Sunday, April 27, 2008

I've got my eye on the finish line....

Yeah, a great song by Pedro the Lion, but also true about me right now. School is practically over, I'm almost off orientation at work, and the baby is due in three weeks. The funny thing is, when those things happen, they just create new things for me to do. So, basically there are no finish lines.

I went for a jog today! It was pretty short (just to the video store), but it's a start. I was so out of breath when I got home, I auscultated my chest to make sure I wasn't having some kind of critical cardiopulmonary event. My lungs were well ventilated without adventitia and I didn't have any S3 or S4 heart sounds, so I figured I just ran up a healthy O2 deficit. Ten minutes later I was fine.

Last Monday I had a pathophysiology test that I didn't even know was on the syllabus (my organization has been atrocious this semester). It was on my weakest subjects, nephrology and gastroenterology. Give me hearts and brains any day, but kidneys and guts just have too many small parts to keep track of. I WANTED TO HANG MYSELF ON THE LOOP OF HENLE! stupid nephrons...

I'm probably getting a new old car sometimes soon. It'll most likely be a tiny import. Take that, global warming!

Also, my time at Blackhawk is now complete. We taught our last weekend of Sunday School this week. We've been teaching these kids for about a year now, so I'm sure gonna miss them, but now we're going back to good ol' BLC! Good times for all.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Overhaul

Yeah, I've changed everything because I don't feel like talking about work on here, most of the time; although, I really like to talk about work in general.

So, yeah.

Monday, April 7, 2008

Ultrasound Numero Dos

Well, it's week 33 and we just got ultrasound #2. We've been measuring about 2cm small the entire pregnancy, so our CNM wanted to see what was up. Apparently nothing was up. The ultrasound was completely normal, and everything looks good. At the first ultrasound we elected not to know the sex, but this time we couldn't wait. We found out that we're having a girl! It surprised us because we thought the first ultrasound looked boyish. This one seemed even more convincing, though. Plus, at 33 weeks, things are fairly obvious. 21 weeks was a little early. Well, Willard IV will have to wait; Anika Marie Cupp will be first!

Thursday, April 3, 2008

hmm.... plans

I oscillate between a few different options for my graduate education. I go back and fort between nursing and seminary. Right now, I'm thinking seminary, but I'm sure I'll have a good day at class and go back to nursing, but who knows?

oblivio accebit

Yeah, I still hate school. I thought I liked pathophysiology and couldn't stand my other classes because of the subject matter, but I think it's because I don't have to do anything for patho. For exampe, I read a little bit of the endocrinoloy section to brush up on the old pituitary hormones, but didn't read any of the cardiovascular or pulmonology chapters and still got a 94% on the multiple choice section. It's not that I'm awesome at those things, it's just that it's an easy class if you're already a nurse. Then, last night, I was doing homework for my research class, which I had previously liked, when I decided that I hate that class with a passion. My school-assocaiated laziness has reached a new level.

Work is still cool though. I got a new preceptor since it's the halfway point in my ICU orientation. His name is Tracy, he's been an ICU nurse for like ten years and he's a pretty cool dude. The bad thing about my orientation is that no one knows how long it should be, nor at what point I am at along that line. When I was hired, I was told that I would have an abbreviated orientation, but it hasn't really worked out that way. I would like it to work out that way since one of the reasons I was hired was that I had been an RN for about 6 months already, so they were thinking I would be sort of ready to go. The truth is that working full time in the STICU on days is pretty much the complete opposite of working part time on the medical neurology floor at nights. I do think that I have a bit of an advantage from my experience though in that I'm used to having responsibility for my own patients, working independently, and some things specific to being an RN in the Parkview system.

The other day, one of my patients was getting a percutaneous tracheostomy. Two pulmonologists, a family practice resident, and the endoscopy nurse came to do it. So, one of the docs was using the bronchoscope via the ET tube and the other was doing the cutting (I'm sort of surprised that a general surgeon didn't do it, but you know.) Anyways, the doc doing the cutting told one of the best lame jokes I've heard in a while. Keep in mind that it was on St. Patrick's day. "What is Irish and gets left out on the porch all night?" .................................."Patty O' Furniture!" Also, after they were all finished, I was helping the endo nurse clean everything up and we found a picture that was left behind which was printed from the bronchoscope. The pulmonologist using the scope had accidentally taken a picture of himself with it. It was strangely amusing. Nothing compromises an airway like aspirating a pulmonologist.