The time has come, I am in my last semester of nursing school. I wish I could say it has flown by but in all reality it feels like the exact amount of time it was...two years! The most interesting thing is that the days have always been longer than the weeks. Do you know what I mean? It's like everyday drags on forever and there is always SO much to do. I think to myself on a daily basis wow it's only noon and I feel wiped out. With every day feeling like an eternity all of a sudden I turn around and it's Friday. It is the strangest feeling. Last semester I was so wonderfully distracted by new Love that I came surprisingly close to not having my "mid-term break down". Yes I have had at least one...alright more like four total breakdowns in each semester of Nursing school. By the way I do not discount the coincidence of my menstrual cycle with these break downs. Because of my wonderful Christopher, I suffered only two breakdowns during third semester :) One was in result of losing 9 pages of a research paper. I felt absolutely justified in balling for a few hours over that one. The computer program froze and lost 9 flippin pages of my paper! Computers should not do that anymore, I mean with all the technology you would think it would never happen. Well it was a flash back into 1999 and my computer couldn't handle the simple job of running a word program. Therefore breakdown No 1 ensued. The second break down was worthy of sedatives lol. Picture this....Me balled up, face down in the corner of the bathroom crying hysterically into a towel, yes a full sized towel. Tissue paper was in no way capable of containing this mess. What brought me to this point? None other than my Hyperactive, type A, Perfectionist, anal, IwillNeverGiveYouPositiveFeedbackNoMatterHowGoodYouDo- Clinical instructor. This woman was intense to say the VERY least. She is a career ICU Nurse who is also one of the clinical instructors at my school. If any of you know an ICU Nurse I need not say more, you understand how they can be. For some reason either perceived or actual this woman had it out for me. She was watching and critiquing my every move. On more than several occasions I would walk out of a patients room and she would be standing at the door having listen to every word I said to my patient. Raising an eyebrow and writing in her book she would then proceed to interrogate me on everything having to do with my patient. Did I know the lab values, did I know Meds, Special needs, how many other patients I was taking that day, their meds, their lab values, On and on and on! And this would be at 7 o clock in the morning! I had barley met my patients let alone studied the multiple meds/drug interaction/needs/assessments. At first I used this in a positive way, I thought it is only going to make me a better nurse. I need to be pushed. In a weird overattentive way she is trying to help. In the long run yes, she has made me a better nurse and as much as it pains me....I thank her. BUT it would have kept myself and all the other student in my clinical group from tears had she just balanced her criticisms with positive feed back. I made it a point to excel at everything she got on me about. By the end of that clinical experience I was a dang good student nurse and I knew it! Did she ever ONCE comment on how good I was doing? Or how much I had improved? Nope. She just had something else that needed to be improved upon. I understand that I am a student and I still have SO much to learn, but the truth is I am learning! Yes I need to know what I need to improve upon but give me a little credit! I have gone from not knowing if I should scratch my watch or wind my butt, to being a knowledgeable hard working student nurse. Anyway, one day after clinical I let her get to me. I had worked on my paper work for 6 hours the day before, making sure that it was perfect so that she wouldn't have any room to criticize. Turns out that I had one mistake in it, not kidding ONE little mistake in ten pages of paper work. I had reported that the patients capillary refill was ">" 3 seconds instead of "<" 3 seconds. Greater than 3 seconds is an abnormal finding vs less than being a normal finding. Side note* The rest of my paper work that clearly stated (without the use of > or <) that his capillary refill was within normal range. She proceeds to lecture me for 10 minutes on this mistake. Seems like a small ordeal, yet in this case it was the straw that broke the camels back. I almost didn't make it out the door before the tears came flooding in. I had worked so hard and I still wasn't good enough. This in combination with Aunt flow, and lack of sleep, and stress from school sent me right over the edge.
So in making a short story long, those were the only two breakdowns of 3rd semester :)
This last and final semester has been a blast so far! It is all of the meat of nursing and for the first time all the material is making sense haha. It starts to piece together in 3rd but in 4th it really starts to click. I am seeing what should be done in order to treat patients, I am understanding the disease processes so that I can know what my next move should be, I am absorbing medication information at an incredible rate......AHHHHH it feels SO good! This has been the most fun I have had all throughout Nursing school. I am in love and I have the unconditional support of my gorgeous man, and I am becoming a REAL Nurse! I only have 7 more weeks of class and then I am done. I will then have my preceptorship (it's like a teachers Student teaching) at St. Josephs hospital in Labor and delivery. When I am done there I will be Graduating. May 14th is when I am graduating and I would love for everyone who can to come. It's going to be so emotional and wonderful.
Alright now I better get back to studying for my test tomorrow:)
Loves
Julie Ann
