In the Dark.....

Name who sings a song by that title, and get a prize!!!! Or at least, get to say that you know it. (No Google Cheating)

I have one more week of day shift extravaganza, and then next Wednesday, I'm gonna hear the sweet sound...coming down...on the Night Shift! That means I have to somehow find a way to make myself sleep during the day....Like staying up till 8:30 AM won't do that.

So today's purchases included....black out drapes, new sheets, and Advil PM (or whatever time you need to sleep).

I have physically adjusted to the LONG shifts, and I no longer feel like I have been mugged at the end of the day. However, I am so dog tired, that I get home, eat, and am out like a light by 9:30-ish. That is after not actually leaving the hospital till after 8 pm, and a half hour commute.

Started my first IV on a little boy (first try!!), tried to assist with a catheter insertion on a 3 year old little girl who was having none of it. After 1.5 hours of screaming, wiggling, and a not too unimpressive Linda Blair-type levitation, she peed into a sterile container in 3 seconds flat.

I have learned so much in the 3 shifts I have worked, and I was fortunate to have a great teacher. This week, I spend one more day in acute, one day on the floor, and one day doing charge with my clinical coach. Then it is over to nights.

I am loving what I do. Really. And there really is no getting out of doing unpleasant tasks like you can as a secretary. The patients rely on you for care, and you have to be ready to give it. You can't put them off, or in a drawer. There is no out of sight, out of mind, because they are in your mind even on your days off.

I have developed a terrible scrub addiction. Husbeast think since I only work 3 days a week, I need only 3 sets of scrubs. Um, like I am going to wear the same outfits every week? Has he not lived with me long enough to know me better than that? Still, I don't think 8 sets is outrageous.

I had a very nice Mother's Day. I had thought I was going to have to work, but it turned out that I was not scheduled after all. So, I got breakfast in bed, and taken to lunch. I got a pda as a gift so that I won't have to lug around books in my bag, and software to put in it. (drug book, rnotes, labs & diagnostics)

Went to see my grandmother. Got a guilt trip from my own mother. Hope everyone else had a nice mother's day as well.

W. :)

Thanks everyone!!

I'm sorry it has taken me so long to post again. Besides the stress, the shock, and then orientation and getting used to the 12 hr shifts, I have been kind of running around like the proverbial chicken sans head.

Ok, so first.....The test. IT WAS TERRIBLE!!! I came out of there feeling like for sure I failed. I wanted to throwup, and then to cry. The machine cut off at 75, and I internally screamed, "NOoooooo, give me more questions! I swear I know some stuff." Then to add to my self-torment, I went and got a little buzzed with my best friend whose team just split against one of the worst teams in the conference. She sat and berated herself for not coaching well (meanwhile they are now at the regional tournament), and I kept looking up things in my books that I got wrong.

Hoosier asked me what to expect on the test. All I can say is, expect anything and everything. Every person I have spoken to has had a different experience. Some had a ton of pharm, some had a lot of prioritization, I had a lot of pick all that apply, and MS questions. I have found that so far, if you come out feeling like you failed you probably passed, and if you come out confident you did well, you might have failed. At least that has been the trend in my group.

So, Saturday was shot, didn't sleep at all that night. Everytime I closed my eyes I was back in that damn testing room. Sunday, I moped around the house. Monday, I dragged myself to orientation, for sure that I was just wasting my time in even starting, since I was going to be unemployed by Wednesday.

Monday, I checked the Pearson site, and it said my results were available. The best $8 I ever spent was getting that pass score.

Tuesday and Wednesday was spent in nursing orientation. I practiced phlebotomy and IV starts on a rubber arm. Learned about codes (and was surprised to learn that all the doctor does is stand in the room and bark out orders. Those darn medical dramas are so inaccurate.), ekg's, and the computer system.

Thursday was my first shift. My clinical coach was not there, so I ended up working on the pediatric hematology/oncology floor. Lots of sickle cell and leukemia kids. Being that the kids are chronic, it was amazing to me to see kids so educated in their own medical conditions. THEY told ME how they take their meds, what they were for, what best helped their pain, etc. Amazing but terribly sad.

Then I was off until this past Tuesday. The weekend was filled with softball, and I got to run the scoreboard both days. (About damn time. I was getting tired of yelling at the people to add balls, strikes, and runs to the darn board.)

Friday night went bowling with best friend at a really cool but very expensive bowling alley. ($24 for one game!!!!) Then we got a pizza and hung out at her place.
Monday, we had lunch together. And then she was off to regional tournaments, and I went to work.

Realized yesterday that I missed a customer service orientation that I was supposed to attend Tuesday. Once again on Tuesday, my clinical coach didn't show up (this is discouraging), so this time they paired me with a nurse who is not a clinical coach, but agreed to take me on, that was working the acute care kids. She is great, and we work really well together. We had 3 patients, 1 that was being dc'd, a very hormonal teenage boy with seizure disorder, and a child that was a near-drowning victim that is in a persistant vegetative state. The last child was a heartbreaker. When you go in the room you see a beautiful child that seems to sleep all day. They required a lot of work, and we spent most of the day caring for they.

We got an admission at 1700 of a baby that had been sedated for a CT. They brought him up to us for observation, and we fed him, and changed him, and he was suffering from nothing more that terminal cuteness. Then he went home at 1800.

Wednesday started out in chaos. I got all my stuff ready to go in the car, and realized that I parked to close to a wall to get me, and my backpack, and lunch bag out of the car. So, I thought, well I'll just get the stuff out from the other side. Except......I forgot to unlock the passenger door, and my keys, phone, badge, stethescope, pens, EVERYTHING were in the backpack that was sitting on the front seat. Of course. Husband came to rescue me. Thank goodness. Then I lost an earpiece on my stethescope. And my pen stopped working.

Thank goodness all the crappy stuff happened to me, because patient-wise it was a much easier day. My PSV child was breathing much easier than the prior day, and we had a baby that was in for observation (another case of terminal cuteness) for sleep apnea, and the teenage boy, again. Another nurse had asked us to keep an eye on one of her patients who was a boy with short-gut that had been in the hospital for a long time, and the parents, who were familiar with my preceptor, asked that she remain his nurse, since he had had his nurses changed on him an awful lot as of late. So she agreed to take him on. Well, turns out that child needed a lot of care, and I was basically left on my own with the three acute kids. My preceptor said I did a great job. I also got to assist on an IV start on a 5 day old baby. (So CUTE)

I know I still need to get organized. I need to get my system for time management. I need to learn to talk to the families, and be confident in my responses (although, my preceptor told me that I said all the right things). I need to remember EVERYTHING I need to get when I am planning on completing a task. (I always seem to forget something.) It seems that the hour between 1800 and 1900 flies by, and while I am trying to get all my charting caught up, all of a sudden the next shift is there, and it is time to get report. I have learned that sometimes doctors can get really nasty if they don't get their way. (Such a bad story, that I wish I could share)

Also, figured out today, that I have been clocking in with the wrong code. Ugh! I work tomorrow and Sunday. After that I have no idea what my schedule is. Time to bother the clinical nurse specialist.

Hope all is well out in bloggy-land. I need to get caught up in my browsing. I have not read in two weeks! Speaking of reading....It is SO nice to be able to read for pleasure, again.

W. :o)

Passed!!!

After probably the most stressful week of my life, I took, and passed, my boards! I am now a registered nurse. I started orientation yesterday at the pediatric hospital where I will be working.

I am terribly excited, and estatically happpy. Thank you to everyone out there in cyberland, that gave me support and pozzivibes.

I will be doing some much needed updating to this blog. My links are all terribly old, and need to be updated.

Be back soon.

W. :)