Archive for June, 2009

As in, “Buzz’s girlfriend, WOOF.” (name that movie) This is something my brother and I say to each other once in a while, and I find it best describes the past week. Yes people. the theme of my AT nursing program is: THIS.IS.HARD. the end. I’m trying my best not to be negative and to keep moving but I also know I am being expected to learn loads of information at the speed of light, which is kinda extraordinary. This is why I have not updated in a week. This is why I had two major breadowns this week. This is why I love my family so dearly. This is why I need you to repress your annoyingness. ha. Just kidding on that last one. Sort of. I’ve come up with a new little something I like to call the “threshold for annoyance”. It sounds mean but in reality I am making fun of myself. Let’s take last Wednesday for example. I’m sure there was not enough sleep had, woke up at 5 to be at clinical at 6:45 then had my Pathophysiology final. I barely had enough brain function to read the questions on the final! I exaggerate not. Feel free to ask my fellow students if ANYTHING I said that day made any sense. The answer will be a resounding, “NOOOOO”. But it will be a “no” without judgement because their brains were not functioning either. So, come Wednesday afternoon, after I finished the final, my threshold for annoyance was at an alltime low. As in I needed absolute reason to be mad/annoyed at you. Any and all things you said to me at that time were held against you. Like HOW DARE THAT FLY LAND ON ME!! or THE SUN, WHY IS IT SHINING!! Enter breakdown #1. Now with all that said, I have the BEST family in the whole world whose only “sin” is that they are related to this girl who’s in a crazy nursing program, doesn’t get enough sleep and cries all the time. They are awesome. And I hope they stick around even when the threshold is lowering!
The good news is, I finished Summer I session, technically I am 1/4 done with this craziness. I say “technically” because time-wise I am nowhere NEAR 25% done. 6 weeks out of 12 months does not 25% make. I am thrilled to have made it this far. There were times, like Wednesday, where I honestly wondered if I’d pass Pathophysiology and therefore pass Summer I. But I did. Now onto Adult Health, which I feel will be the scariest thing I ever encounter. If you do not hear from me in the next 7 weeks, I am probably still alive. No promises though. I need to wrap up because I have something like 24 chapters to read before Wednesday.

LOVE!

ps There were times when I thought that aquiring one of these would dominate a blog post. Apparently when your sanity is on the line, a lot pales in comparison. BUT, IT IS AWESOME, I LOVE IT AND WANT TO MAKE BABIES WITH IT! Yes that is most definitely a picture of my best guy as my wallpaper and yes, I have absolutely showed all my pictures of him to most of my classmates. I miss him very much.

And just for good measure, here’s a photo of one of my favorite things EVER. Storm brewing at the Lake. Wish I was there!

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This past week was the first set of clinicals. For those of you not up to date on your nursing school lingo, clinicals are where we actually go into a hospital setting and care for a patient. Now “care” means anything we’ve already learned. We aren’t thrown into the patient’s room and expected to remove their gallbladders, lest you be terrified of any nursing student you may have should you ever be in the hospital. My first day I had THE.BEST.PATIENT.EVER. Honestly. I fell head-over-heels in love with nursing that day. I totally got to give an injection too. The second day was a little rough because I’d been up late studying. 5AM is an ugly number on the alarm clock. But I had a really great patient on my second day too. I got to take out a nasogastric tube (the one that goes through the nose to the stomach). I also stopped by to see patient #1 to say goodbye as they were being discharged. (disclaimer: I am doing my best to not ascribe gender pronouns to patients in order to honor HIPPA, so all you’ll get is “they” or something equally vague.)
The rest of this week, the non-patient-care parts were rough. I am starting to think it is not a coincidence that the HIGHEST point so far and the LOWEST point so far were on the same week. Things get hard when there has not been enough sleep had. I blame everything on lack of sleep; grumpiness, low threshold for annoyance, brain malfunction or complete lack of function, confusion, etc. Yesterday was particularly hard but I had ONE VERY EXCITING THING TO LOOK FORWARD TO: my new iPhone 3G S waiting for me at home! And that iPhone has yet to be activated. Poop on everything yesterday except clinicals. oh and the cupcakes, I liked those too. Here I am, trying and retrying to get my iPhone to accept its SIM card like the desperate nerd I am. I won’t go through the details but I spent something like two hours yesterday trying to get at&t and Apple to help me. The conclusion was that at&t has a pooptastic system that is getting congested.
Okay I really need to get some studying done as I have finals next week.
haha. Almost fooled you.

HAPPY 24TH BIRTHDAY TO THE BEST LITTLE BROTHER IN THE WHOLE ENTIRE UNIVERSE!!
Alex, I feel like it’s all been said but I’m going for it anyway. Sometimes I wonder if anyone has ever loved a sibling as I love you. You are the most amazing young man I know. The fact that you are you, that I know you, well it gives me hope that there is someone as equally awesome for me out there. Heck, I’d take him if he was 1/3 as amazing as you are. You give 200% in all you do, especially in loving your family and friends. I’ve yet to meet a sane person who doesn’t adore you.
I LOVE YOU TO INFINITY AND BEYOND! Even when you get spots on my new purses. and exlaim at my eye make-up. and thankfully report that I am “free of legions”. No one can ever say you aren’t entertaining.
love, your big sister

LOVE!

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You know the saying, “necessity is the mother of invention”? Well I think “procrastination is the mother of blogging”. Just take a gander at all those entries I made while at JBU. Where will I get my motivation to blog once I’m done with school? Well we needn’t worry about that because I’ll be in school for FOREVER. At least it seems that way with the rest of this program to finish as well as my Master’s and possibly Doctorate. So don’t you get all frazzled dear reader (is there more than one of you out there?!), I shall have plenty o’motivation for at least the next 5 years. ish.
Okay remember how I was all, “DUDE! Catastrophe SOOO stalks me”? And I told you about the time that bird got into our basement somehow? I’d put a link for the entry but my links seem to go all crazy on me so I’ll refrain.
Here’s another story I was thinking about on my drive home from school this afternoon. Please act like I didn’t just preface the story because I like to start a certain way. ahem
Did I ever tell you about the time I saw a guy fall off his motorcycle in 2002? Now at first, this sounds like a HORRIBLE and most GRUESOME story to be telling for entertainment but I ask that you hold out on the insult-flinging and wait a minute. My friend Kelly and I had gone shopping in KC one day and were driving home. Little did I know (that phrase ALWAYS will remind me of “Stranger Than Fiction” LOVE IT) that a surprise going-away-to-college-party was awaiting us at my house. We’re driving along KS-7 when we come across a young man on what is called a “crotch-rocket” I believe? He apparently decided that merely riding the bike was too mundane for him and he proceded to liven things up. First he stood on the seat while holding the handlebars then he stood up completely on the seat not holding anything. I kid you not people, I KID YOU NOT. This guy is going something like 60mph and standing on his bike. It was crazy and I wish I’d had a camera.
Then he fell off. It was a tad horrifying. Honestly I was more concerned about his runaway bike which I guess was on cruise control (do they have cruise control for bikes?) running into the adjacent field and surprising some sheep or something than I was about this poor (but stupid) kid who’d fallen off a motorcycle and was nearly run over by several cars. He got up though, so I decided he was okay. I think he had a helmut on.
So there you have it. Even MORE proof that I am a witness to many a wild thing. Maybe I should make a friend out of catastrophe.
Now, wouldn’t your insult-flinging be better directed at the foolish motorcyclist than at me? I’m just the narrator!

LOVE!

PS I SO wasn’t going to do another entry because I have this rule that I must wait until I have at least 1 comment before I will “move on”. So I was JUST about to break the rule when I see that I HAVE A COMMENT! from KATE! It just needed to be approved? Which is weird because I’m relatively sure I didn’t set that up. oh well.
Kate, I don’t follow mightygirl regularly, never really read finslippy but sometimes check on dooce. Sometimes I have to take a break from dooce though. We can talk about that in private though. And by “private” I mean through other means on the internet. ha.

and also I see that my brother commented as I wrote this very entry. Kismet! I don’t even really know what that means, but it sounds appropriate.
Glad you liked the lists!

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Everyone loves lists, right?
Okay so I’ve been making “Life Goals” lists at the beginning of every journal I’ve had for the last few years. I journal a lot.
I thought it would be neat to share some things I’d like to do in my lifetime.
Here we go

1. See the Aurora Borealis
2. Visit all 7 continents
3. Take one great photo
4. Make something beautiful
5. Write a book
6. Go to a ball/gala
7. Visit Argentina
8. Start a singles outreach when I have a home
9. Do something big for someone
10. Learn to do a real dance (tango!)
11. Adopt a child
12. See “The Return of the Prodigal Son” in person
13. Visit all 50 states
14. Own a pair of Manolo Blahnik shoes (no judging)
15. Buy a new car
16. Be able to play the piano well
17. Live on a sail boat for a month (or more!)
18. See (and ski!) the Tetons
19. Have a BIG family Thanksgiving (touch football required)
20. Swim in a bioflurescent body of water (okay so mightygirl has this too but I TOTALLY have wanted to do it for a long time. Ever since I learned about this stuff in high school.)
21. See the Olympic games in person
22. Go on a trip purely on a whim. I’ve always wanted to walk into an airport and buy a ticket on the spot!
23. Get my pilot’s license
24. Zipline somewhere sometime!
25. Own all of the Beatles albums on vinyl.

What do you think?

LOVE!

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I may be exhausted but I’m still blogging. No promises on how great my blogging will be. I’m running on empty guys. As I said on Facebook, week 4 of the AT program must be when the exhaustion sets in. I’ve been really careful about sleep because a) I have a two-hour roundtrip commute everyday and b) I tend to get hopeless and depressed if I do not get enough sleep. There are only so many times you can promise yourself, when the alarm goes off at 6 AM, that you’re SO getting 10 WHOLE hours of sleep tonight before your self starts to catch on and starts asking WHERE THOSE 10 HOURS WENT in the most painful way possible. And then starts critiquing your run-on sentences. whew.

But this week has been great. And not just because I told a joke before our exam Monday and everyone laughed and I felt loved and spent the ENTIRE time I was taking my exam thinking, “They like me, they REALLY do, this is SOO great.” So I thought I’d share what I know with you guys, in case you need any of the services I can provide (in a non-street-walker way).

Things I know how to do and may be doing in clinical next week:
Urinary catheterization
Wound care
Head-to-Toe Assessment
Restraints
Teaching use of crutches, wheelchair and walker
Bed Bath
Perineal Care

Things I’ve read about how to do but hopefully won’t do by myself anytime soon:
Enemas (woo, party time)
Injections
Medicine Calculation/Administration
and much, much more than cannot be currently elicited from my poor, overworked mind.

First exam was Monday, did well, confirming the fact that I’m NOT due to be kicked out of the program THIS week at least. Next week is another Pathophysiology exam, and we all know how Pathophys. feels about me so I can’t guarantee no kicking out. Feelings mutual, pathophys., feelings mutual. Friday is the second Fundamentals Exam. I would type out my schedule just to shock you and convince you that this is HARD, but I think you guys get that. Especially from all the sweet comments on the last entry. I’m back to being too busy to worry about boys (HA! except for you-know-who). Okay so how about I’m too busy to worry about being single? Never too busy to admire.

Off to collapse into bed. There better stinkin’ be coffee between waking up and going to class tomorrow. I might be a grump tomorrow.

LOVE!

PS. TWICE in class I’ve muttered something under my breath that has embarassed me exceedingly. Embarassing things to do with my privacy preference during, ahem, bathroom practices or just my bathroom practices. MORTIFYING. I’m hoping all of my classmates read the “no judging” clause in my contract.

Since I love posting pictures.. 3 years ago today I was celebrating my dear friends Randi and Tim’s wedding! Here we are; me, Randi and Katie. Seems like just yesterday!

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This week was really tough. Tough as in I definitely just hooked up my bluetooth keyboard and mouse so I could be more comfortable while typing out this entry. I don’t so much have a problem with the start of the week, although it was stressful it was definitely a high point. Or THE high point. In case you didn’t hear it through the grapevine, I got an A on my final as well as an A+ on my Head to Toe Practicum, leaving me with a solid A in Assessment. YAY. Oh how quickly the joy comes and goes in this program. We were immediately hit hard with Pathophysiology (my arch nemesis) and Fundamentals (which I fondly refer to as Boodamentals). Fundamentals had 18 assigned chapters as well as at least an hour of practice questions for Thursday and Friday. We had a test in Pathophysiology this morning. So Patho got the upper hand and all of my time last night (6 hours to be exact). What I wish someone would have told me last night was this: “Go ahead and read for Fundamentals because all of that studying you are doing for Patho? WILL BE USELESS.” I MAY have scored better had I not known ANYTHING for this test. Thankfully the Fundamentals professors have been flexible and merciful and let us get by without reading, though it will be done this weekend because our first test in Monday (second test Friday).
I don’t even really know what to say about the Pathophysiology exam this morning. Let’s just say this morning was the first time I cried due to school-related emotionalness. It was a mess. A lot of people are in the same boat as I am and this makes me feel better. Not one person scored an A on this exam, which CLEARLY shows that it was faulty, ha. If you hadn’t already surmised that from the fact that I did not do well on it. We got our test booklets and I literally laughed (chuckled actually) because THERE WAS NO FREAKING WAY I KNEW WHAT THOSE QUESTIONS WERE ASKING. So yes, I did not do well. Dad, if you are reading this, I will gently remind you this is a JUDGE-FREE ZONE. As long as I am addressing readers, “Broseph” is it? Thank you for capping off my GREAT day by complaining that I blogged about nothing yesterday. Sorry to have wasted your time poopface. This is my blog and I WILL BLOG ABOUT WHAT I WANT. I reserve the right to NEVER mention you again, so watch out.
Okay so during lunch time I find that SOMEONE stole my Diet Coke from the communal fridge.
Dear someone who stole my diet coke,
Today was not the day to steal much needed caffeine and joy from me. One day you will be in the hospital or need nursing care and let’s just say karma is a b-word. You are a poopface too. I know you stole the banana bread I brought for my classmates as well as C’s lunch.
Love, M

I’m just gonna come out and say I have been struggling with some other stuff too. Yes, this is me, opening up to the internet. I trust you. I’m really having a hard time with my singleness (again). I HATE saying that because I feel like the ultimate post-college Christian girl. Boohoo I didn’t get a hubby in college, woe is me. I hate that, I hate that you either have to be a miserable singleton frantically searching out “the one” or you’re the girl that “totally fine being single, love it, wouldn’t have it any other way, really, no really” (said in really high tones cleary conveying fineness). I don’t want to be either. I want to me. But why does everyone else have someone? How come everyone else gets to have ADORABLE babies? Deep down I KNOW there is reason and purpose behind where I am at now. Okay I can’t even talk anymore about this because it’s depressing and so cliche and I may start crying again. So I laid it out there people, don’t make me regret it. I guess what I am saying is, listen I’m struggling and a lot of that is due to stress (and maybe some hormones) and I really need my “peeps” right now.
I really wish I could put up a new picture but I haven’t had time to take any. How about a picture of where I was a year ago? Will that do?

okay I can’t resist putting another up

taken by Alex, aka “Broseph”.

LOVE!

PS I’ve password protected a few posts. You guys have all read them so I’m not worried.

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So this is what that feels like.
more later. And by “later” I mean maybe tomorrow night?

LOVE!

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