Job updating

Well I am sure you have been wondering what I (we) have been up to these past few weeks (months?). It has been steady work trying to keep our schedules intact, including for August through October I had been working teaching the odd lab and lecture for the physical therapy students in the midst of their pediatric course.

The major update is that I have applied for multiple clinical positions and heard back from a number of them. The biggest issue is that people think I have been getting my DPT (doctor of physical therapy) degree, so I have to clarify, which if they actually read my resumé then would know the difference. The other issue is salary, being that I would be considered underpaid in my first PT position and then had contract work at a higher rate of pay no one quite knows what to pay me. I guess that's a generally good position to be in, as they have been offering me higher rates than I would have been expecting. I interviewed in Chicago a while ago for a clinical position. I decided after much thought not to accept the tentative offer I had been given. I realized I have a few issues with their practice, one being that they early intervention clients they service are only at the clinic, when early intervention is meant to be home-based services, two they do not believe in episodes of care (which is basically that you only provide services to children when necessary, not just because they have a disability), and three because it does not appear that they are providing services to those with Medicaid, which I found crazy since the clinic is right in Chicago. Crazy right?!

So I have also applied and interviewed at two major Children's Hospitals as well. One was a Skype interview and one was in-person. So, I bet you are wondering how you manage to have interviews when you have four kiddos. Well...... it's a bit tricky! I have had multiple phone interviews at home with children being entertained by the electronic babysitter (tv or computer), which I generally try to schedule when I have at least one child out of the house. This means squeezing in an interview while the boys are at preschool and praying that B won't have a fit, which she has had EVERY time I have had a phone interview (or Skype), OR trying to have an interview over nap while S is at K (which sort of works). I think my favorite moment was 5 minutes into a Skype interview B decides that the basement is boring and she wants to come upstairs, but I have gated her in downstairs with S and the closed the basement door at the top. Well, this upset her quite a bit, so she starts crying........and then screaming........and well generally carrying on at the top of her lungs while I am in the room above pretending that I can't hear here and PRAYING that the people I am Skype interviewing with can't hear her. And what should have been a 20 minute interview lasted 45+ minutes!

Of course my other favorite interview moment was trying to carry on a telephone interview in the car while picking up S from school with the other 3 in the backseat.......I'm thankful that it actually went well and that my interviewer had a very limited time to speak to me.

I did manage to have a successful onsite interview with one hospital, which was following a less successful phone interview (boys were screaming during what was supposed to be nap.......). This was managed by flying out of our local airport at the crack of dawn, almost missing my flight because of delays at the check-in counter, having the interview (lasted about 3 hours), heading back to the airport and getting in really late the same night. All of which could not have been done without my mother-in-law because our regular babysitter was ill! Oh and this was followed by taking Al for minor surgery the next morning......

So...... yes you can job search at home with four kiddos, but man it is tough! Sometimes I have to lock myself into my room and then into our bathroom to hold a phone call briefly when I am at home with all four. It's a crazy thing, but it has worked out well for me. I can say that I have accepted a position at a wonderful children's hospital as a pediatric PT working 30 hours (full-time)!