[February 22, 2020] It’s been a week since I posted last here in my leadership blog. In the early morning hours of Saturday morning, last week, I drove myself to the Emergency Room for what I thought would be a quick in-and-out after a doctor looked at what was hurting in my back. After a CT scan, the ER doctor showed me the little bugger creating waves of pain was a 5mm Kidney Stone causing a urethral blockage. That began a series of events that took me off-line for a week.
The news here is not that I discovered a new height to the 10 on the medical 1 to 10 pain scale, or civilian hospitals are excellent providers of emergency care, or even that many friends and family came out to support me during those dark times. I found that this particular civilian hospital1 was efficient and effective in the highest professional sense. Excellent customer service, state-of-the-art equipment, and highly qualified medical staff made my stay eye-opening.
It takes some highly-dedicated people working as a close-knit team to pull off this level of care. I credit them all – from the intake administrators to the ER team to the medical workers on the ward floor where I stayed – for doing a great job. Working in unison, I was amazed as they took the time to explain my issues and what they were doing to solve them. I got an inside glimpse at how a hospital works and succeeds.
I stayed in a two-patient room with a U.S. Marine veteran. He had been there for about eight months, according to his reckoning but his mind was a little scrambled. James was living in a local VA home before he was transferred to the hospital to have his gallbladder removed. During the day, all he watched was a television show called Family Feud and he was hard of hearing. I will never again watch Family Feud.
As I was wheeled into the operating room, just before being put under anesthetics, the doctor was called away to perform an emergency Caesarean-section on a troubled pregnancy. Fortunately, the mother and child are doing well. It was a small sacrifice for me to wait a couple of hours to ensure a new life was born. I saw many smiles that day. My operation couldn’t get to the kidney stone due to so much swelling. I’m being rescheduled later.
It’s been more than 60 years since I was an overnight guest in a civilian hospital. As a 10-year-old boy, it was a frightening experience. Today, I was far from such fear, and I’m thankful for the medical staff that was quick to diagnose and treat my pain and work toward a solution. Oh, no comment on the hospital food; through my suffering, I had little appetite and ate almost nothing.
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- The AtlantiCare Regional Medical Center – Mainland Campus, Galloway, New Jersey.
Just found out, welcome back, Gen Satterfield.
Yeah, me too. Whew! I wondered what happened. Been busy lately but now back at theLeaderMaker.com. ❤
I would like to graciously thank everyone for their kind words and pick-me-up comments. I hope to stay with my leadership website for a long time. And, yes, I do have pending surgery to remove the large kidney stone in the near future. With some luck, there will be no disruption in my blog this time.
As always, great to hear from you and to know you are reading our comments. Thanks, Gen. Satterfield, keep up the great work you are doing for us all.
I was just contacted by one of your regular readers to inform me that you’ve been out of the net for a few days. I’m glad you’re back —- yes, I will take you up on your offer for another article in the near future.
Yes, I agree with you EMK. And I also look forward to your next article as well. ?
Great website and I hope, with all my family, that Gen. Satterfield and his family remain healthy and happy.
Glad to see you back to posting regular leadership articles, Gen. Satterfield. As you can see from the many comments below, we missed you and your daily education, wit, and sassy intellect. Stay on board with us. We are your fans and will be pulling for you when your operation comes up soon. Stay healthy.
I didn’t realize you publish regular articles until today when I went back to read some older blog posts of your’s, Gen. Satterfield. Well done! I like this site even more. Plus it goes back for several years; something most readers may not be aware of.
Same here. I will add my voice too to the welcome party. Oh, pass the beer.
Randy and Wendy, I know you guys are new, so welcome. But also you will find some really new info on leadership and ways to improve not just those skills but life skills as well.
Thank you, Lady Hawk. ?
Great to have you back. Thank the stars you are still writing.
Welcome back, Gen Satterfield. Keep your health up. ????
Yes, great to have him back in the tanker’s seat.
Great News! Gen Satterfield is back. Glad I checked out your webpage this morning. Good luck on your medical issue and God speed.
JT and I are long-time readers and big fans of this leadership blog and consider it THE place to get the latest info on how to be and how NOT to be a leader. Get well, Gen. Satterfield !!!!!!
There will be many who don’t know that Gen. Satterfield is back so hard to expect a large outpouring of comments today. Tomorrow, however, the word will get out. Great to have Gen. Satterfield back in the leadership role.
General Satterfield, we all missed you and since we are fans, as you can see, we are quick to recognize when you have again posted. I only hope you don’t go back to the hospital. ?
Good news today, folks. Gen. Satterfield is back in the saddle.
https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&id=8A1EBCA838BD8B9D80E3BAFF8EE17A401A70AC9B&thid=OIP.7R1JbWTPM_1NOK5eEuC7TAHaKk&mediaurl=http%3A%2F%2F3.bp.blogspot.com%2F-saCn-pqQdGg%2FTvr5F_2TfSI%2FAAAAAAAAdRA%2FgNk5ykPWU3g%2Fs1600%2FCowboy%252Band%252Bhorse1.jpg&exph=1528&expw=1070&q=cowboy+in+the+saddl3e&selectedindex=9&ajaxhist=0&vt=0&eim=1&ccid=7R1JbWTP&simid=608022538038083787&sim=11
Great pix.
Loved this picture, thanks Dale. Good to have Gen. Satterfield back.
Another good picture “welcome back” …
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_AA9S1vCuprA/TLy1D8ecSCI/AAAAAAAAAB4/gxn8c8S8yis/s1600/welcome.gif
We missed you, General Satterfield.
You’re back !!! GREAT. Now we can get back to the serious business (and sometimes funny) of leadership.
Whew! I was wondering what was going on. This site is always up and running (one of the great benefits to the site) and I thought maybe there were technical difficulties like a couple of years ago when you switched providers. Again, like Janna said, welcome back.
Yeah I remember that. Too many website just post things whenever they want but here we see something good every single day.
Yes, and so I was wondering what happened too. Just stumbled back onto the site.
Welcome back Gen. Satterfield. We missed your daily bite of leadership. Thank goodness you are okay.
Hi, I’m new to this leadership blog. Looks like a great place. Thanks.