There is a term used on the rez for the letdown and fatigue after the pow wow known as a “pow wow hangover”. In past trips, I have honestly felt this, but not this time. There is still so much to see and do that my fatigue thus far has not overtaken my energy level. Monday began with a trip to the historical center at the main Oglala Lakota College campus in Kyle. I am pretty sure that the students were quite excited to find out that we only had to drive across the street and up a hill to get there instead of the usual 30-60+ minute drive. After a somber and reflective time listening to the history of the Lakota, many students verbalized there frustration with this historical mistreatment as well as an understanding of why there is such a mistrust of the governmental-run health care system on the rez. We enjoyed the college grounds and the views from the pow wow arbor where graduation is held before heading to the college bookstore for OLC t-shirts and other souvenirs. The primary purpose of being on the campus was to do screenings at OLC Head Start Administration for the staff who had an all-day orientation session. We had a room of approximately 40 employees, and I knew from past experience that we would be quite busy. We set up as three teams for screenings and after some initial equipment and technology glitches that were quickly resolved (or as quickly as I could get them fixed), the students were screening smoothly with their best teamwork to date. We saw many repeat screening participants and had many quite positive interactions. We did have one employee with a blood sugar of over 400 who had not previously been diagnosed with diabetes but had a family history. The students provided education, and I gave her very specific instructions about following up ASAP with her provider. I will plan to follow up with her next week to make sure that she was able to get an appointment. After an intense and busy few hours, we moved on for another brief siesta before heading to the main part of Badlands National Park.
The park was super busy, but still an outstanding visit. We did a hike through the rocks to the edge of the cliffs, and at one point I told Suzie that if we got lost she had to wait for me, even if it got dark. We successfully made it back to the van with the rest of the group though—thank goodness. We never saw any buffalo, but after turning down an unpaved road, came across a herd of bighorn sheep with lots and lots of tiny babies. I have never seen these before during any of my trips so it was quite thrilling. We got out and took photos as close as the sheep would allow us to get. I’m pretty sure that is the students could have caught a baby that it would have ended up in the van. A bit further down the road, we stopped at one of the many prairie dog colonies. These prairie dogs are apparently used to people and allowed us to get quite close to them for photos. After turning around to try to find an overlook to watch the sunset, we saw more prairie dogs and upon the advice of one the students decided to try to feed them popcorn. This began initially as popcorn and pretzels being thrown from the van to the prairie dogs and progressed to the students getting closer than I would have liked to offer their popcorn. We had previously discussed that prairie dogs carry the plague, but this was not a deterrent. Apparently, I have lost control of this trip (not really)… Many had what was described as a ‘bucket list’ prairie dog encounter and lots of photos were taken in the process. We had vigorous hand-sanitizing before moving on for the sunset. Ten pm tacos were the end of this busy, busy day.
Nursing Students at Pine Ridge 