Back to Work YOU!! What do you DO?|Pad Chatter 1.2.2019

I'm a drug dealer aka pharmacist. I would like to say that I play a vital role in one's healthcare but after dealing with all the angry people who didnt know their insurance switched or had new deductibles, that's how I feel right now.

In high school I worked at a Hallmark type gift shop, and part time at the Walgreens next door. Yes I had two jobs in high school. And then I had three when I started working at the baseball card shop. I would break up card packs to make full sets for the owner and flirted with lots of boys. I think I may have brought in some customers for him. Ahhh to be young again, lol.

And I am still at walgreesn so basically I am at the same place I was at during high school.

 

That has to be tough! The darned insurance carriers do that all the time and I'm sure a lot of people just don't get it! Poor pharmacists must take a lot of wrath.

 

I spent most weekends babysitting as a teenager and during school days in High school I would take the school bus to the local diner in our small town (which was only open for breakfast and lunch) after school and hand wash all the dishes from that day. After high school I got a job as a typist for a local insurance company.
I married a year out of high school and moved about 45 minutes away. We only had one vehicle so I had to find work close to our apartment so the next job was as a receptionist..... and that lasted till my lunch break, the boss had instructions for what to do/say when the wife called and when the girlfriend called!!! I said ‘no thank you!’ So then got a job at Hudsons in sales.
We had our first child about 1 1/2 after getting married and I was then a sahm. On and off I would babysit for extra $$
Then when our youngest child went into middle school I decided to take a holiday job at Bath Body Works and LOVED it! Then one day I was shopping at the local Scrapbook store and they were looking for help and I applied and got the job. But sadly they closed. Now I m bAck to being a domestic goddess full time.
We have 6 children our oldest is now 31 and my youngest is 19.

 

I thought of another job I had, where I got to learn a really useful skill... In college one year, I worked in the cafeteria and one semester I got the between lunch and dinner shift. My job was to plate up desserts. I learned to cut a pie into 9 pieces and a large round cake into 12. So yeah, need any pies or cakes cut?

 

You lasted longer than I would have picking cotton OUTSIDE in the central valley. YUCK!!!

 

I'm thankful for you . . . every month I have to deal with my pharmacy to get my Schedule II meds. The hoops I have to jump through are irritating, but I know it's not my pharmacist's fault or any of the staff's fault. It's just where we are right now in our country. I do try to let them know I appreciate them . . . just passing that along to you as well, in case you don't get told!

 

I like to think my eyes/ears are always open, but @Karen I didn't know any of that about you! I even knew about Julie's bio stuff from watching a video of her on tv once. I've had a great time reading all of these. We recently had this conversation at work recently. My boss assumed my 1st job was with our hospital. I started when I was 21, but had already worked a lot by then.

My 1st job was assisting the lunch lady in 5th grade. I was paid with free lunch. When I told my mom this, she was so proud that she had me keep my lunch money as wages. I've always loved helping. Throughout junior high, I worked in the office & was some sort of library officer. In high school, I was always a teacher's aide.

I have worked 2-3 jobs at a time, for most of my adult life. As soon as I graduated high school, I started working at a care home for $5/hr. At first it was data entry. By the end of my 1st year in college, I took care of 5 mentally disabled women & 1 talkative 2yr old. I cooked, cleaned, dispensed medication, bathed everyone, & even made cold calls for the owner's other business refilling ink cartridges. I left for a higher paying job at Macy's--$6/hr + 20% employee discount. Thus starting my longtime relationship with Macy's West. 1 year in & I was paralyzed by a virus. When I was able to walk again, I took a job with Stanford University Athletics. I was an usher for $35 per football game. I was told I'd made quite an impression. In time I was given the student section. Chelsea Clinton attended the school. Her detail & I would walk the stands before each game to make sure everything was secure. I even got a letter from Hillary Clinton, thanking me for taking care of her daughter. I went back to Macy's before the 1st football season was over. I would stay with Macy's on & off for 18 years & Stanford for 11. I was a supervisor/specialist at both places & enjoyed what I did. In this time, I'd also gotten a job with a hospital in the appointment center. That's 3 part time jobs & college at this point. My grades suffered. The appointment center was going to be closing, so they offered free Medical Assistant training & Ophthalmology began training me as a receptionist at the same time. I worked appointments from 730a-1230p, reception from 130p-5p & went to medical assistant school from 5p-9p. I quit college at this point. But, still worked my other jobs when I could. In 2001, I tore some space between discs in my spine. The hospital put me off work, saying there was no modification available. I chose not to collect disability & got a new job managing a Noah's Bagels. I still worked at Macy's & Stanford. I also worked on my AA degree while fighting the manager that put me off work. I won & went back to the hospital as a Medical Assistant, leaving Noah's forever. That spring I got my AA in Humanities. I left Stanford when Brody was born. My last stint at Macy's was in 2014. I finally got that BA degree last year.

I guess I could've said I've only had 5 jobs as an adult, but a lot of them were concurrent. Throughout the years I've also been an election judge & the chair of our city's traffic committee. Now, it's just one hospital job (where I do a few different things) & my CT/Polly gigs.

 

WOW! Do you ever sit still? That a lot of jobs all at once and all very interesting! I loved reading about you too!

 

My degree is in contract law, and I have been in the insurance industry since I was 15. I also have 2 professional designations.

I was running an independent insurance agency (managing 3 of their locations) for a few years before I moved to a major carrier and got into Claims. I was a Senior Bodily Injury Negotiator in the Claims Litigation Department for over a decade. I also was a Medical Language Specialist for 8 years. These two had a symbiotic relationship most days.

I’ve been the IT Administrator for a different insurance company for almost 11 years now and predominantly handle all of our company contracts. Over the years I’ve learned a tremendous amount about what it takes to make a successful IT Department, plus the inner workings of the insurance and the medical fields. I’m always trying to learn and improve, so I’ve been blessed in my jobs.

I did stay at home and try homeschooling for 2 years when my daughters were young, but it just wasn’t for me. Thanks for the great thread!

 

Well thank you! I really appreciate that. It’s unfortunately bad doctors that ruin everything. We just had a practice go down for Medicare/Medicaid fraud. They also prescribed over a million opiate units. I used to see their scripts all the time. The bad thing is patients that are in legit pain, like you and my hubby, are the true victims. Some people need opiates to function.

 

Amen!

 

Great question Anne.

As a student I worked as a cashier and did some stock taking. For my first real job, I worked as a girl friday/receptionist for a veterinarian, just when computers were new and being used. Second job much the same, smaller practice though so more hands on helping with the animals. (my element) Third job was admin/ girl friday at an LPG (liquid gas) company. Resigned when I started maternity leave and that was 25 years ago. This is my first year with no children in school, and only one at home. I will let you know how that goes...watch this space.

 

During high school and after I worked everywhere-The public library, the library at school, Wendys, Long John Silvers, Pizza Hut and as a telephone operator. I got married to DH#1 and worked at a dept store as a window dresser (yes they decorated windows in the 80's) and also the inside displays. In college I worked as Nanny and tutored English to football players. I got an English Degree. I also worked as a montissori school. After graduation, I worked for a bank way back when there were no computers- all handwritten bank books. I got divorced and moved back home and worked as at the Childrens Place as an Asst. Manager and Manager. I married a Navy man and really didn't work for 15 years (I did a stint at my girls preschool). Then I worked as a substitute teacher and then paralegal for 9 years and had two other jobs- one as a Project Coordinator for an IT Company and a test analyst for the local shipyard where my DH worked. I retired in 2010 to focus on my elderly FIL and MIL, then my dad and my senior dog. Since I put my father in a nursing home in 2014 and my FIL died in 2017, I have been a dog mom to 2 new dogs and granddog, travel mom and a helper to my MIL. Also a scrapping mom!

 

Oh my gosh, @AnneofAlamo , only two are left at home!! Congratulations on successfully getting them out the door.
So... I took a scrap-hiatus last year, partially because there was family stuff that was stressing me out and killing my scrappy mojo, but also because I have become crazy busy at work.

I work for the Canadian government, developing laws on marine liability for things like wrecked and abandoned vessels, and compensation for marine oil spills. My background is law, and developing laws and regulations is my jam, and this summer we were doing just that. I'm happy to say our bill received Royal Assent on December 18th, and I'm now onto a new project... that is top secret and I can't talk about. But I'm excited about, and I'm hoping that I'll get to travel out to Calgary and the Vancouver area, and hopefully spend some time in some Indigenous communities. My old job took me to London twice (where I got to meet @MrsPeel). But my absolute favourite work trip ever was going to Dauphin, Manitoba where I got to see wild horses and the milky way from the middle of the prairies with now city lights for miles.

 

I HATED law school. In fact, I tried to quit after my first year, but I was going on interviews and when I'd get asked what I'd been up to in the previous year, I had people telling me, "no one likes a quitter." So I went back, I even did the bar. Even though I'm a "policy analyst" and not a lawyer, I work on developing new laws and regulations, and spend a lot of time on statutory interpretation, and occasionally some litigation support, so it's served me well.

 

@Heidi Nicole my husband is a rad tech! He's the senior x-ray tech in a small private clinic. (We're in Canada, and most healthcare is public). It doesn't pay as well as a hospital, but there are never any nights or weekends. He keeps on putting out the idea of getting his MRI specialization. There's some pretty cool research around mental health going on at one of our local hospitals, and I know it's his dream job.

 

You know I never babysat for others, probably because I was the oldest of 5 and had to watch my siblings a LOT of the time...and for FREE...how rude!!!!!!!!!!! ROFL

 

I wasn't going to answer this question, because I knew it would be long, but after seeing and reading everyone else's long and interesting posts, I decided to join in.

My first job was through my school administration, during my junior year, as a work-study student with the Community Education department. I was basically the school's representative for a particular building (in my case, the middle school) whenever there were community program taking place. I had to help set up, clean up, and just hang around until everything was done. There were two or three classes a night, plus the building was open for walkers, and I had to be there for all of that (mostly just doing my homework. LOL) I also filled in for students iin other buildings when they needed a substitute, if I was available.

Just before my senior year started, the librarian at my local library approached me as they needed a new page and she wondered if I would be interested. I applied, and worked there for about a year, until I graduated from high school. It was a small library and I really enjoyed it! I would have continued through college, but it was too far a drive from school, for 12 hours a week, no more than two hours a day.

While I was in college, I did a couple of work-study jobs on campus to earn extra money. I started as a page at the library, during the two years I lived there, but I didn't continue when I moved off-site. Instead, I took on a bunch of smaller jobs -- I delivered a stack of Wall Street Journals every morning to the management department (from the basement to the fourth floor, taking the back staircase as students are not allowed to take the elevator!), I filled in for the management department receptionist during her break, I *was* the receptionist for the art gallery (sponsored by the humanities department), I graded papers for a professor (in the electrical engineering department and not one of my professors), I entered test questions for a management professor who wanted to use them for generating random tests (I learned a lot about management principles -- not my major -- from doing that!)

My college was set up as a work-study program, so for ten "work" semesters, I worked at a local manufacturing facility as a co-op student, mostly shadowing different salaried positions and sometimes getting my own assignments. One semester I coordinated the work for a new conference room for the plant manager and during another one I was a vacation replacement for production supervisors.

When I graduated, I hired in full-time at a different local manufacturing facility, as a controls engineer, and stayed there about three years. I then transferred (internally) into a product development organization, first as a calibrator (transmissions) and then as a software engineer (engine control modules), which is where I have been for the last 16 years. (A calibrator customizes the software to work in a particular application; there are particular variables they can "tweak" to adjust for changes in the hardware so that one set of software can work with multiple hardware variations.)

 

My first job that required a W2 form was for the National Park Service at age 17. During college, I was an intern at the U.S. Attorney's Office. I was interested in pursing a career in law, but ultimately decided it wasn't for me. After I graduated, I had a couple jobs in sales before transitioning to the insurance industry. I've spent the last 20 years at two very large companies.

• Claims Rep
• Casualty/Litigation Specialist
• Team Manager
• Branch Manager
• Sr. Branch Manager: Operations manager over a 30+ employee branch comprised of managers, supervisors, reps and admins)
• Process Manager
• SAHM for a hot second and realized, that while I have a tremendous amount of admiration for SAHMs, I'm not SAHM material
• Compliance Manager: proprietary contacts and regulatory state filings
• Director of Business Strategy: Post merger & acquisition integration for 10 insurance carrier acquisitions
• Sr. Director of Business Integration
• Sr. Director of Digital Transformation
• Sr. Director of Business Strategic Development: Strategic program management for innovation, automation, artificial intelligence, advanced analytics, supplier management, expense optimization and real estate

Anyway, very interesting hearing what occupies everyone's days!

 

In high school, I babysit during the summer and then when the oldest started school I was responsible to get her on the bus and make sure she was OK. The big problem with that is she got car sick so there was quite a few mornings that I had to change when I got to school since she would get sick. We (parents and I) finally figured out that she could not drink orange juice and ride the bus.

After high school graduation, I started working for a company that made electric wire and my job was to file the completed orders (of course this was before computers) so everyday alot of paper hit my desk.

I left this job due to moving and being pregnant. I then stayed home through 2 kids until my daughter's first day of kindergarten was my first day of being a receptionist at an insurance agency.

The agency was purchased by another agency after I had worked there for 2 years. I was told that I would not have a job so I left to work for a couple of guys who sold life insurance. Turned out that I did not like dealing with life insurance. I got a call from the company that bought out the original insurance agency I worked at and went to work for them. I still work for the insurance agency however they have since been bought by another agency so I now work in the "corporate world".

I am in the commercial side of insurance and handle large commercial businesses (specializing in construction accounts). I actually do love what I do and figure I have around 10 years to work so working for the "man" is OK by me.