I Found My Present Within My Past

I am an asset—a valuable one. And I haven't lost my stride, my legs are still up under me.

AI-Generated Image: A Black woman with locs, smiling, wearing scrubs and glasses, sits at a desk, checking a patient in for their services.

I prayed for it all to come back to me, and it did.

Tuesday, May 27, 2025, was my first day back as a rehire to my site where I was conducting hereditary genetic testing, but am now a Patient Coordinator (among other job titles). I sat with the other Patient Coordinators to get a refresher on the front desk and how to do what I was once so very used to doing. As I watched each woman check in patients, I noticed how they differed in some ways, but they all came to the same ending—registering their patients and collecting any payment due at the time of service.

This is home to me. It is my mode of honorable recollection. I loved this job when I had it once before, however, COVID-19 came along in 2020, and in November of that same year, I transferred to our radiology scheduling department in order to work from home. I was with that department for four years.

I did one full day and 1/2 of a thorough run-through of what we should do, how we should do it, and what is expected of us during every single day: “remarkable patient care.” It wasn’t long before I had my stride and was by myself, taking on the Patient Coordinator role as if I had never left it.

When I held this role previously, it was dubbed Patient Access Specialist. I prefer that job title over its current one, but beggars cannot be choosers. And since I did not choose the job title, I have no say in what I should be called while I am employed.

I found myself back in my past while deep in my present, and everything I once knew flooded directly to my brain—downloaded for access and direct usage during my first week “back in the saddle again.” I had my legs. They hadn’t left me. I had several patients who complimented my smile, others who were just happy to see another smiling face, and my old co-workers shouting, “That’s where you’re meant to be,” or “Boy, is it good to see you there again,” to me.

hopped into the hot seat–outta
practice for four years, but
took to it like riding a bike
again.

I knew I’d get the hang of
it as soon as I put hands
to keyboard and head to
tasks.

I am a people person who
people’d more than I should
today, and I didn’t spazz out,
I didn’t lose myself in the
deluge of patients rushing in
around lunchtime.

I kept my cool,
breathed several deep
breaths, and turned on
the charm I am most known for.

I crushed it. —Tre L. Loadholt, “back at it again”

It was a week full of mini emotional roller coasters and dealing with IT who have had their brains duped more times than I can count, trying to keep up with an employee who has been contracted twice, but is now back as a direct rehire. Let’s just say the road is bumpy corresponding with them (they were recently outsourced, and local help is no longer a thing). But I am making do.

Medical Records Assessment and Distribution will be next.

Since I am a Jane of all Trades, and I am full of energy and want to stay on task, I will tackle the Medical Records Representative position as well. When that team member takes vacation or PTO, I will flip my hat to her role and cover for her while she is away.

This is a role with which I am quite familiar as well. Several things have changed, and there is new software I must become adept at using, but it isn’t anything I cannot learn quickly and apply accordingly.

And this is exactly what the Center Manager and Front Desk Supervisor love about me: my ability to switch roles whenever needed because I am trainable and teachable, and I catch on easily. Much of what they are doing, I already know, so... it will not take much time for the appropriate adjustments to the overall environment.

Beginning June 23, 2025, through June 27, 2025, I will be training in the medical records department. The following week, June 30, 2025, through July 3, 2025, I will run that role until my co-worker returns from vacation. We are closed, Friday, July 4, 2025.

I am both excited and overcome with emotion about this. I am undoubtedly looking forward to being in a smaller space with a cubicle for a week vs. upfront with three other women and a crowded waiting area every single day. It’ll give my introverted side so much joy to not have to “people” so much, and I’ll be able to recover enough for the week after the holiday.