreciative of the work the physical therapists put in to help them, but then again there were also some patients who really did not like the therapy at all.  I think this job has some good things about it as well as some bad things, but I think that will hold true for most jobs.  Another thing that I really liked about shadowing this job was seeing a couple patients who were going through their last day at the hospital.  They were doing their last physical therapy session and were checking out later that day, and it was like a bright side to seeing everyone else struggle so much.  It showed me that all of the hard work really does pay off and it was really cool to watch something like that.