Rant

There's beena lot that I want to rant about lately, but I've decided that those things weren't worth ranting about.

However....if you know that I worked an over night twelve hour shift that began at 8pm and ended at 8am and you want to know the time A Place closes, please call That Place, not me. chances are they can give you the answer. And I can stay asleep.

Thanks.

Mixexd UP

This week was the first week of my final clinical! I'm at a pediatric ED and worked my first shift this past weekend. I love the preceptor & the site...I'm less thrilled about the shift: midnights.

And there's no doubt that midnight shifts screw up your internal clock. The day of the first shift, I woke up around 7ish, and then went back to bed from 11:15 till around 4ish. But I wasn't hungry when I woke up and never really had dinner (I snacked instead...probably a bad idea). By midnight I was so tired that I felt drunk before we took a break to eat (lunch? dinner? midnight meal?). After that it was smooth sailing until 5ish when we finally had a chance to sit down. And true...I didn't work the entire twelve hours.

My nurse is this amazing woman who has such an incredibly (and refreshing) positive outlook on life and her profession. The day encompassed a lot of shadowing, but...I got to try and start my first IV! (classmates response: are we allowed to do that?! I have no idea if we're allowed, but she offered and I jumped at the chance). While I got in at the first try, and even got some blood return, the blood stopped flowing and wouldn't flow into the tubes (we were also collecting blood). My nurse then attempted to start an IV on the same patient with the same result before calling for someone else to attempt the IV.

I learned and saw A LOT in that one shift. There are about 7 more shifts that I need to complete, and hopefully I'll be seeing, learning, and doing a lot more!

After the shift, I slept until 2ish before running errands and meeting up with some friends, getting home at 1:30am, and then waking up at 9:30. I can see how nurses (or anyone working a midnight shift) can gain weight, as I've been eating and sleeping horribly this weekend and still in my pajamas lacking the motivation to attempt a 4 mile run. The 20-something degree weather, clouds, and winds aren't helping either.

Oh, someone give me a good kick in the rear!

Vignette

In one month...

....put up a tree, awoke to a tree on the ground, picked up tree, accepted new job offer, signed paperwork for new job, opened presents, flew first class(!), visited family, celebrated xmas, stayed warm, drank tea, read books, shopped, flew home (econo class), visited more family, stayed home, was invited to sign up for a 1/2, debated on 1/2, postponed signing up for 1/2, spent New Year's with new friends, ate a Nu_tella sandwich at the start of the year (hope that's not a sign of weight gain to come), bought new shoes, bought more new shoes, finally bought cold weather running gloves, ran with new gloves and debated their effectiveness, saw a movie, shopped some more, went back to school, nearly missed being vomited on, turned in license application, put together presentation, presented presentation, got fingerprinted, went out for sushi, ran some more, signed up for 1/2, regretted signing up for 1/2, still ran some more, started class, ran some more, froze a bit....to be continued
:)

puking blood

This is a good news bad news story, and I'm shaking as I write this. In the grand scheme of things, this isn't horrible bad, but it just looks bad more than anything.

Here's a very abbreviated glimpse of what happened. I interviewed at a small community hospital over a month ago. They never called back. They did however, ask me if I wanted to do my preceptor (kind of like an internship) there.

I told the hospital that I already submitted my letter but I would see if it could be changed. The school told me that it might not be possible to change.

Over lunch one day during class, we (my classmates + clinical instructor) were talking about preceptorships and one of the classmates asked if I knew anything about my placement (she knew about my asking to possibly switch preceptorships). I mentioned how it probably wouldn't change because yadayadayada. My current instructor, the one eating lunch with us said, "I'll see what I can do."

During all this time, the small hospital was quite pushy about changing my preceptor assignment, going as far as to call the school, me, etc. The hospital sent me multiple emails. I kept saying, "Thank you, but I'll see what I can do." I really didn't to make waves or force changes....it was no big deal to me where I did my preceptorship.

I eventually found out my preceptorship would be at the small hospital. Still no job offer.

My current clinical instructor and I had our end of clinical evaluations and she ended up questioning me as to why I wanted that position. She made some comments that were totally true and it got me to thinking about that area of medicine.

Still no job offer.

Then, about 2 1/2 weeks ago the small hospital called to say they were offering me a position in a department that I thought I wanted...the one with the preceptorship. I freaked out...asked if it was ok to let them know in 2 weeks. They sounded surprised but were OK with it (they wanted to know right then and there).

Fast forward to two weeks later (which was last week). I had an interview at the big hospital. 2 days following the interview, I called the nurse recruiter. we played a game of serious phone tag.

My friend got a spot for the same position I interviewed.

Next day I still couldn't get in contact with the recruiter from the big hospital. I hastily call small hospital and leave voicemail saying I'll take the job.

4 hours later I get offer from big hospital. Better pay. Better benefits. In state (read: one state income tax, not two).

I play phone tag with nurse recruiter from small hospital. Finally get in touch with her today. Tell her I'm very sorry for not being about to get in touch sooner. Tell her I'm sorry about the offer. I know I verbally accepted over the voicemail, but I am no longer going to be able to work in their state. Repeat I'm sorry. She was silent and then said thank you for letting them know. Then that was all.

I didn't know what to do and I feel sick to my stomach. I'm worried about the preceptorship assignement and am hoping that the school doesn't hate me after this. I honestly don't care if I still do my preceptorship there. I never told my instroctors that I was even offered a job there, because honestly, I just found out a couple of weeks ago, before the preceptor garbage went through.

Seriously. Want to be an ostrich right now and stick my head in the sand. I'm confident that iI'm making the right decision in employment, and I hope that everyone else can come to this realization. I just hate that I made that hasty phone call.

Anxious

So I might have some big news about that thing you're supposed to start after graduation. It's big. It's so big that I'm hoping my cards are played right and that I'm making the right choice after screwing up eariler today. this is cryptic and vague, I know. Let's just say I can't manage to keep my foot out of my mouth and I have the inability to make a decision and I might have to change a decision that I made on a whim. The decision on a whim was made today and within 4 hours, the mind was changed. But as I haven't signed anything, I think it's ok. Bad, but not as bad as it could be. And because the more I type the more cryptic this message becomes, I think I'll write about something else.

Like parties!

There's an holiday party tomorrow night....one of the traditional students at my school invited me to her holiday party, which is complete with turkey and ham (!), so I'll need to figure out something nice to wear.

Shiny leggings might not be appropriate.

but they might be good for Saturday's Tacky Xmas party (you know, where you wear one of those awful sweaters/sweatshirts that are Xmas themed). I feel bad for all the older ladies out there who spend that much money on those sweaters!

Here's what I have so far to wear:
reindeer headband? Check
Red/Green sequined headband? Check
Rudolph blinking nose? Check
cream colored mock turtleneck with tiny snowman motif? check
Red sweatshirt with white lace collar, complete with design of xmas teddy bear wearing an xmas bow? Check
Xmas themed pins? Check and Check
leggings? check

I think I'm going to have to go with the stirrup leggings. As you may have seen from a previous post, the shiny leggings with a shirt above the butt aint' so cute (sorry, had to use the aint').

leg warmers? Check...although I might take those off...I think they were made for a 10 year old. no wonder they were only $4.

Keep your fingers and toes crossed that the right choice is being made and nobody gets upset... And that the xmas parties are fun :)

Weekend in Review

Too much to say, too little time (need some sleep!)

• Friday night Trivia: we rocked it with 2nd place! Followed by a very cold & brisk walk to other local bar for karaoke, followed by brisk and colder walk to friends home for some shut eye.
• Saturday: gourmet breakfast at friend's house, grocery shop, class project, Gator Game (um, YAY!!!!!!!!!!), Scrabble
• Sunday: NY Times @ local coffee shop, Costco (we bought a vacuum), lunch, try vacuum. In disbelief at amount of hair/dirt sucked up by vacuum. Empty canister. Repeat vacuum in same spots. Begin to wonder if the vacuum comes with dust bunnies that are to be released into canister or if vacuum is sucking so hard that the carpet will disappear before our very eyes. Finally, more lazy reading, purchase Xmas tree (complete with ice chips!), decorate, cook, eat, etc.
• Monday: Xmas tree is on floor, in horizontal position. cats are wisely hiding out and no where to be seen.

I Say It's Great...

To Be...a FLORIDA GATOR!!!!!!!!!!!!

(now why couldn't the Gator's do this when I was there??)