CON Artist

... but wishing i was

2009-07-06T21:17:00.000-07:00

... dead, that is. I kind of feel like I am, so maybe this is hell. I will be one happy little camper once July ends. Literally. Summer semester will be over, and I'm going camping with Mister. And his motorcycle. The very motorcycle that I fell off of a couple of weeks ago (fortunately, it wasn't really moving when that happened.)

Summer semester has not been fun. Nope. It's torture. So much to do crammed in a few weeks. Between now and July 31, I have one quiz, six exams, one more care plan, three journal entries, a paper, and six more clinicals to get through. sigh.

So, while the rest of the US was celebrating July 4th, I was working on a care plan. I did pause for a moment to go sit on a blanket in my back yard and watch the neighbors try to outdo one another in fireworks displays (the guy two houses down wins for loudest booms). Also, the town, once again, lit up the night with its county budget. This little community goes all out for fireworks. And the really cool thing is that all the proceeds from firework sales in the county go to benefit the local volunteer firefighters' association. I kid you not.
So I sat out on the blanket and waited to see how the pups would react to all the excitement. Baby Boy, the deaf one, tucked tail and ran for the house at the first big BOOM! Little Britches sat on the blanket with me and silently freaked out in her own special way with that wild-eyed crazy look she gets. And then there's Boo. He parked himself on the porch stoop and barked through the whole event.
Speaking of Boo ...
Everyone except him knows him as Milo, but he seems to only answer to Boo. He will lie still without budging while I'm yelling "Milo! Come on, Milo! Time to eat, Milo!" But the moment I say "C'mon, Boo!" he pops up and is on his way. It only took me 13 years to learn his name. Personally, I prefer to call him Bubba Magoo, but that only adds to the confusion.

Boo dog has added to a bit more confusion here at nursing school HQ - the other evening after Mister and I returned from dinner, Boo was there to greet us with his usual enthusiastic barking which led to the following:

Mister: Why does he bark like a hound dog?
Me: um... Because he is a hound dog.
Mister: No he's not.
Me: Yes. He is.
Mister: He is not a hound dog.
Me: Then why does he bark like one?
Mister: That's what I'm asking.
Me: It's because he IS a hound dog.
Mister: He IS NOT a hound dog.
Me: Right. He must have just picked up the accent somewhere.

If this is as bad as our disagreements ever get, then I can live with Mister thinking that Boo is some kind of 90-pound poodle with a hound dog accent.

Now, Mister does not have dogs, but he does have kids. I get to spend a lot of time with the two wee ones. And while I love every little candy-coated inch of them, I do want to take a moment to send a personal message to my dear, sweet mother: THANK YOU FOR NOT KILLING ME WHEN I WAS FIVE. I'm sure I deserved it, and I appreciate that you were able to hold back, especially since you had to spend every single day with me. Seriously, the kids are great loads of fun and I adore them, but they have given me a new appreciation for what my mother went through on a daily basis. They've also given me a new appreciation for valium.

Okay, time to get back at it. It's 1am and I'm still up doing school work. Why? Because it refuses to do itself.

>banging head against desk<

not dead yet

2009-06-01T16:04:00.000-07:00

Well, hello, long-forgotten blog! Really, it's not that I forgot you at all, it's just that: 1) nursing school is a total time-sucker; and 2) because nursing school requires all of my time, I really haven't had anything interesting to say. So I apologize for not filling this space with lots of blah, blah, blah about how all I did today was study and write some care plans. But for some reason, today I decided I needed to jot down some stuff. Why? Because at this time last year, I was just embarking on this long, weird adventure. And now, here I am, still on the island and only 2 semesters to go. I might just make it out of here alive ... and about 15 pounds heavier.

I'm now in my first semester as a senior nursing student! And so far, the only invasive thing I've done to a real, living patient was a vitamin K shot to a shiny new baby boy. "Welcome to the world, little guy, and here's your first dose of reality. It's all down hill from here." Let me just say, it is counter-intuitive to stick a sharp, pointy object into a baby. I stood there holding the needle above his little leg so long that my instructor finally said, "Okay, do it. You both have to get this over with before either of you can leave the hospital" Like pushing a kid off the high dive, next thing I knew I was stabbing a baby.
I have done invasive procedures on my fellow nursing students. We are all in a panic at this point in our education because most of us haven't had the opportunity to practice any of our fabulous new skills on real people. So.... (whisper voice) we "borrowed" some tools of the trade and have been practicing starting IVs on each other .... shhhh. Apparently, it's a Very Bad Thing to practice procedures on fellow students at our fine CON, so we are all sneaking around, trying to find private places where we can clandestinely stick needles up each other's arms. And because we are all new at this business, we have bruised needle tracks all up and down our arms. I told Mister about this illicit activity and he just rolled his eyes and wondered aloud when he would have to bail me out of jail. Blog, you may or may not remember the last time I was here I had started seeing a law enforcement officer. Well, he's still in the picture. Fortunately, he doesn't have jurisdiction where I live.

Last semester, I had clinical rotations in Psych, Pediatrics, and Labor & Delivery. Psych was incredibly boring. Mostly we just sat around and put together jig-saw puzzles. Peds was fun. I seriously enjoyed that rotation, so much so that I requested the pediatric emergency department for my senior practicum. Labor & Delivery was awesome - it is an incredible thing to see a child come into this world. I loved working in the nursery. OH, and one more thing in case you're wondering: NO. I STILL DO NOT WANT TO HAVE CHILDREN. If anything, that conviction was validated. But, my utmost respect goes out to all those women who go through this process WITHOUT DRUGS.

This semester, I get to spend time with the oldsters and the general med-surg folks. We are just getting started so I'm not quite sure how I feel about it, yet. Generally speaking, I like the elder folk, so I'm optimistic that summer semester will go by quickly and relatively pain-free.

big bang

2008-09-02T14:10:00.000-07:00

School is off to a bang. Seems like this semester has already been forever long ... it's only been a week. *sigh* I'm not partial to starting off with a bang. I like to ease into things. This goes for swimming pools, rivers, lakes, the ocean, and baths. I like to slowly approach these situations, allowing one small part at a time to acclimate to its new environment. Once I'm in over my head, I tend to speed up a bit. This business of getting thrown into the deep end of classes right from the get-go is definitely intruding upon my comfort zone.

Pharmacology might become interesting if the instructor ever runs out of anecdotes regarding his wife's ill health. Apparently he is married to a medical marvel. I think this poor woman has every possible disease known to humankind, and probably a few that haven't even been discovered yet. The other instructor for Pharm merely reads the powerpoint slides to us at mach speed. Seriously, she sounds like an auctioneer. I wouldn't dare raise my hand to ask a question for fear of hearing "SOLD! to the confused-looking girl on row three!"

I think Foundations class is interesting, but I'm so distracted by the professor's haircut that I'm not sure. The first day in there I was having trouble focusing on the material because in my head I was picturing a new hair style for her. Currently, she sports a very harsh page boy, as in Capt. Kangaroo. I think if she kept the page boy, but angled it along the line of her jaw, it would be much more flattering and less distracting. Today, I couldn't stop picturing her as a cartoon. All that aside, I really like her and the class material. This is the Stuff Of Nursing.

Foundations Lab is fun in a sadistic kind of way. This class makes me feel like I'm in elementary school again. Friday morning (8AM!!!) we worked math problems, as in dosages & calculations. It's just evil to expect me to do math at that hour. The way the instructor was teaching this was completely backwards from what intuitively made sense. Fortunately, R was sitting beside me and offered up huge amounts of help on the conversions. We went from math problems, to making an occupied bed. I am the Queen of making occupied beds ... oh yeah! Then we went into this whole confusing tailspin called The Nursing Process. I was lost. But then I was found for a moment. But then I was lost again. I worked on this stuff today with E and K, and I think it's sort of starting to make sense ... maybe. I am kicking ass at the actual hands-on stuff of nursing, but some of the other stuff is currently alluding me. It seems to all come down to semantics. For example: apparently you can say things like "headache secondary to car accident" but you can't say "headache related to car accident" because in this universe that's just WRONG. However - and here's the tricky part - you CAN say something like "headache related to brain ooze". Why? Because you can do something about the brain ooze, but you can't change the fact that the car crashed.

The other class is online. Another wretched online class ... arrgh. This one is called Nursing Theory & Research. And so far, I am not loving it. It's just piles of useless busy-work. But apparently it's all the useless busy-work that sets the baccalaureate nurses apart from the rest, or at least that's what they keep telling us. Somehow I have a difficult time accepting that anyone out there in the "real" world away from university-land is ever going to care if we know the theories of nursing that were put forth by folks who have been dead for at least fifty years.

This past weekend I spent all day Saturday helping set up evacuation shelters with the Red Cross. For whatever reasons, approximately 500 folks from LA came here to escape Hurricane Gustav. Seems like they could have gone somewhere closer to LA, but maybe they wanted to make extra sure they were completely out of Gustav's reach. I loaded hundreds of cots, blankets and care packets onto a truck and then unloaded them at the shelters. Oddly, I had a good time, but only because of the company I was keeping. Conversations with A are always weirdly interesting and funny.
On Sunday, I played volleyball for about 3 hours outside on a sand court with 10 other of my fellow nurse nerds. It was fun, but very hot. I almost accidentally clocked Smarty-pants girl when we went for the ball at the same time ... that would have been bad. Smarty-pants girl is tiny. Her head is about the size of a small cantaloupe. If my fist had hit her melon instead of the ball, she would have been compost.

Party's Over

2008-08-25T15:07:00.001-07:00

Classes started today. As much as I did not want this to happen so soon - didn't we JUST END summer semester? - it seems that time does continue marching forward regardless of my feelings about the matter. If it's going to move so fast, the least it could do is just jump ahead a year so that I'm staring down my last semester rather than my second.

What I did on my 3-week long summer vacation ...
As previously mentioned, I spent quite a bit of time playing at the river.
I saw a movie at the theater. T and I went to see Wanted. It was ok. Angelina Jolie is, as always, a total bad-ass in this movie.
I went to Dollywood. A nursing school friend and his wife have season passes to Dollywood, and they can get guests in for free. So E and I went with them and a couple of other folks. I'm happy to report that I do still have roller coaster stamina.
I met a guy. And went on dates. Of course, I did not meet this fella anywhere 'round these parts because apparently there's an extreme deficit of single, straight men here. E convinced me to try the online thing. She made a good argument. She pointed out that we have 3 weeks off from school,we live in a place where it's very hard to meet guys unless you like hanging out in bars, which I do not, and I didn't have to post my picture or name. Of course, all of this encouragement was very easy for E since she's married. There was no fear of me coming back with, "I'll do it if you do it." I'm convinced that singles sites would completely vanish if it weren't for peer pressure. So, I posted a profile, sans photo, with no expectation that anyone would contact me, but it gave me a chance to window shop and wink at a fella here and there. Seriously, it's very much like shopping on Ebay. I love shopping on Ebay. It's fun to go through and post bids on things knowing damn well that I will NEVER win the bid. It's like retail therapy without total annihilation of my checking account. But lo and behold if I didn't start getting contacted by guys. Most of them were just blatant, "You interested?" kind of messages (um, no, I'm not >delete<) but one stood out. His message was short, well-written and at the end he said, "Even if you don't respond to this, we may get a chance to meet someday if you go into flight nursing due to my line of work." Okay, I took the bait. I responded. "What is it that you do that puts you in contact with flight nurses?" State trooper. Damn! A COP! Just my luck. The one articulate, interesting nibble on my profile is a law enforcement officer. Don't get me wrong - men in uniform are HOT. But do I really want to date one rather than merely admire them all from a nice, long distance just out of radar? Oh well, why not? Dude could prove to be a valuable resource in learning how to avoid the po-po. So, that's been fun. I actually called him one afternoon as I was speeding down the interstate and asked if it was, in fact, illegal to drive bare-foot. It is not. All this time I thought I was exercising extreme passive resistance to The Man by driving without shoes, and it's not even a bad deed. I'll have to come up with something else.

Today, I had my first Foundations Lab. In this class, we will learn how to do a lot of things that I already know how to do. But we will also learn how to do the one thing I've been dreading since I embarked on this journey: Foley catheters. There is nothing I fear more. I know it's a basic and simple procedure, but ... ARRRGH ... the DREAD. Yes, I will be facing my fear this semester. We will also learn how to give all kinds drugs in all kinds of ways, except for IVs. That part comes later. Before we left class, we had to get more photo IDs made and stand in line to be issued a Lab Bag that contains all our gear for this semester. I came very close to starting a cadence. I'm not even kidding when I refer to this program as Boot Camp for Nurses.

doing the river dance

2008-08-11T19:30:00.000-07:00

Oddly, it seems that now that I have a break from school I have less to say than when all I had to say was that I was studying for an exam. I did finally get my final grades: A in Health Assessment; A in Community Nursing; C+ in Pathophysiology ... what a freakin' GPA-buster. Oh, I also FINALLY got my summer school tuition reimbursement check. I picked it up last Wednesday and went to the bank with it, only to discover at 4:15 that the bank closes at 4. Apparently Corporate America was determined that I not have this money. On Thursday, I had to make a special trip all the way back into town just to put the damn check in the bank.

I've been spending time at the river with E and the dogs. I actually have tan lines for the first time in YEARS! And yes, I do use sun block.
One day last week I went to E's and we baked muffins using fresh blueberries she picked that morning. My contribution to this project was supplying the muffin tin and putting some batter into the muffin tin. E did the rest. She's very good at that sort of thing. I am not.
That same evening about 12 of us from the nursing program got together and played volleyball ... for 2.5 hours. I went from playing volleyball straight into boxing class. The next day I was able to identify every single muscle in my body and what each one actually did based on the level of pain associated with movement. Also, I had some crazy bruises on my arms - huge, purple, swollen bruises.

Tomorrow my plan is to turn in my paper work to the scholarship folks. Perhaps if they get started on it now, I'll have my fall tuition money by Christmas. In addition to giving them a copy of my fall semester bill and my class schedule, I have to turn over my report card. They are very curious about what kind of grades their scholarship recipients are getting. I hope to offer up something more impressive with my upcoming fall semester report card.
Also on the agenda for tomorrow is buying books for my fall classes. I do not want to do this. I want to continue on with my blissful denial of school ever starting again.
I also have to go by the financial aid office and see if they can help me track down some financial aid money. I applied back in February for this coming school year, but haven't really heard anything back about whether or not I will be getting money this time 'round.
And, since I will be in town, I may pop by the uniform store and get my scrubs. Because this semester? I actually get to go into the hospital and do stuff. With real patients. Scary.

Rockin' It Like A Rock Star

2008-08-02T18:04:00.001-07:00

I have completed my first semester of nursing school! Only 4 more to go before I'm let loose on the world. I'm still not sure how I'm going to be magically transformed into someone with life-saving/sustaining skills in this short amount of time - this whole experience is kind of like boot camp for nurses.

E and I recently took Smarty-pants girl to the river. Smarty-pants girl is not exactly the outdoorsy type, but she did surprisingly well. No complaining or anything, well, not much complaining. It was pretty funny watching her gingerly make her way down the very steep trail that leads to the river while holding a cell phone in one hand and bottled water in the other and carrying a very large bag filled with ... what? I don't know. A laptop maybe? She was quite the trooper, though. She even endured being showered with the river water that our dogs shook off. This was probably the only time in her entire life that she will ever step foot in water that hasn't been purified, so I feel like I've contributed in some small way to making her a more well-rounded individual.

School is out for 3 weeks and I'm already puttering around the house wondering what it is I used to do before life as a nursing student. I figured cleaning my house was a good place to start, and in doing so I found my banjo! Ahhh ... a project. Can I learn to play the thing in only 3 weeks? Stay tuned ... Speaking of tuning, I totally broke a string trying to tune up the banjo, so my homeschooling on a musical instrument is postponed until further notice.

Today I got out my studio supplies and started playing around with some creative stuff! Mostly all I've managed to create is a huge mess in the middle of the floor.

Over this nice, long break I do actually have some things to take care of. First on the agenda is getting the school to release my summer school tuition reimbursement check. This needs to happen soon, like last week. Or there's going to be trouble. BIG TROUBLE. The kind that involves me asking my friends to post bail.
Next on the list of Things To Do is get my scrubs for next semester! They have to be embroidered ... at least until the Powers That Be change their minds. I'm totally going to try the Grey's Anatomy scrubs, because that material? It's totally fabulous! Unlike regular scrub material, the GA scrubs are made from a rayon blend and they actually drape. So instead of looking like I'm wearing frumpy pajamas, I'll look like I'm wearing silky pajamas. And that would totally rock.
Other things include stuff like getting my car checked out because it's making some weirdo noise, getting Puck's nails trimmed, and cleaning my lab coat. I wore my lab coat for all of 2 hours and now it's filthy ... how does this happen?

Grades haven't been posted yet, but I know I got an A in that wretched online class. And I made a 100 on my final skills assessment in Health Assessment class, I also made a 100 on the documentation part for the skills assessment, and I made a 96 on the final exam .... who's a rock star! (Just for the record, Smarty-pants girl made a 90 on the final exam. Seems the actual skills of nursing are a bit more challenging for her than Patho was ... nice to know there is balance in the world)

Hello, Sunshine! Remember me?

2008-07-23T15:28:00.000-07:00

Wow - it seems like it's been months since I've written, but it's only been a week and half. During this time I have taken 4 tests and turned in one big assignment. Not only did I make a 100 on that assignment, but my teacher wrote "Great job!" next to my grade. That's like getting a GOLD STAR! Apparently, I am very good at documentation. This is good since the prevailing mantra in nursing school is "If you don't document it, you didn't do it." And as much as I would like to think this notion gives me the total go-ahead to screw up so long as I don't document it, I'm guessing it doesn't actually work that way. All these little rules and nuances are so tedious.

One thing about nursing school that is starting to dawn on all of us is that the stuff covered in class is completely unrelated to what will be on exams. Exams are a total crap-shoot. And no one has come up with a magic formula on how to approach these things. It basically comes down to having a 1 in 4 chance of guessing the right answer - 1 in 2 if you can narrow it down that far. I find that I do much better on the guessing game if I DON'T narrow it down to 2 possible answers. Because if I have a 50/50 chance? I will ALWAYS choose the wrong answer. During my last Health Assessment exam I actually heard Clint Eastwood in my head asking, "Do you feel lucky, punk?" No, Mr. Eastwood, I do not feel lucky. In fact, I feel miserable and stupid so why don't you just go ahead and shoot me.

On the administrative side of things at the CON, there seems to be a serious failure to communicate ... or maybe just some heavy-duty crack-smoking. These folks sent out a packet of information to all the nursing students upon acceptance to the program detailing everything we needed to get, have, do, or have done to us. So most of us got on it right away and took care of business. Part of this business included getting a lab coat with the CON official patch on the left sleeve. This was a clearly stated requirement. So I got my super cool lab coat with its nifty patch (actually, the patch is pretty ugly), only to be told a couple of weeks ago that they changed their minds. Instead of the patch, they want the front of the lab coats embroidered with "CON BSN STUDENT". This proved to be a bit of an issue for those of us who already had the patch. Why? Because this patch is a weirdly shaped 4-pointed iron-cross type thing which means lots and lots of stitching. Which means lots and lots of holes if removed. So, those of us with patches were told to keep the patch AND get the embroidery. Now, I have the coolest lab coat in the world with an ugly-ass patch on the left sleeve and a pile of embroidery on the left front. All that coupled with my ID badge which also says CON nursing student kind of makes me feel like a walking billboard for my school. Only twelve more items and I'll have my 15 pieces of flair.

On the fun side of life ... oh, yes, there has actually been a little bit of fun in the sun ... I have discovered the river. Last week, E and I went around our little town to interview various folks in different health agencies for this ridiculous community assessment paper we have due this week. Our venture proved pretty futile, but then E mentioned that she and her husband found this cool place to get in at the river. We drove over and checked it out, and decided that the next day we would bring our dogs and play. I only took my girl dog because the boy dogs are way more interested in running off into the woods than playing in the water. The four of us dog-paddled our way down the river, and now my legs are completely banged up, bruised, and scraped from all those insidious rocks lurking below the surface. Oh, and my back got a bit red from overdosing on sunshine. BUT IT WAS GREAT!!! I'm thinking next time we need to score some inner tubes. And sunscreen.

I also ventured back home for an afternoon of volleyball and cookin'-out at J's house. It was great to see friends I haven't seen in FOREVER. It was just the soul infusion I needed.

Coming up, I have a final exam in Health Assessment on Monday, and the big skills assessment check-off next Thursday. So, I'm hunkered down studying my butt off as per usual. Hopefully, these things will go well and by next Thursday afternoon I'll be floating down the river again. And then I get TWO WHOLE WEEKS off before fall semester starts.

Havin' A Blast, Wish You Were Here

2008-07-12T14:57:00.000-07:00

The war has been won. I took the wretched comprehensive Pathophysiology final exam this past Monday ... and I PASSED! WOO-HOO! I went into this thing having made peace with the very real possibility of having to take this class again. I mean, I went in as fully prepared as I could possibly be, but given the way the rest of the exams have gone, I knew I was riding the fence on whether or not I could pull it off. I appreciate all the prayers and small animal sacrifices that were performed on my behalf - I think that's what pulled me through. FINALLY, Dr. G's voice will stop ringing in my ears. (note: If anybody actually sacrificed small animals, I do not want to know about it.)

I was very distressed at missing my friend J's 40th birthday/July 4th extravaganza. I told him a while back that I would have to sit this one out thanks to the Patho exam. I pictured myself sitting in my loft studying away with the distant sound of fireworks going on around me. But my little community had other plans. When I got home from school on Tuesday, a team of Mullet Men were in the field next to my house clearing every little piece of growth that had found a strong-hold there. They cut down the honeysuckle that was growing next to my house, and this distressed me to no end. My first thought was that something dreadful was going to be built next to me. Something like, oh, I don't know, maybe a home for juvenile deliquents. But the next day, the field had been cordoned off with bright yellow tape, and it dawned on me that perhaps there was a July 4th thing happening. Turns out FREEDOM FEST was the big deal that was going to blow up right here in my little corner of the world. I spent most of the day studying with my newly adopted study group, and later in the evening my friend E came over to watch the show. And she brought me a freshly baked blackberry thing ... SCORE! I think this county blew its entire budget on the fireworks because it was quite impressive. And every single neighbor around me seemed to be having a competition to see who's personal fireworks display dominated.

Nothing more exciting than that going on here. Nursing school does not lend itself to having anything more than "studying for an exam" to report. I have a Health Assessment exam on Monday and a big research paper to work on for that ridiculous on-line class. That is my life right now. And I have to say, I miss my old life. I miss my friends back home. I miss my fire department. I miss Sunday brunch followed by a lazy afternoon of croquet and volleyball and horseshoes. I miss coffee at Espresso News, and gallery openings, and quiet nights out in the country where the stars were so amazing that it took my breath away. I miss my porch swing, and the sound of Cove Creek. But I DO NOT miss my former neighbors: the weirdo Rabbi and his motley crew of wayward young men. My current neighbors are fabulously normal people who play volleyball in the pouring down rain, and who do not speak English. And I adore them.

Other things that I've grown to appreciate in this strange world I now call ... um ... headquarters (I still can't bring myself to call it home) include: the totally hot motorcycle cop (this county not only has money for fabulous fireworks, but they have all kinds of fancy toys for the local law enforcement folks to drive); the way the railroad track is on a slight hill so that when I drive over it at just the right speed, I feel like the Dukes of Hazard; the fact that the local diner, the post office, the town hall, the elementary school and the fire department are all within spittin' distance of my house (seriously, this town is THAT SMALL); I love that when school is in session I can hear the morning announcements from my backyard; but mostly I love that there are always folks out and about here: a pack of kids riding bicycles and older folks walking on the track at the park and neighbors working in their gardens and people at the church across the street playing kickball ... basically, I almost feel like I live in a Norman Rockwell painting. Almost.

get up, survive, go back to bed

2008-06-26T15:59:00.000-07:00

Okay, so here's what my life has been for the past week: had a big group project due on Sunday for the online class (that was a royal pain in the butt, not to mention a perfectly good waste of precious, precious time); on Monday I had a Health Assessment exam and a medical terminology test; and on Tuesday? uh-huh, that's right, Patho and I went for round number 3. And even though I came out of that test feeling as beaten up as I did the first two, I actually did okay. I scored a good 10 points better than I did on the first two, and that, to me, is very cool. The down side to this is that because I spent SO MUCH TIME and energy preparing for this exam, I am now exhausted and having quite a bit of a struggle focusing on the new material. Although I have barely won these first three battles, the war will be decided on July 7. On that day, Patho and I will face off on a comprehensive final exam.

My new strategies include the purchase of a digital voice recorder. So now, in addition to watching DVDs of Dr. G's lectures, I can listen to them while I'm washing the dishes and cooking and cleaning and playing with my dogs and shopping for groceries ... basically, I literally hear this man's voice in my head during my every waking moment. And I seriously look forward to the day he just shuts up.

Another new strategy: I dropped my ineffectual study group. I just didn't want to deal with all the negative attitudes there. And apparently it was a good move since I did so much better on this exam than the previous ones.

Last new strategy: The Smarty -pants girl on the front row who rakes in all the pens for answering questions in class is now one of my new study buddies. I figured I would benefit more from her friendship than from pummeling her with my 20-lb Patho book, so I asked if I could join their study group since I ditched my own. Turns out Smarty-pants girl is actually pretty cool. So now I have a good study group full of people who do not have bad attitudes and who are making passing grades ... ROCK ON!

The other thing about Smarty-pants girl: she has no practical skills whatsoever. She's totally new to taking vital signs and doing the actual stuff of nursing. I mentioned to her when we were practicing our vital signs that no matter how many hundreds of blood pressures I've checked, I still get a little nervous about hearing and reading it accurately, and she said, "That makes me feel so much better. I'm totally new to this and the blood pressure thing just baffles me." It's a biotrophic symbiotic parasitic relationship we now have.

The only non-school related thing that's happened is a Red Cross volunteer thing I did on Tuesday after my Patho exam. Some of the soldiers from our area who were in Iraq returned home Tuesday evening and the Red Cross was there to greet them and their families with cakes and cookies and chips and all that. It was a happy occasion. It was just the pick-me-up I needed after that wretched exam. One of the other volunteers is a retired nurse, although she looks and acts way too young to be retired. S is fabulous and I just love her. She's also single. So after most of the soldier folks had split, there was a group of guys still there just talking amongst themselves and I was all like, "S, you should meet one of those guys. Obviously they are not married or their wives would have been here to greet them."
S: "Well, it's just so hard to tell how old they are with their shaved heads."
Me: "Honey, they are legal, and that is all that matters."
S: "So which one do you have your eye on?"
Me: "Oh, pretty much all of them, but I'll share."

Keep the prayers and good thoughts, etc, coming - they totally got me through this last exam. At one point I was starting to panic and hyperventilate and basically have massive systemic breakdown, when I just closed my eyes, took a deep breath and reminded myself, "My momma is praying for me right now. All I can do is the best I can do." You know what they say, as long as there are exams, there will be prayer in schools.

nursing school = life sucker

2008-06-15T07:52:00.000-07:00

As I become more and more absorbed in the nursing program, my life becomes less and less interesting. Which means there's just not much to say here. I talked to my friend J last night and he was giving me the run down of what all he's been up to since we last talked - things like croquet and cook-outs and fun in the sun and light and happiness - and then he asked, "So what's been going on with you?" Um ... well ... I get up, go to school, come home, work on school stuff, and if I'm lucky I collapse in bed by midnight. Often, bed doesn't happen until 2 or 2:30. And then I'm up by 6 ... IN THE MORNING. I'm sure I'll say this many, many times throughout my nursing school experience: NURSING SCHOOL IS BAD FOR YOUR HEALTH. It's sucking the life right out of us all. The lack of sleep coupled with the incredible level of stress is enough to send anybody into the world beyond. Before it's all over with, I'll probably be begging to be put out of my misery.

This past week I had the privilege and honor of taking another Patho exam. All I can say is that my plan for world domination is coming along much better than my plan for being valedictorian of Pathophysiology. I passed the test, barely squeaking by again. But at least I'm not the girl who was sitting outside crying afterward. She did not pass the test. Nor did she pass the first one. If I didn't know that she had gone out with friends on the Friday night prior to our exam, I would have felt a bit more sorry for her. But still, I do feel a little sad - not just for her, but for me and everybody else who are working our butts off just to barely scrape by.

I am seriously thinking of dropping my study group and, therefore, forfeiting my 10 extra points. On the one hand, I REALLY NEED THOSE POINTS. On the other hand, if I weren't spending so much required time with my ineffectual group, maybe I could make more progress on learning this stuff. Last weekend I sat in with a different study group, and MAN! the difference was amazing. I honestly believe that my time with those folks is what kept me in the passing range. Of my assigned study group? I was the only one who passed. And our group leader? She has a really bad attitude. She's pissed because she's not passing. Sorry, sweetheart, but while Daddy can buy you a really nice condo, and really nice furniture to go in it, and a really nice SUV, Daddy can't buy you a passing grade in Dr. G's class. And if your daddy could do that? I would totally sleep with him and get him to buy me one too. (Mom, that was a joke. I would NEVER do that. You can start breathing again. I censor a lot of "brilliant" sarcasm from my blogs out of fear that I'm going to kill my mother, but sometimes I just gotta let loose ... sorry Mom.)

Health Assessment class is going well. I aced my first medical terminology quiz ... SCORE! I needed that win after getting beaten up in Patho. And, I also kicked butt on my first skills check-off, even though it involved doing a math formula problem on the fly. Totally NOT prepared for that! It took me an embarrassingly long time to work through that problem, all the while my professor and lab partner were looking on in eager anticipation. But I did it, even though my hands were shaking.

The on-line class is still the big pain in the butt that it's been from the start. Only now, the Wizard has turned up the heat a bit. I like to think of the instructor as the "Wizard" simply because nobody seems to know who she is. We've never seen her, and on her first internet introduction she said, "You shall refer to me as Teresa." I used the real name she gave here, because I'm not convinced it's actually her real name at all. I mean, who says that unless they are protecting their identity? I was very tempted to respond to her internet introduction with, "And you shall refer to me as Her Majesty"

Keep all the prayers coming, or rubbing the Buddha bellies, or burning the incense, or whatever ... because this little girl who wants to be a nurse when she grows up needs all the help she can get.

trials and tribulations

2008-06-04T17:45:00.000-07:00

Yeah, yeah ... I know ... it's been almost two weeks since my last posting. I was feeling so defeated after my first Patho exam that I just couldn't bring myself to write about it. I mean, I passed it ... by a hair. I've seriously never worked so hard for such a low grade in my life. And now I'm facing another one. On Tuesday. Have I been studying? You betcha. That's pretty much ALL I've been doing. And that does not make for an interesting blog post, now does it? So I will try to fill in around the edges a bit.

I did do one fun thing recently. T and I had a girl's evening last Friday! That's right ... we went to see Sex And The City! The experience was fun, the movie was marginal. There was a group of women sitting behind us in the theater who started chatting it up with us - they were all like, "Girls!, we are going for cocktails after the movie ... you two should come with us! It'll be FUN!" I think what they meant to say was "We're going for MORE cocktails after the movie." Nothing brings women together faster than a movie about women! After the movie, T and I popped into a shoe store that's in the same shopping center as the theater. Actually, with the exception of our new best friends who were at the bar by then, I think most of the women from the theater were in the shoe store. Of course, T and I were not buying because we are poor nursing students, but there's almost as much joy in just trying on all the weirdo shoes that you would never wear even if you could afford to buy them. The next day I saw an article in the local newspaper about a group of ten nurses who rented a limo to take them to the movie and out for cocktails afterward - each of the nurses was dressed as her favorite SATC character ... and I bet they were wearing some of those fancy shoes that you just can't wear out to any ol' place. Like I said, SATC is an experience, not just a movie.

Okay, so my new strategy to conquer the upcoming Patho exam is to assign all my loved ones diseases. We are covering diseases of the blood and cardiovascular system, so I'm doling out leukemia and malignant lymphomas and atherosclerosis, just to name a few, to my nearest and dearest. Why am I giving my loved ones diseases rather than people I do not love so much? Because if someone I love tells me they have some scary disease, the first thing I'm going to do is research every possible resource for information. I will find out everything I can about it, and try to figure out how I can make it all better. However, if I hear of someone I do not love so much coming down with something nasty, I'm going to be all like, "Karma just bit you in the butt, didn't it." Hell hath no fury, and all that. So if any of my nearest and dearest are reading this, chances are I've given you a disease, but only because I love you more than chocolate. But not to worry! You will be miraculously cured next Tuesday ... only to fall victim to a respiratory affliction.

Oh yeah, we started an additional class this week. Health Assessment. I actually look forward to this class because we will learn how to DO THINGS. NURSING THINGS. And the very first day I got to use my nifty new stethoscope and sphygmomanometer (that's a big, shiny word that means blood pressure cuff) provided by those who now own me (the people who gave me that fabulous scholarship). I love how all of my equipment has their logo on it ... even the watch. I haven't even started working for these folks and I've already gotten a watch. I wonder what they give for a 5-year service award.

In other news, I now know where the Doggie ER is because I've been there ... twice. All is well now, but Bubba Magoo gave me quite the scare a couple of weeks ago. He was having some kind of reaction to something ... it was unlike anything I've ever seen. And apparently, he baffled the vet, too. But she plied him with drugs and whatever was going on stopped. And now I have all these really great pictures of Bub's insides. I'm looking for some nice frames so I can hang them in my house. Because those pictures? They were very expensive and should be properly framed and displayed. That way, every time I get hungry I can just look at one of those pictures of Bub's insides and think, "Right there is why my cupboard is bare. But damn if he doesn't have a fine looking set of lungs."

tales from the crypt

2008-05-23T15:24:00.000-07:00

I can't even begin to describe how exhausted I am. Seriously, I'm like one of the walking dead. Why? Because Pathophysiology class is eating me alive. Patho class is so challenging, and I feel so totally stupid in there ... all I want is to answer one little question correctly so I can get a pen. Dr. G gives a pen to whoever answers questions in class. The girl on the front row? Man! she has racked up a mountain of pens. I, however, have no pens. And every time that girl on the front row just casually and coolly lets the correct answer roll off her tongue before I've even had a chance to figure out what the question was? I want to smack her in the head with my 20 lb. Patho book and then ask her to explain THAT physiological response to the class. We have the first exam next week, and the amount of stress I'm feeling is unlike anything I've ever known. Ironically, the stess response will be covered on this exam.
My favorite thing about Patho class is that Dr. G ends practically every sentence with "... and then you die." This totally cracks me up. Tuesday, when I was already sleep-deprived and feeling punchy, it was all I could do to hold it together every time he said it. And now I have a compulsion to end every sentence I utter with " ... and then you die."

The other class is online. It's just weird and time-consuming. At least Patho is interesting and USEFUL. The online class is typical of the bullshit classes that are created to justify life in academia. It's exactly the kind of class that made me never ever want to get a Ph.D.

Oh, and since things are not stressful enough, and I have so much free time on my hands ... Health Assessment class starts a week from Monday. It's almost as though the powers that be are all like, "Okay, you seem to be surviving and haven't yet had a complete nervous breakdown, so we're going to turn up the heat a bit." ... and then you die.

Freak show

2008-05-15T19:01:00.000-07:00

Several times today I have described myself as a "deer in the headlights". But upon closer self-reflection, I realize that what I am experiencing is more akin to the squirrel that runs into the road and then gets freaked out about the car coming toward it and starts frantically running back and forth only to suddenly just freeze ... in exactly the wrong spot. That pretty much sums up my experience during my first week of nursing school.

On a positive note, I'm not the only squirrel. And some of the other squirrels? Well, they're pretty damn cool.

Hi-Ho And Away We Go ....

2008-05-13T17:56:00.000-07:00

So, I'm off and running. Today was my first day of nursing school, and I would by lying if I said that I got a good night's sleep prior to my 8am class. I was so excited that there was no sleeping for most of the night. Just little blips of dozing interrupted by bursts of energy brought on by 1) getting the scholarship that will pay for all of school, and 2) my FIRST DAY OF NURSING SCHOOL.

Yep, I got the scholarship! Even though I felt like a complete mess when I showed up for my interview. I went to bed early and set the alarm for 6am so I would have plenty of time to eat a good breakfast, get dressed and look my freshest best. It was a great plan, only I forgot to actually turn the alarm ON. So I awoke a little before 8am and immediate went into panic mode. No breakfast. No looking my freshest best. And to make matters worse, Mother Nature forgot it was spring and dosed us with some pretty chilly, rainy weather, so the perfectly professional-looking, short-sleeved, bone-colored top I was to wear had to be covered by ... WHAT? I flew through my closet and a small miracle jumped out and said, "I match that top perfectly." I actually have in my possession a bone-colored, suede blazer that I got in a thrift store several years ago. The one and only time I ever wore that blazer I managed to get blue ink marks in, not one, but two places on the front. One of the blue ink spots is down low and not too noticeable. But the other one? The other one was standing up straight and tall, front and center on my chest. Not having the time to worry about it, I held my arm and purse in just the right position to cover it, and hoped the man who was interviewing me wouldn't see it. Thank god I don't have attention-grabbing boobs.
The interview went very well, and I floated out of his office on a nice, big, fluffy, white cloud of joy.

Today, I got up and - this is another fine example of what a total dork I am - I actually announced, out loud, to my dogs, "Today is the first day of the rest of our lives, guys. Today, I start nursing school." And they were all like, "Kibble? Did you just say kibble?"

My first nursing class: Pathophysiology, 8am. All I can say is it's a damn good thing I find this stuff interesting. And the material is so hard and there's SO MUCH OF IT that will be crammed into my head in a very short amount of time, that I feel challenged to kick this class's ass. That's right, I want to be the valedictorian of Pathophys.

My other class is online, and, from the looks of things? It's going to be a royal pain in the rear. I started hyperventilating when I read the syllabus, and immediately called my friend D. so we could have a shared panic attack. This class was originally scheduled to be in lecture format, but apparently it's so awful that they can't even get anyone to TEACH it, so at the last minute, it became an online class. I do not like online classes. Online classes do not provide the structure and adult supervision that I need ... sigh. Hopefully, my new BFFs at school will help keep me from drowning.

Speaking of my new BFFs at school ... Since today was the first day of class, and hence, the first day that I got a good look at the folks I will be spending the next 1.5 years with, I took a good look around at my classmates. It's an interesting group of folks for sure, and I have to say that I'm glad I already knew D. and M. and R. going into it. The thing that really struck me was how old some of the folks are ... and then I found out they are MY AGE! Then I reflected back on a conversation I had last week with A. who insisted that there is "NO WAY" I am 40. I spent a good 20 minutes trying to convince him that I am. So, I've decided that, hence forth, I shall be known as She Who Is 30 ... Again. Not because I have a problem with being 40, but because my 30s kind of sucked the first time 'round and because I get tired of having the conversation that ends with, "No, seriously, I REALLY AM 40". So, why not? Mom loves this idea, because if I take off a decade then she has to also, which will make her 56 this Thursday.
Happy Birthday, Mom!

It's Nothing A Drink Won't Fix

2008-05-08T13:50:00.000-07:00

Here's a run-down of what all happened yesterday:
1. wrote a huge check for tuition that sucked every precious, little copper-topped penny out of my savings account
2. picked up my super cool lab coat with its nifty CON patch on the shoulder
3. spent time volunteering at the American Red Cross ... totally fun! and the guy I was hanging with there? oh yeah, totally hot ... and totally engaged to a she-cop.
4. went to a cook-out that included others of my ilk, i.e. nurse nerds ... and here's the point I want to run with ...

The cook-out was fun. Not a huge crowd, and mostly made up of nursing nerds, kung fu freaks, and computer geeks (with some folks falling into more than one of those categories). For such a weirdo mix of people, it was oddly comfortable, and the conversations were very interesting and funny.
At one point several of us nursing nerds were in the kitchen snacking and talking when a non-nursing nerd suddenly turned and puked in the sink (too much Jaeger for that one). AND NOT ONE OF US stopped our snacking or conversation, or even so much as batted an eye. Somebody leaned in and asked the puker if she was okay, she nodded yes, and that was that. It was as if this kind of thing happens all the time. And we are so desensitized to it that we can just keep right on eating in the midst of someone who is yacking.
If that was some kind of test, we all passed with flying colors.

And the big news: Monday, 9am, scholarship interview .... keep sending the good vibes, thinking the good thoughts, praying the good prayers, and rubbing the Buddha bellies!

Confirmed: I'm A Dork

2008-05-05T19:38:00.000-07:00

Last night I dreamed I made a 73 on my Anatomy & Physiology final. I was absolutely distraught. It was one of those horrible dreams - the kind you wake up from feeling all defeated and BAD. Let me just say, again, for the record: College is bad for your health, and not in a fun way.

Today, I turned in my scholarship application. If everyone will stop praying for world peace for just one second to send a little prayer up for me to get this scholarship, I would REALLY appreciate it. If I get this scholarship, I might be able to quit one of my jobs.
During CON orientation on Friday, one of the things that was stressed about our nursing program is that it is accelerated and content intensive. They basically said, "Good luck if you're going to try to work at a job and succeed in this program."

The other exciting thing that I did today was to get my lab coat. I think it's probably the coolest lab coat in the world, so I'm pretty excited about it. The store I'm getting it from gave all of us at orientation a $5 coupon - five bucks isn't all that much, but it did make a difference. My coat plus the school patch plus having the nice folks at the store sew the patch on was all less than $20 with the coupon! SCORE! That's a pretty smokin' deal, if you ask me.

Covering My Butt

2008-05-03T16:04:00.000-07:00

Last year I was warned by C who was already in nursing school, "Make copies of EVERYTHING you turn in to the office of the CON." Apparently these folks have quite the reputation for losing things. I'm not talking about the nursing professors, those responsible for turning us into highly skilled professionals. No, I'm talking about the administrators, the people in charge of my PERMANENT FILE. The people who, with one wrongly placed X on an official document, could put me on a course that no GPS on the planet could make right again.

I want to thank C again for the heads up.

The first hoop I had to jump through following my acceptance into the program was to gather together all kinds of information and signed documents, get immunizations and a physical, take an assessment exam, and turn it all in within THREE WEEKS! of acceptance. This was a pretty significant feat to accomplish in such a short amount of time since I still had to go to class full time and work two jobs, but I did it. And, most importantly, I made copies of everything. Which was a good thing, because a week after I turned it all in? Oh yeah, I got this message from the office of the CON:

TRAUMA QUEEN,
WE DO NOT HAVE YOUR CLINICAL REQUIREMENTS. IF YOU DO NOT TURN IN THIS INFORMATION, YOU WILL NOT BE ALLOWED TO ATTEND CLASS.

And yes, it was all CAPS and bold. Those folks sure know how to make a person feel all warm and welcome. I immediately replied:

Hi, K
I turned in all of my material last week, on Monday. Was there something missing from my packet?
Trauma Queen

But rather than wait for a reply, I went over to the office to handle the matter in person. I told K again that I had handed my packet of information to B and it was on her desk when I left the office the previous Monday. K was just a teensy bit condescending when she said, "Well, we don't have it." And so was I when I said, "Well, it's here somewhere, but I did make copies of everything just in case something like this happened." Then K said she would look in my file - my PERMANENT FILE! - on the chance that my packet had been put there before crossing her desk. And lo and behold! Crazy though it may sound, my packet had indeed been placed in my PERMANENT FILE. I asked K if everything was there. She looked through it and with a friendly smile said it was all in order.

Trauma Queen: 1
CON: 0

Reality hits hard, but I hit harder.

2008-04-27T14:47:00.000-07:00

A little background check is in order, here, on this first posting. This is like the Introduction in a novel, in other words, the part nobody reads. So, don't feel obligated.

Several years ago I decided that I want to be a nurse when I grow up. And not just any kind of nurse, but a trauma nurse. At the time I was working at a job that was going nowhere real fast, a job that didn't pay enough to cover my living expenses. I took a good, long look around and decided that I needed a career, something with options, something that I could utilize anywhere, something that paid a decent salary. After much soul-searching, and long talks with folks in the profession, I decided on nursing. It wasn't as arbitrary a decision as it sounds. A million years ago when I was in high school, I was actively involved in Health Occupations Students of America, and had worked as a nursing assistant for a while after school. So, I like to think I've come full circle.

The program I was initially looking at had a 2-3 year waiting list and required CNA certification. I got on the list, and got certified as a CNA. Then I decided to get my EMT certification. That's when the fun really started. Turns out I'm an adrenaline junkie ... who knew!? One little drama led to another and last fall (2007) I ended up moving to a different state to attend a university that offers an accelerated program for 2nd degree students. The move rendered my CNA and EMT certifications useless - unusable in the state where I now live. The move also put me in a place where I knew no one, had no friends, no job and no money. My long distance bill was insane those first few months. And I seriously cried every single day, sometimes more than once.

My first two semesters at school have been interesting in so many ways that it's impossible to back track here and document all the things that initially freaked me out. Let it suffice to say that I have felt very much like a stranger in a strange land. And when I'm feeling really homesick, I become particularly surly where the native inhabitants are concerned. Yes, I am that obnoxious person - the one that other people tell to, "Just go back home if you don't like it here." On the positive side, I've discovered my super hero power of invisibility - if you don't believe me, take your 4o-year-old self for a walk on a university campus and notice how many of the 20-year-olds SEE YOU.

My pre-requisites are finished (well, almost. i have 2 final exams to take) and I officially start in the College of Nursing (CON) in 2 weeks. It's hard to believe that I'm finally starting. It seems like I've been trying to make this happen FOREVER. The current nursing shortage isn't due to a lack of interest in the profession, believe me! It's due to a lack of educators to accommodate all of us who are interested in the profession. The program I am starting accepted 120 students out of over 500 qualified applicants. I'm proud to be one of The Chosen. I'm also terrified. And I very much feel the weight of not only my expectations for myself, but also the weight of knowing that if I do not do well I will be letting down a lot of people who have supported me and propelled me forward. And I will also be letting down the 380+ people who did not get accepted this year. And I really don't want to do that.

So here is where I will document my experience. I hope to post here often so that when I finish school (or school finishes me) I can look back at where I started and wonder, "What the hell was I thinking?" with a smile on my face. This blog is for me, I am not writing for others, but if others happen to read along, that's okay. I can only hope anyone else might find it inspiring, amusing, or at the very least, a useful warning.