The Reason I Write

I sat with the last quote for a long time, and it felt good, but then I went back to find my own encouraging words that are located in several haphazard places because I do not have a file system for my own writings (I think I am afraid someone will stumble across them) and I found this:

"I swear, people will make you feel like you're crazy if you let them. There aint nuthin wrong with me. I know exactly what I want, and I am not going to be bothered by the fact that it exceeds what you happened to have imagined for me. You should've dreamed bigger."

~ Myself

It came from this post on June 27th, 2006.

How appropriate the profound truth I uttered that day.

I found many more, including this one from my "Shoot for the Moon" journal:

"I remember the way the stars aligned to get me here. The universe wants this for me, even when I am not strong enough to want it for myself."

It occurred to me that this is one of the reasons I write; I need to be able to look back and say "I know something about the world and, more importantly, I know something about myself." This way, when someone tells me something about myself that is not true, I am able to find my own truth in my own words when I need it most desperately.

Every day we slaughter our finest impulses. That is why we get a heart-ache when we read those lines written by the hand of a master and recognize them as our own, as the tender shoots which we stifled because we lacked the faith to believe in our own powers, our own criterion of truth and beauty. Every man, when he gets quiet, when he becomes desperately honest with himself, is capable of uttering profound truths. We all derive from the same source. There is no mystery about the origin of things. We are all part of creation, all kings, all poets, all musicians; we have only to open up, to discover what is already there.

~Henry Miller, Sexus

Whatever you do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising that tempt you to believe your critics are right.

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Fight one more round. When your arms are so tired that you can hardly lift your hands to come on guard, fight one more round. When your nose is bleeding and your eyes are black and you are so tired that you wish your opponent would crack you one on the jaw and put you to sleep, fight one more round - remembering that the man who always fights one more round is never whipped.

James Corbett

Talking to Myself

When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.

~Franklin D. Roosevelt

Creative Writing

I was selected to participate in a creative writing program on campus. It's a writer's workshop of sorts. The first meeting is today. Of course, tomorrow is my med surg exam, so I am not feeling like taking the break out of my day to do this. I am going to go though because I need to be able to think/write/talk about something other than nursing, and I need a break from studying. I read through some of my old writing to find something to take to workshop (no time to write anything new) and was so disappointed that I haven't been able to write much in the last few months. Reading my own writing made me remember that I *am* good at something, even if it isn't Biomed. It takes a huge mental and emotional shift to learn the material I'm learning, especially since most things I had to do as an English major came so naturally to me.

Me and my friend (M) also had a revelation: Just because we can't do happy hour on Fridays anymore, that doesn't mean happy hour is a bust...we'll just go on Wednesdays! So I'm also going to be taking a break to drink $2 margaritas from heaven and eat free burritos, cheap wings, and tasty spinach artichole dip.

Then I'll pull a semi all-nighter studying for med surg Test 3, aka "the test from hell!"

Yet Again

It's just not even funny. LOL I did worse this time than I did the first time, although I knew the information better. This is why that meeting with the dean was so necesssary. I swear, this is crazy. I just shot the professor an email, asking what he'd like me to do. The first time I did this, he told me not to worry about it, a lot of people failed it. He recommended I have a session with the TA, which I did. I followed every bit of her advice. I wonder what he will say this time...

Look at Those Errors!

I just read over my last post and was amazed at the number of errors there are! LOL I would normally edit the post, but not today. Back to Med Surg...oh and I passed the Pharm exam, now I'm waiting on Biomed...

Meeting with the Dean

Apparently some students in our class requested a class-wide meeting with the dean. We had the meeting this morning, and people got to air out all their frustrations. It was quite weird actually. Very different from my undergrad institution, probably because people can preface their comments with "I pay too much money to..." which really gives a student some power I guess. It was weird because our dean is new, this is first year on the job. She is supposedly suprised by how some classes are being handled as well, so she was in agreement with much of what was being said. Accept when it came to my comment! LOL I don't know what it is. It will be interesting to see how many changes she is actually able to implement, and ow many things somebody "sets her straight" on since she is new to the school, and maybe new to the type of institutional culture at the school. The insitutional culture definitely has an impact on how things are done, and sometimes I think some things will never change just because it is the way they have been done for, oh, about a century? LOL

The main comments were that Biomed, taught by a scientist, needs a major overhaul. (I agree, its terrible) A guy in our class said "I spent 18+ solid hurs studying for this exam, and i still didn't do well." What he forgot to mentioned was that he has a master's degree in a science field already, which would have lent more credit to his comment about the insaness of the course! BTW, we don't have our scores back yet, so I don't know how I did, other than to say I didn't know the answer to half of the questions! Pharm, taught by a pharmacist, has too many guest lecturers. The idea is that for every given topic a specialist in that field should teach the course. It the university's policy to have students "learn from the best there is." Well, ok. But sometimes we also have gest lecturers who they have selected speifically because they are grads of our program and they think it would be great for us to support these new graduates, and for them to get teaching experience, and to be possible role models for us new students. It sounds good, but the program is so accelerated that we really don't have time to be pratice students for people. I need you to give me what I need to know in as condensed (and complete) a form as possible because I get one lecture and one lecture only to know everything there is to know about AIDS. So while, yes, it is noce to see new grads doing great things, now is not the time! There was also some issue with the fact that whle we sometimes have guest lecturers, our exams are still written by the actual professor, so there is sometimes a huge gap in what we were taught versus what was on the test. We then gave many solutions to the problems we presented to the dean.

My comment, which wasn't received well, had to do with having nursing scholars/researchers/teachers actually teach Pharm and Biomed. The response (which is in no way new) to the question was basically "nurses aren't smart enough to teach the coontent" which I think is a serious problem. Does it say anything about the profession and the school to have these tougher courses taught by non-nurse scholars? What do you mean nurses aren't smart enough to teach the material? Isn't that exactly the kind of image we're trying to dispute in the profession? Our current nurse-lecturers do a better job relating the drug information to our practice than the pharmacists do, and the same goes for the biological processes in the body! Are you, the dean, really standing in front of the room and saying that your PhD educated faculty do not have the knowledge nor means to teach pharmacokinetics? That worries me. It also bothers me that we bring a men in to teach the harder courses, what are you saying, without saying anything?

Anyway, I was disappointed that everyone didn't know about the meeting before it happened. Only a handful of students knew we were having a meeting today. (I was one of the students who didn't know until the moment it was happening) There was a lot of complaining going on, but I think it was necessary, and I'm glad it happened. I can only hope that some good things come out of it. There was also a midwifery issue that had my blood boiling, but I'll tell u about that later!

Next Exam

Does it seem like I'm living exam to exam? You're not going crazy, it's true, I am. It's a strange month. I have a med surg exam Thursday. Yes, I had a biomed exam yesterday, and a pharm exam the Thursday before that, but who's counting? (I am, LOL)

I'm doing a lot of laughing. In fact, I feel loopy. Like I'm losing it, going crazy, smiling all the time like I'm drugged and don't know that I'm being hazed and that I'm supposed to be falling under the crushing pressure. LOL My friends blow me kisses in the hallway, one of us at each end with arms open wide, taking me in - "Oh you had bio med today, I just know you rocked it" with a sarcastic wink. Then they notice you're in your uniform and they say "clincal tonight, too?" - hugging me like I'm going off to battle - like we're in some ghetto version of a sweeping epic like Gone With the Wind. And you make the "I hate life" face and they say "have fun, 5 more weeks" as you continue walking, feeling blessed to have someone put the "just 5 more weeks" chant in your head. And then you turn around and yell, because you forgot to ask (this is how life is right now), "Oh shyt, how was your physical assessment check off yesterday?" And they toss their head back and laugh because they are a third-year and they no longer get stressed because they've already reached the maximum capacity for stress, so now they just go through the day with cheshire cat grins and drunken-ish sways - even if it didn't necessarily go well. Besides, what can they do about it now? They're loopy, too.

My med surg professor emailed us today. I know she's a little worried about the amount of information on this test, you can hear it in her voice when she talks to us, her boding tells me that I better not rest until Thanksgiving. But some idiot decided that we should have our 3rd pharm exam the Thursday we come back from Thanksgiving break, so really there won't even be rest then. At least I'll have some turkey and mac-n-cheese to snack on while studying. It'll be so much better than ham sandwiches or whatever else I usually eat in the absence of being able to bring cooked food into the library.

Can I tell you a secret?

(Of course I can, it's my blog!)

Here's the secret--------------> I'm loving it.

How insane does one have to be to love this madness? Who wants to have someone constantly reminding them that they don't know a damn thing about oncological disease, but, yes, your test is still on Thursday. Or, I know we didn't get a chance to cover universal precautions in MRSA patients, but, yes, it's still on your test, with a hearty helping of "I suggest you read up on that" at the end. I know that must sound crazy. But I am in love with being in charge of my own learning. I am in love with having to manipulate information until it no longer resembles what you thought it was supposed to. Building up a diagnosis (a nursing one, no less) and creating a plan of care based on that diagnosis, and then meeting the patient who bursts your bubble because while, yes, she knows cocaine is bad for her, no, she will not be taking your advice to go to rehab, nor any of your other "crazy" patient-teaching suggestions because she's a grown azz woman and doesn't want to hear your young azz telling her what to do. And, she "aint come in here for that noway." Now could you kindly give her an asthma treatment so she can get back to her 4 children who need their school clothes ironed, and her job - as a home health care aid, no less? Yes mam, I can. But first, let me tell you I know what "speedball" is, so let me at least tell you how to be safe. Did you know you can get free needles (up to ten at one time) at the pharmacy, without a prescription? "For real?" "Yes, maam, for real. So be safe."

It could have driven me nuts (last night's clinical), but, like I said, I'm loopy, and on a "this is what feels like to learn" high.

Thursdays

My new Thursday starts with class at 8 am, and ends at 10pm when clinical is over. There is a 1 hour lunch from 12-1. How did I end up with a clinical placement at the same time as my Friday anatomy class? We go to 1 hour's worth of class, but then it's off to the hospital (which is a 30 minute communte on the worst friggin interstate I have ever used) and we miss the last 2 hours of anatomy. Doesn't this seem azz-backward? I don't mind because I didn't go to the cadaver labs anyway, but the other students in my clinical group (who also have to take Anatomy) are not at all happy about it, and I completely understand why. Today I had a biomed test, which is why I am done early with class and have time to write this.

The biomed test was very frustrating. I spent hours and hours studying very productively. I had a 2 hour quizzing session early this morning with my friend who happens to being doing well in the class. I had to answer the questions without prompts from memory, which is harder than answering multiple choice questions because there's nothing to jog your memory. I did fine during this session. We both decided I knew the material. So how come I had no idea what the answer to almost 20 of the 40 questions on the test?

I am going to clinical unprepared because our preceptor was not there when we went to do chart review yesterday and so we had no access to the computers that hold all of the patient's information, and my patient's chart was missing because he wasn't on the floor (getting labs done probably).

What I want is a cocktail. Oh, wait. My weekly happy hour is now a thing of the past because I have clinical on Friday nights. Lucky me.

Sunday Brunch

Me and my friends went to brunch on Sunday at a cute little place off campus. It only had about 12 tables, but they had a serious line waiting to eat. After our 30 minute wait, we finally sat down and realized why people were so willing to wait. It was a beautiful day, the food was beautiful and tasted oh-so-good. I had french toast with whipped cream and pecans. It was amazing. Someone else had rasberry-lemon crepes which looked so good! I'm working on getting the picture so you can see it! There were about 9 of us, I think, and it really made my semester. It felt like I had been waiting to do just that for the last 6 weeks. It's the kind of thing I had imagined I would be doing, before I got here. Two of the students were third-years so they basically gave us some advice, and the rest of us just got to know eachother better!

I complain so much that I thought "I've got to tell them about this."

So there ya go, now I'm back to studying for biomed...

Crunch Time

Today when I walked into the reference room/quiet study/mini library, a girl was having a breakdown. Two classmates were trying to support her, but it was emotionally very hard to watch. I understand. The pressure is tremendous and people are very, very far from home or friends, and it's hard. I wouldn't say it's the hardest thing I've ever done, but it is very quickly approaching that extreme. Several classmates have gone to the doctor/NP and been prescribed medications to help them deal with things like depression and anxiety, and people are having panic attacks. It makes me wonder about the culture of nursing school. I know all nursing schools aren't this way, and I think these "incidents" have a lot to do with the program being accelerated more than anything else. But I wonder if they shouldn't do some kinds of stress assessments as part of the interview process? What is the consequence of this stress for people who come from cultures with strong stigmas attached to taking medications for mental health issues or even going to have their mental health assessed? Historically black women have had a hard time recognizing depression, as I'm sure other cultures have. If we aren't going to speak to mental health professionals (why aren't we) what are we doing to cope?

It's crunch time (I have a BIOMED TEST this week) and I find myself going a little nuts...I'll keep you updated...

Pharm Exam/Clinical Week 7

The Pharm exam went well enough. It takes a couple weeks to get the scores, but I'm not at all worried about it, I finished quickly and easily enough, but this week of memorization was no punk.

This was the first week of my new clinical assignment. The commute was about 30 minutes on the way there, but only 15 on the way back (traffice differences). It sucks to be holed up in the car with folks you don't really know. That, and the interstate we have to take is notoriously bad and so the whole time my eyes are closed. It was an interesting first day. We got lost (as required) which ticked me off because people would not listen to me. We just drove around in circles for 30 minutes before they finally listened to what the hell I had to say. My suggestion was to start from our school since the only directions we had started from the school. But, no, they decided they "knew" of another way to get on the interstate, so we drove around looking for it. After 30 minutes, we were right back at my house, and after I pointed this out, someone *else* had the "bright idea" that we should just go back to school and start from there. Did I mention the school is probably all of two miles from my house? Arrgh. Then, when we arrived at the hospital I informed the group that my friend had told me that we needed to get our parking ticket validated as soon as we walked into the hospital so we could pay the flat rate; otherwise, we would have to pay the hourly rate because the desk closes at 7 and we aren't done until 10. Do you think they listend to me? No. For whatever reason, they thought that it wasn't really important. And she told me "oh, don't worry about it" as we walked right pass the desk where we could have done it. Ok. Whatever.

In the mean time, we go through our first day of clinical, which does not involve taking care of a patient. We do scavenger hunt type activities to locate where everything on the floor is, we go over hospital procedures and regulations (ie How to call a CODE) and we get to know eachother. We found out that we will be doing concept maps instead of careplans for this rotation. Our preceptor is also a teacher at a diploma program. A concept map is basically a visual careplan that you can draw, color, or whatever. Fine with me. The nurses on the new floor are nice and they were excited to meet us. The patients on the floor are very sick. Many of the rooms double as hospice rooms and it has a very sad feeling to it. The exception is the outpatient room which is actually on the floor. I dont' know why they would want to have an outpatient area (where patients get chemo) on the same unit as hospice - that seems really eerie and inappropriate to me??!! There is also a notable difference in presence of clergy on this floor. I never saw any on our last floor; I saw two on this floor within the first hour.

So, to continue the previous rant, clinical ended and we started to leave when the driver realized that not only should we have gotten the ticket validated, but we needed to at least bring it IN the hospital because you actually pay for parking before you leave the building. She went to get the ticket and brought it in. We put it into the automated machine. It cost more than three times the daily rate. So everyone is forking over the cash, but I forked over less. I refused to pay the difference between how much it *should* have cost us and how much it actually cost us. Not to be the difficult one, but I don't have money to waste, and when she decided (on her own) that we didn't need to pay the daily rate, as far as I'm concerned she took responsibility for the difference in cost. Then, we got back to the car and started giving her the gas money. Earlier this week I said we should meet for second and figure out how much we should pay to whoever was driving. Again, no one thought we needed to do that. So last night when it's time to fork over the money, everyone is paying five or ten bucks. Now, this is not a problem, but I at least need to know if this is just for today, or for tomorrow, too? Why is this so hard to discuss? People probably want me to just roll with the flow. I hear that all the time. But that's not the kind of budget I'm on. You can tell me how much you expect per week, or I can make the decision for you and you will just get what I give you, but I must know how much to plan for.

In essence, I hate group dynamics. Also, as I get to know folks, I think a lot of people are here because they didn't want to work yet. For example, people are getting their THIRD master's degrees in succession. Hmmm. You're 30+ and you've yet to have a real job? Or people who have an undergrad in one thing, a master's in something else, did the peace corps for two years, taught for one year, and now they're doing this and they aren't even 30 yet??!! What's really going on? And when I hear them talking about their undergrad and grad loans from previous programs, and I remember what schools they're coming from (all Ivies), I can't help but add that up...and I realize that they are adding yet another $100,000 in loans to the loans they already racked up in undergrad and previous grad school...we're talking $200,000 easily. That's a lot of money. But it ain't my business.