A Word about L&D

I recently started working in L&D at Long Beach Memorial....and I gotta say...It's nothing like our rotation during school! Maybe it's just this particular hospital, but the L&D nurses are known as adrenaline junkies, and it's considered to be one of the most stressful and fast-paced units in the whole place...(I didn't really know what I was getting myself into- no wonder they kept asking me about my ICU rotation during the interview) Anyway, it seems more like an ER than anything else, and I think I'm gonna love it once my head stops exploding from new information every day! Just thought I'd share. :)

Glenn Styffe's class in action...

....so how could any of us forget the day Glenn popped his head into Gewe's class and reminded us that at our next class we'd need to role play male sexual dysfunction?
Well can i just say i almost laughed so hard as that day swirled through my head as i was instructing my 80 year old pt on how to use his new penile prosthesis. kinda reminded me of that day and the day with Cheri and the Sex after 90 movie we watched.

nursing definitely brings you into such random parts of life....

Happy Thanksgiving!!

I realize I am writing this after the day has gone by, but I wanted to tell everyone Happy Thanksgiving. I am so thankful to our Lord for His many blessings. Hope you guys had a great day!

First of all may I say CONGRATULATIONS to Haley and Andy! Yay!!! I am so excited for you guys!!!! Good work ;)

Secondly, I LOVE and MISS you all and hope everyone is doing well in their respective jobs! If you're anything like me...it's going okay, but you'd be willing to give it up in a heartbeat if you didn't have to work :0) (Am I right, or am I right?)

And lastly, I am just wondering if anyone else is realizing the importance of using proper ergonomics in this profession we have gotten ourselves into?! It feels pretty ridiculous to be the one posting this, considering that most of my patients are 10-50lbs, but my upper back is killing me! I know it's not due to lifting, but trying to sneak in and do assessments in the middle of the night without waking up the little kiddos is tricky enough without the noise and commotion of moving the bed/crib to the right level---I just want to get in and out without a fight! Anyway, after a few months of bending over and holding that ridiculous axillary thermometer that takes forever and a day to read and listening to infant apical pulses and breathing...my back is killing:( Just wanted to put that out there and see if anyone else was experiencing this? Should've listened to Gewe. :)

how do i put this gently...

i never thought i would be the first one (although someone else might be out there and just not talkin') but SURPRISE!!!....andy and i are pregnant!  i know, totally unplanned and crazy but we're super excited!  we actually just moved to orange about a week ago into this AMAZING townhome so i guess the timing isn't quite as bad as we first thought.  i'm only about two months in and due approximately july 8th.  so yeah, crazy!  i had a sonogram because i was having some complications so i'll go ahead and post it (exciting but also just a black dot, ha ha)  so yeah, and heads up in your e-mails, i want to make sure i have an updated list of everyone's addresses so i can send out christmas cards...love you guys and miss you all, and if you're ever in orange county let me know!

Classic:

So this morning at work a person (I'm not sure if she was a med student or intern) was giving kind of a tour to two other young looking girls (probably med students).  

She asked me: "Did anything happen last night with the pt in 79?"  

Me: "Nope. Nothing at all" 

She didn't wait for me to say anything else before she turned around and told the other girls, "Always ask the nurses, they know EVERYTHING"... and that was the end of our conversation.

Yikes... does anyone feel like they know everything?  uh, sometimes I don't feel like I know ANYTHING!  LOL

Just starting out. . .

I finally passed the NCLEX the second time around & just finished my 2nd day of orientation at PIH today!! Was thinking about you all so I thought I'd let you know what was going on with me. :) I love reading all your stories, even if they're about how difficult nursing can be (thanks for sharing, Haley!)- they're all encouraging. We're finally doing what we spent 5 (or 6!!) years in school studying and preparing for- Praise the Lord!
<3,><

my experience...

hey all...i miss you guys tons!!!  i'm so glad to see at least a few people posting on the blog, i'm starting to miss you guys.  i've been trying to think of ways to explain my work, here's my best:  i'm still preceptoring (which is a godsend...knowing all the types of chemo and various cancers and blood disorders is too much right now) but i'm pretty independent within the preceptoring situation.  sometimes i feel like my day is filled with looking at chemo, giving a ton of meds to protect side effects of that chemo, giving tons of shots, asking the kiddos if they have pain, and dealing with central lines (why did we not deal with those in school???)  so far 2 of my patients have died and one more is actively dying, it's really hard to deal with emotionally but i'm so glad that the Lord has me on this floor for "such a time as this".  

i don't know about you guys but while i love the floor that i'm on, nursing is a lot heavier than i was anticipating.  i am constantly overwhelmed at all of my responsibilities and feel bogged down with trying to keep people alive while giving them poison that could sometimes kill them just as easily as the cancer would.  while nursing is way more than i feel ready for i know without a doubt that i'm in the right place and that's what keeps me going.  so yeah, it's overwhelming but i also like it, in a confusing twisted sort of way.

anyways, yeah, more updates to come, i promise:)  miss you guys tons!