VTech's Tragedy

Its weird that when I heard the news for a fleeting moment, which was yesterday from a minute phone call from my sister telling me "that a co-worker of hers on her lunch break called asking her what school I went to and quickly informing her about the shooting at VTech". She then quickly informed her co-worker that I attended SuchandSuch University. She told me in her head if this was occuring at my school she was ready to just walk out of work, book a ticket and be on the next flight to my city.

So I really couldnt react to the info. I was just in a stress nonreactive state of mind sudying in with my group. Here was my response "wow,seriously, 32 people died, oh my goodness, wow" (all the while three classmates staring wide eyed at me)*quickly entail the info to them*. Hang up the phone with her telling me to be aware of my surroundngs and be safe.

So I go home try to look up the info online, I'm still not reacting. Take my quizzes today, which I bombed one which I'll post about another time. Go to the gym which I havent been since February and after working out sat in the lockers lounge and watch the CNN's news coverage for 30 minutes. That one student which they titled as a hero, when asked to comment about what he thought about that*in my head I'm like what kind of question is that* he broke down and barely squeezed out that he was just glad to be here today. Boy did that do it for me. Can I say it just hit me. I mean I say that many times thank you Jesus for waking my up and blessing me with another day. Those words are never overused in my opinon because it's true. 32 people all those pictures and one sentence snid bit of info on each, accomplishement or major. I was thinking these people were more than what they were majoring, these people had a life, a family, friends.

It's weird that I feel at peace and thre's no spirit of fear upon me. After 9/11 that was a different story..took me a minute before I started flying. But now I know Christ, therefore I'm at peace. Please put the victim's and gunman's families in prayer, may they receive the spirit of comfort and peace in this time of pain, loss, and sorrow. Thank you God for your loving mercy and grace.

Two weeks and already tired.

So this is our second week of classes had three quizzes all on one day yesterday. Pharm Med Math, Adult Med Math, and a Community quiz. I believe I did well. But for some reason I've been having problems gettinng on my beat to start studying. Thank God I joined this studying group for this quarter which I have no choice but to go but at the same time we have fun doing it.

It didnt help that on Monday and yesterday I wasnt feeling well. Yesterday all I was thinking Lord please let me get thru the last quiz. He sent me an angel, my classmate and friend, to hand me some sudafed. Can I tell you not more than 5 minutes I felt soooooooooo much better, though I needed more tissue from the action of the pseudoephedrine(alpa1 agonist)which stimulates peripheral vasoconstriction basically squeezing all the mucus thru my nose out. I really felt decongested. Another thing I always find myself using what I learned in class to try and apply it on what's going on with someone I know or myself, or anything from watching House. Like last quarter during the week of finals I had diarrhea, so I was drinking a whole bunch of water cause I was thirsty, then I started feeling nausous and a bit irritable, then duuuuhhh "Fluid and Electrolyte imbalance" which was the famous topic of half of our lectures in Adult I. I diagnosed myself as having hyponatremia and possible all sorts of loss electrolytes with all that diarrhea and ingestion of water. So I quickly got me some gatorade and I was cured!!!! Diarrhea completely stopped and I felt hydrated and sane.:)

Okay on to another topic, Can I say I love my peds clinical. Why? Because its not in a hospital setting. So you wonder where will I be getting my peds clinical experience. Well it's a long term home for children who's either too sick to be home or too well to be in the hospital. These children are either victims of physical abuse resulting in head trauma, intentional or unintentional drowning accidents, MVA, and/or degenerative diseases. What we were told about each child made my heart get sad and sad and sadder. Its disheartening that most of their families arent involved. That's what made me really really sad. I could count on one hand how many of those kids parents still visited them from time to time. Plus my professor is awesome awesome.

Now the peds lecture class is another story. I had a really hard time this week staying in the class the full two hours. I sat in the back(probably that's a wrong move in itself cause I always sit in the front) and just was getting annoyed about having someone go on and on, powerpoint after powerpoint. So I took many breaks, once I stepped out for 30 minutes. This is like 16 pages with six slides on each condensed with a whole lot of information. Maybe it was because I was sick, who knows. Anyhoo at the end of each lecture she had like 10 to 15 practice question and I was able to answer them correctly even though I wasnt there the whole time. I guess that's good. I mean I did fine last week. I just was tired of all this info being thrown at us.

Other than that. I think this quarter is waaay more relaxed than this quarter. Its not because we have less work to do but I think it's because we've gotten the hang of it from last quarter. Last quarter was adjustment time. Now its just the same routine somewhat. Two days of lecture and three days of clinical. Two days of lecture and three days of clinical. and so on and son for 8 more weeks. Hey that doesnt sound bad. Only 8 more weeks after this week. Thank God. Then the last final quarter which I heard is the hardest of all 4. But I'm ready and I'm passing and my last week will be the first week of September. And I will be taking my boards in September. And I will have those two letter behind my name. In the name of Jesus. Alrighty let me do this assignment even though its due the last week of clinicals, its my way of getting out of the rut and back on the grind. Much love.

Sooooo

So I have 15 minutes to post until House comes on. Did I say I looooovee that show. Pick that over Grey's anyday.

So I think I mentioned that I was excited about my community nursing course this semester. But not too excited about my clinical assignment which is again at a posh posh retirement living facility. I was one of the unlucky ones. Oh well. So here's this email I sent to a nurse asking for a volunteering opportunites after I was referred by a nurse practioner who did my pap smear last week.

So of course some changes has been made to retain confidentiality:



Hello Nurse Such and Such,

My name is Such and Such and am currently in my 3rd quater of Such and Such's nursing program. I have a a great interest in community based and/or oriented nursing which I plan to pursue upon graduation. I was referred by Such and Such after an in-depth conversation of my interest in women's health and moreso my passion in addressing the lack of prenatal care in this country. My future goal is to enter Such and Such's Nurse Midwifery Masters Program. I believe providing my services in a community health center would in some way address the lack of prenatal care and offer an alternative choice for uncomplicated pregancies to deliver without the unwarranted medical interventions such as c-sections.

I also shared with Mrs. Such and Such my idea of implementing a prenatal house call services in my future career as a nurse midwife. I was then informed that your facility already has a similar program in place. I was both excited and delighted. I'm currently enrolled in community nursing this quater and assigned to a retirement living facility for my clinicals. Therefore, I wanted to supplement my clinical experience by actually having some exposure to my realm of interest in a community health center setting.

So, I'm asking if there's any volunteering opportunites in any of your primary care services and/or shadowing opportunies in the "Prenatal House Call" program, I would be extremely excited and grateful for the opportunity. Thank you for taking the time to read this long email.

Sincerely,
Desperate Student,SN, Future CNM

It's almost time

yep this night is my last freedom night to sleep, stay up, read a non-nursing textbook, and/or be a lazy bum which thus far I've completed all four. Currently in the lazy bum stage. Tomorrow night when I go to sleep I will wake up at 6:15 for adultII,community,peds,and pharmII. Oh how wonderful, I cant wait!! yeah right.

Anyhoo quoting a classmate, I wish I could either fast forward to 6 mos. later or just freeze time for a moment. But you know what? I'm gonna make it thru another quater. I'm half way there, once I complete this quater I'll be 3/4 in.

I am destined for success thru Jesus Christ.

I survived the 2nd term, 2 more terms to go.

Right now I am very blessed and am praising God for his marvelous blessings!

So this past week was finals week, where three of my grades was based on my final which was 40% and 10% for the infamous HESI(is a twin NCLEX but much harder). So I took the HESI for each topic( Maternity, Psych, and Adult) results following 92.9,94.0, and 89.4. I am very happy because at the end of this program there's a HESI exit exam which you must pass, even if you pass all your classes they wont let you graduate without passing that damn HESI. So if you pass the HESI which is way harder than the NCLEX, you obviusly will definitely pass the NCLEX which will preserve the schools rep of 100% of thier graduating students passing the NCLEX on the first try. Anyhoo, So passing this topis now made me feel really good. I was really trying to pass this term with a 4.0 but in the middle of finals week I started feeling as long as I pass who cares. But I slept it off and got back on the bandwagon. I think it's still possible. Two grades have been posted, Maternity I got an "A" for the class which I was very happy and most anticipated because obviously with a dream of being a midwife I would hope I knew my stuff to the 'T". I passed Psych with an 'A" which is supprisingly the clinical I enjoyed most. Two more grades left, took pharmacology yesterday and Adult taking 4eva putting their grades up.

Let me contemplate about this term, in the beginning I was determined to pass these classes but I guess I was still anxious with the knowledge of 2nd term as the one when the most people fail a class. I definitely didnt want fall into that statistic, b/c I dont have 3 months to wait out until the next group to come along and I damn sure and most importantly dont have the money to be forking out. I have just enough to complete this accelerated program with no stops. So anyhoo back on topic, after I took my last final yesterday which was pharmacology I called my sisters so freakin happy feeling like I did well and of course my ass cried. I cried because I made it, I cried because I did well. I really felt all the stress just fall of my shoulder. This quater was chaotic and I made it. I made it. I made it.

So as far as classed, maternity professors made it suck, the book sucked, and I think because this is a fast pace program I really didnt have time to sit and enjoy the topic, I just absorbed and went on to the next topic. The maternity clinical was okay but there was sooooo much down time, it was at a posh posh hospital where all the pregnancy was planned and majoriy in thier mid 30s all married, it was cute. But I dont see myself working in a posh posh hospital, I want to work in underserved communities. I want to be in a community health center and/or birth center. I want to be in the front line of giving prenatal care to minorites, I want to teach child birthing classes. I really have these ideas I would like to implement in the future addressing community women's health issues. So next term I definitaly will be loving Community Health Nursing. So I can not wait. I got peds also and heard thats one clinical with alot of down time oh brother. Oh yeah and of course Adult II, its cool with me as long as I got stuff to do which makes the time go by fast. We can not forget our beloved Pharmacology II.

So this is my week off meaning =SLEEP,FUN,SLEEP,NO SCHOOL STUFF,SLEEP,FUN until April 2 when I get back on the grind.


I MADE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:)

Finals week

Nuff Said.

Tuesday evening with no clinical prep, whoohooo!!!

Well since I didnt have to go to the hospital to prep on my patient and come home late due to traffic and stay up till 2 doing a damn care plan with 1o medications=blog entry time. lol. Anyhoo, tomorrow I'm going into the OR, I'm excited but I think moreso because I wont have to be on the floor. Last week went pretty fast in medsurg, I was giving meds, charting like crazy and I got myself a lucky patient who was a teacher/baseball coach in his previous life who questioned me on everything and gave me tips. He pretty much grilled me in front of my professor, but I can tell it was good natured so I didnt get any hard feelings. It actually kept me on my toes. So thus far I've given two insulin & one heparin subcut, filgrastim subcut(stimulates neutrophils), and a whole bunch of po meds. Oh yeah I started a IV piggyback med.

And guess what last week in maternity was so amazing, finally was able to see a vaginal delivery. The last time I saw one was like 6ys ago, in high school where they had us do an internship in our career interest(always knew I wanted to deliver babies). Anyhoo, I really forgot how big the coochie(yes I call it coochie) got, it was humungous. What made it so interesting was that I was assigned to a lesbian couple. You're probably like so what its 2007, but that's big relative to being in a posh posh maternity unit, all pregancies are planed, all pregnant women that I have encountered are in the mid-30s, all are married with hubby right there, very typical "American TV" nuclear family. So when I was assigned this couple I was pretty psyched. I even asked how did they decide who would carry. They were very nice and I thanked them for letting me take part in their bithing experience. Oh yeah I also did the first apgar check on the baby(I'm cheesing b/c I felt real comfortable), vitamin K shot, and erythromyocin on the baby's eyes. All in all it was awesome and she pushed like four times with no screaming or grunting and the baby was out. The labor went pretty fast, not even 4 hrs I was very impressed.

Okay next topic, my pharm professor has been removed due to student complaints of her teaching incapabilities. We freakin got two weeks left, sheesh they should have just let her finish. Guess what? The prof replacing her is mad hard based on the info from the grapevine, supposedly she had to do a big curve last time. So we just went to worse to worser(I know thats not a word but it just needed to be there). that freakin suck, no really. Oh well this means pharm will be my best friend for the next two weeks its worth 40% of my grade. Pray for me.:)

By the way, why am I already applying to grad school? I would like to start next summer. My maternity clinical instructor said she would do a recommendation letter for me. So that's one down two to go. I'm thinking of asking my psych or adult1 prof. We'll see! I think I would like the last one from community health next quater since thats going to be my focus when I start working in the field. Alrighty that's it much love.