Foundations by Hannah Cram

Episode 1: Beachside Balance

hannahcram1 — 2025-06-12 23:40:55 UTC

Topic Points:

Intro to the new podcast!!
Who am I?

What is occupational therapy?
How would you describe it to others?
WHY
Relation to core values & ethics of OT?

Occupational Balance :)

hannahcram1 — 2025-06-12 23:42:24 UTC

This artifact was taken June 12th, a beautiful sunny day at Wilsons beach. Starting on the right is myself (Hannah Cram), Ashley Giordano, Jessie Deschenes, and Hannah LoVerdi. We spent a beautiful afternoon enjoying the sun, talking about life, school, I recorded my first podcast, and we took a couple dunks in the water. The highlight of this day was the discussion we had around school and life balance. We talked about how we thrive in school when we are still taking care of ourselves. We could have been studying or at school getting ahead on work, but we choose ourselves. We all did our homework when we got home and went to class the next day prepared. It was a little reward that left me feeling recharged and ready to do homework. I think this reflects how we all want to be as future practitioners. We can not care for others if we do not care for ourselves. We highlighted the idea of "soul sickness" that we had all read for class. It was great to reflect and verbalize everything I am writing now with peers/friends on the beach.

Empathy

hannahcram1 — 2025-06-13 17:04:44 UTC

I love to scroll on Pinterest, which is where I found this photo. I work on being mindful a lot, especially of what I am doing and how it effects others. I am growing slowly but surely. Within the last year I have made big steps towards self growth. I have started taking anxiety medicine, because I could no longer handle the effects it was having not only on me but the important people in my life. It is always easy from an outside perspective to just say "relax" "its okay" "its not a big deal". My mama and fiance made me feel really seen when they avoiding saying those things. Instead they shared that they were empathic and hated seeing me so worked about things outside of my control. My mama enourcaged me to find a form of help. I was upset at first that she was making me feel like no matter how hard I tried it was not enough. She said, "I am so sad for you because all I want is for you to be happy and I know you can't be happy because you are so miserable all the time.". I felt offended by this, but I realized how right she was. As a practicnor I hope I do not just sympathize but I empathize. I truly am an empathic person, and I hope I have can as therapeutic and helpful as possible for others.

Altruism - Caring for Others

hannahcram1 — 2025-06-21 01:00:45 UTC

My newest baby!!! Winnie is a cockapoo puppy my fiance and I just got together. Having her as a puppy to care for fully has made me realize the quailty of commitent and care I strive for. I could go on and on with all of the quality of care she deserves but it would be a endless post. I truly am invested in each person around me wanting the best for each and every one. I hope this reflects in my future practice as an OT.

Episode 2: Beachside Balance (Goes Lakeside!!)

hannahcram1 — 2025-06-22 18:17:03 UTC

Topic Points:

Intro to podcast!
Who am I?
What are we talking about?
Slages Lecture: 1969 Facilitating Growth and Development
What was happening in 1969 in relation to this piece of information?
Relevance to current OT practice?

Empathy x2

hannahcram1 — 2025-06-25 03:01:10 UTC

After having my simulation for TUS, I realized the importance of empathy as an OT. The paitent shared that above all else I was empathetic. She highlighteed it as my strong suit, and expressed that she felt heard. I was happy she felt I was empathetic, comorting, listening, yet still digging deeper. This quote really stuck out to me as she was portraying a depressed paitent, she even shed a real tear. I felt recharged by the new expeicerence and the postive feedback. I truly identify as an empathetic person, so I am more than happy to know I can carry this into becoming an OT.

Honesty & Transparency

hannahcram1 — 2025-06-25 03:02:45 UTC

I recently got a puppy named Winnie. At the time of this situation she was 11 weeks old. I had sent my fiance to a vet appoinemtn with her, he had to leave work early to bring her to their very limted sceudle opening. I was in school, and had brought her just the week before. At the last appoinment they worried she may have “kennel cough” from the place we got her from. They then gave her an antibiotic that had a 2 week duration to be given to her. This follow up appointment was for her to continue getting her vaccines as she is so young we are repsonible for getting her fullly vaccinated. We brought her in, and they were unable to do anything. Yet we still had to pay for the visit. They had known she was sick and only prescribed the medicine 5 days prior and still sceduled us to come in. The office told us they could not give her any shots until the cough was gone. I advocated for myself and her that it was outrageous to know she was coughing 5 days prior and still ask us to make the time to come in. The follwoing day they called and asked if we had a way to weigh her at home for their tracking. I was outraged. I paid for her to go the day prior and they did no routine temp, weight, or check and still had the nerve to charge us. I will carry this experice forward and be honest and transparent with clients. Making people feel that healthcare is a scam or money sucking is why people do not go. This is a serious issue that needs to stop, it creates barriers to a healthy community.

Active Listening

hannahcram1 — 2025-06-25 03:06:01 UTC

I have had this experience a few times, but as an adult I have realized how little my doctor makes me feel like she is listening. Often she stares at her computer without looking up the entire appointment. Specifically when I was getting prescribed anxiety medication she honestly hurt my feelings. She was asking questions and would cut me off and skip to the next one. I understand she was going through a list of questions. However I felt some of the questions she asked could have been answered if she had just listened to what I was telling her. It makes me realize that as an OT I want to be an active listener. I want to make people feel heard. For me it was a huge break of trust, it makes me not want to go to her with issues that come up. If I was not about to age out and switch to a new doctor I would be seeking out a new doctor after that experience.

Episode 3: Beachside Balance (not so fun... car edition)

hannahcram1 — 2025-07-03 02:17:14 UTC

Topic Points:

Intro to podcast!
Who am I?
What are we talking about?
Question Addressed: Some choices of individual and group occupations are controversial. For example, there is much debate on the legalization of cannabis for medical and recreational purposes. Is it possible for occupations to be both health promoting and deleterious? Construct an argument.
AOTA article mentioned: https://research.aota.org/ajot/article/76/4/7604347040/23300/What-If-Deliberately-Dying-Is-an-Occupation

Dignity

hannahcram1 — 2025-07-03 13:46:15 UTC

At Monday's IPE event when communicating with my peers around the client I was thrown off by a few comments made. A physician's assistant student at my table wrote a question referring to the client Gerry as "Demented". As well as verbally saying she did not think he needed to be apart of the team in anyway. Overall just not addressing him as a human being and addressing him as a medical issue to be fixed. As an occupational therapy student we have been taught a very holistic view that I value and appreciate. I hope that this is not what all physician assistant students are being taught, and that they are having balance between medical models and the person. Moving forward into my career as an occupational therapy practitioner I hope to remain holistic. Looking at the big picture and remaining client based regardless of what is medically going on.

Self Care

hannahcram1 — 2025-07-03 13:47:18 UTC

Last year, I had a friend in her undergrad time at UNE who was not taking good care of herself. She was studying and putting more time into school work off campus than me. Yet she still wasn't doing well. She was not practicing self care, taking medications, eating meals, sleeping, and just having a positive mindspace. I believe this lack of self care and the negative headspace she was in was at fault for this poor performance. She cared, she studied, and just could not perform at the time. The brain was not able to consume this information she was providing with no food, anxiety, and no sleep. As an occupational therapy practitioner in the future I need to remember this experience and the advice I gave her. Self care can benefit so many other aspects of life that you do not realize. To be better, quicker, and more attentive, you have to care for your mind. Having a positive mindset is crucial to performance.

Intersectionality

hannahcram1 — 2025-07-09 15:07:11 UTC

Podcast being reference is in week 6 folder: OT Conversations That Matter Episode 4: Intersecting Identities & OTs Historical Context

I was very impacted by this podcast assigned for class. Looking at the community we have around us in our program is predominantly white cis females. It is interesting to think about how all of these intersectionality of aspects of our lives create who we are. How it also impacts what we experience in each setting of life. Being in this program I am in the majority. However we do have 2 boys in this program who we attempt to make feel very welcome as they are the minority. Considering what makes someone who they are is important to understand their experiences in all the settings they occupy. This was solidified and deepened after the interview with Dr. Ryan Lavalley. He mentions the importance of giving the platform for minorities to speak in the OT world as well. We see separation as a consequence of underrepresentation. This is something I want to avoid in my life and in my future practice. I want to have an inclusive and diverse environment around me. You do not know what you do not know, but stepping out to learn about others is our responsibility.

Communication

hannahcram1 — 2025-07-10 13:55:43 UTC

Communication is important to human relations. Honest, compassionate, kind, and respectful conversation is something I highly value. It was not until I moved in with my fiance's parents for the duration of grad school to save money that I realized just how important this was. I am used to the ways my family conversates and goes about high emotion conversations. We are very open, honest, blunt, and work it out in the moment and move on. Whereas my fiance's family beats around the bush, tend to have passive aggressive comments, and take out emotions on one another. This works for them, and they do love each other. However this builds anxiety, makes me defensive, and raises high emotions for me. I often conflict with his dad, he likes to make passive comments with the assumption that I will not say anything. However I often stick up for myself and then it creates a larger problem. Sometimes I feel he takes anger or attitude out on me when I am not his person to do that to. This causes some struggles and they are aware that I do not think it is okay. They attempt to be less passive lately in respect for me but we will continue to have our moments, meeting each other somewhere in the middle. I think this will be relevant when I hope to work in pediatrics of some kind. You are working with an entire family system, not just the child. Therefore I need to be able to adapt to different communication types, while remaining professional. I want to learn about more types of communication and practice working with emotions in a professional manner.

Episode 4: Beachside Balance & Occupationally Speaking (Pt. 1)

hannahcram1 — 2025-07-15 21:44:07 UTC

Topic Points:

Intro to podcast!
Intro to the collab, who are we?
Are we losing the “occupation” in occupational therapy? In other words, are we drifting too far away from the true purpose of occupational therapy and aligning too closely with the medical model?

Espisode 4: Beachside Balance & Occupationally Speaking (Pt. 2)

hannahcram1 — 2025-07-15 21:46:06 UTC

Topic Points Continued:

Are we overprioritizing documentation, productivity, and billable services at the expense of meaningful engagement?
In field work, what we see surrounding occupation-centered practice in action vs are interventions is more medically driven.
How does OT’s alignment with the healthcare system affect our ability to support our clients as occupational beings?

My OTP Vision Board

hannahcram1 — 2025-08-04 14:48:06 UTC