Intuition

I consider myself to be a pretty intuitive person. I get this about me. I can sense if bad things have happened in places, pay close attention to my dreams, and really listen to my gut. The only thing I really don't get is that others don't have this same tendency.

This week I started off by attending hospital orientation. The group was small, like under 20 people. And as far as new employee orientations go, this was a pretty well designed program. About 20 minutes into the morning I began to sense that something was wrong with someone in the room. I didn't really know what or who, but the feeling kept nagging at me. Sure enough I finally spotted the guy. He was rubbing his leg, shifting in his chair, wincing, gasping, and turning red. What surprised me is that none of the speakers nor any of his table mates were doing anything about it. He was in a lot of pain and it was getting worse.

I also knew that he was trying to be quiet. He then began to cry. No one noticed. He didn't want to be noticed. Chances are this was a really good job that he really needed and by leaving early he probably thought he would get in trouble. I would cause a ton of attention by going over there and asking what I could do plus, was it really my role? I finally couldn't take it and found one of the facilitators in the back to bring her attention to the guy. She couldn't figure out who I was talking about even though it was plain as day obvious to me who was in pain. Finally she said she would let the other facilitator know when she got back in the room. This wasn't good enough for me.

I finally grabbed our HR coordinator to let her know. She went over to him and asked the "well, duh" question: Are you ok? No lady, he is NOT ok. He admitted he was in a ton of pain through quiet sobbing. It was only at that point in time that others in the room began to notice something was wrong. The HR coordinator then called her boss to ask what should be done. In the meantime I'm beginning to worry about him throwing a clot, a DVT, or something else really bad. People don't go into sudden huge onsets of pain for small reasons. She then told him he could go. I can only hope she directed him to the ED. I would have at least gotten a wheelchair and sent someone with him. Granted, she is in HR, but come on!

Later this week I began to have tons of dreams about the house which we jokingly called my Father's Castle and my gnawing anxiety began again. Something was wrong. I should also mention that this runs in my family. My grandmother knew my cousin was pregnant before she announced it. My Mom has these feelings quite frequently. And I have had three unique experiences the night before something bad has happened: once before I discovered my boyfriend was cheating on me, once right before I was diagnosed with a tumor, and then right before 9/11. I pay attention to these feelings. Thank God what I'm experiencing isn't anything close to that, but a little warning none-the-less.