New Year, New Job!

Last night was my last shift at United Hospital… it was a long night actually, since they called me in early to cover a couple hours for a sick nurse. I’m pretty pumped about working at Regions though, especially since I just found out that United will be laying off another 30-40 nurses permanently in the next couple weeks. Yikes. The talk amongst the nurses last night was filled with worry. I kinda felt bad telling people that it was my last night and that I had another (better) job lined up.

I feel blessed that I was offered the job and am getting really excited to start on Friday! Mind you, it will be the boring orientation curriculum for a week or two, but still, at least it’s at a hospital that isn’t going downhill so fast as United is. Today when I turned in my security card (for night access to the hospital), the security guy said “Why are you leaving? You got another job? Can I come with! Congratulations!” It was rather funny, actually.

So anyway, I worked almost 11 hours last night and haven’t slept since yesterday afternoon, so I do apologize for yet another dry and pretty boring post… but I’m just too excited about the new job and wanted to update you all.

Have a Happy New Year!

Switching Over

Last night was my first ever night shift as a nurse. It was tough only because I had to work during the day on Monday, so I only had one night to try and switch myself over to sleeping on a difficult schedule. It didn’t go so well since I was exhausted on Monday night from work and other activities, so i could only stay up until about 2:30am and then I had to give in to sleep… it was almost painful how tired I was.

So I worked from 11pm-7:30am last night/this morning and then got home and slept until about 2. I’m still extremely tired though, but it’s hard to fall back asleep when you wake up in the middle of the day. I probably won’t be blogging much at all until I get a little more accustomed to this new internal clock. And after this week I’ll only be working 32 hour weeks instead of 40… which means more blogging opportunity! :) I start working every other weekend this weekend, too.

Anyway, that’s about all my brain can put out right now. If the night is slow tonight, maybe I’ll write something in here to keep me awake… we shall see. Please be praying that I don’t get sick from this crazy new stress on my body!

Holy meds, flatus, and bowel sounds!

Time is flying by this week since I last posted. Monday John and I went to my parents’ place for a little Labor Day fun at their neighborhood lake-front. We went kayaking (although we actually peddled our legs instead of used paddles, so not sure what it’s really called), swimming, croqueting, and John went tubing behind my parents’ new/old motor boat. It was a great day, and I even got to watch a couple episodes of Jon and Kate Plus 8. I love that show, mostly because it makes me really excited to have kids someday. You’d think that watching a family with 8 kids would be reason NOT to want kids so badly, and I realize it’s a LOT of work, but it’s something that I’m really looking forward to.

Anywho, the reason for the title of this post is because the past two days at work (I obviously had Monday off, thank God for that!), I’ve had four patients to care for during my shift. This is a huge deal to me, partly since I’ve never done it, but also because that’s what all the experienced nurses do. It’s definitely a jump from three patients, it feels like every time you add another person to care for, the amount of work is exponential. Especially on day shift because most people have a lot of 0800 meds to be given to them. Those little old ladies that come in from the nursing homes, wow do they have the load of medications. The one nice thing about post-surgical is that a lot of patients are NPO (nothing by mouth in Latin) after surgery (like bowel surgeries) which means they can’t have any medications by mouth either. So basically all they get for the first day or so is pain meds and sometimes they’re just PCAs (patient controlled analgesia) so then I don’t even have to give meds to them, other than possibly some IV antibiotics. Oh and the flatus and bowel sounds reference is because after surgery, a lot of what happens with a patient depends on their return of bowel sounds and well, their flatus function (aka, gas…). Never would I have guessed that I’d be asking “Are you passing any gas yet?” so many times in a given week. 

I’m just rambling now. So as you can tell, my mind has just been spinning today and yesterday with having four patients. So many different things to do and balance and manage. I wish I could just take care of one patient a day because there would probably be enough to keep you busy with just one. I’m slowly learning how to use my little “brain sheet” where I jot notes to myself as I go and cross of meds/procedures as I do them. It didn’t help that my favorite pen exploded today… but that’s besides the point. 

I love that I’m finally starting to feel like a real nurse and am much more independent. There’s still the occasional “Hey, can you give that one pain med while I take out this one tube?” that I have to say to my preceptor, but I know that with time I’ll be much more efficient and confident. It’s a lot of fun too! 

(Embarrassing moment of the day: Since I was so busy, I was really having problems listening to my bladder telling me to STOP and proceed directly to the restroom. It got so bad and I got so stupid that I was giving my patient his insulin and blurted out “I have to go to the bathroom so badly!” before I even realized what I was saying. Never hurt to have a (very) humbling experience every now and then, right?)

Next post will be about something other than work… promise!

Just a Glimpse

new grad orientation, originally uploaded by carriehansen.

I’m trying to figure out how to blog multiple photos at once from my flickr photo account, but am still working on it. For now, here’s a picture of me (on the left) with two of the girls with whom I oriented (Emily and Jo in the middle) for our first two weeks as nurses, and our preceptor, Joyce, on the right. I hardly see any of them anymore now, sadly.

State fair pictures to come soon hopefully!

New Grad Orientation

Today marked the beginning of week five out of eight weeks of my new graduate orientation as a RN at the hospital. It’s been a whirlwind of experiences, emotions, mistakes, triumphs, etc. I was actually started on a surgical care center instead of a medicine unit. They tend to start new grads on medicine, but since I’ll be a float nurse eventually, I guess they figured they could start me on surgical too since I would be going there sooner or later. This didn’t upset me one bit since during my last semester of school I was on an orthopedic unit twice a week and most of those patients were post-surgical. Holy total knees and total hips! But not anymore actually.

Now I take care of all those people who have hysterectomies, bowel resections, hernia repairs, prostate resections, cystectomy’s (bladder removal), cholecystectomy’s (gall bladder removal), appendectomy’s, and then the occasional medicine patient (kidney infection, UTIs, DVTs (deep vein thrombosis))… etc. Anyway, I enjoy using all those bigs words because I’m finally getting accustomed to them and it’s fun! But I have learned SO much over the past month that my mind feels like it’s always two weeks behind where my body is.  Strange feeling that apparently doesn’t really ever go away as a nurse. We’ll see about that. I also got to observe/help-out in the OR and the ER for a day each last week. The OR was boring… lots of standing around (and counting gauze sponges and utensils as they get thrown on the floor), and the ER was not as exciting as I thought it would be (lots of people coming in pretending to be in pain so they could get their narcotics… sorry, not here!). 

The frustrating part about orientation has been how I’ve had four different preceptors so far. And tomorrow I get another! The preceptor is kinda like my guardian nurse who is there to help and answer questions. Sounds great, and it is very very necessary and helpful (I ask a question about every 6 minutes probably), but it’s difficult when each nurse has a very different style and way of nursing. This can be awesome when you can pick up little tips on various things, but it is so draining to try and figure out how to work with four different experienced nurses. Like today I was with a nurse I’d never been with before. She seriously watched me do about 75% of all I did. Even if it was just hanging a new IV bag of fluid. Something I feel very comfortable doing suddenly became very difficult because I knew I was being watched over my shoulder. I tried telling her that it was more difficult to do simple things with her watching me, but she looked at me with that “So if I’m not watching you, can you actually do this safely?” kinda look. Ugh. Oh well, it’s a stage of my career that I just have to get through. In 2-3 wks I believe they’ll be setting me free to work on my own on this unit, and then I think after 8 wks of that I’ll head off to a medicine unit. Then after a couple months there, another unit (maybe oncology or ortho or neuro). 

And I am SO excited to get to start my 0.8 FTE schedule! They have me working 40hrs/wk, Monday through Friday on day shift right now and it’s been a little overwhelming, especially just starting out. I think in 2 wks I will only work 32 hrs/wk, every other weekend. I also start working night shifts 40% of the time. The other 60% will be days. Should be interesting… but I am excited! 

Random… My conclusions from today: 1)  50% of a nurse’s job is simply keeping all the tubes, lines, catheters, and drains all situated and connected. 2) I love that I get to wear comfy scrubs and tennis shoes every day!

Yowza

Summer never seems to be that “vacation” that I always think it will be. No surprise since I started working full-time just over a month ago. We have been so busy (or just plain tired) that I really have been slacking on many things, not just this little blog. I think I’ve come to be okay with the fact that I’ll never be an avid blogger. I love to READ blogs, but I’m just not a good writer and blogging is frustrating to me because I can’t write out my thoughts well. Perhaps it just takes practice like everything else, but since I’ve been blogging since I was 14 and I still have nothing to show for it, I guess I’ve failed that cliche. 

But, good news! John and I finally officially have internet at our apartment! As of last night we are able connect to the outside world 24/7 365. Good and bad thing, but overall I’m glad and excited. The cable guy also decided to be extra nice and bless us with free cable! He said that their company ran out of blocks for our cable connection, so we’ll just get cable for free. Woo! Now that’s something I’m not as excited about because TV is so much of a distraction for me and for John too. I really have enjoyed the quietness of a home without any background noise of the TV. That’s how our house was all the time growing up, so although it’s a little comforting to have it again, I hope we can limit our consumption. There’s almost always something better to do with your time than watch TV, and it just breeds bad things… laziness, marital problems, and most importantly, it steals time away from prayer and reading the Word. I’ve definitely been struggling with that since I started working (be praying for me in that respect). Adjusting to working full-time has been difficult, but I like it a whole lot more than being in school, that’s for sure! At least you have some time “off” whereas in school it feels like you’re never free. 

So as I say in every other post, I hope to keep this sucker updated more often, possibly even with pictures here and there. Now don’t hide your excitement!

Not a Shadow Anymore

As of Wednesday, I’ll be starting my preceptorship on a medicine unit at the hospital I’m now working at. It will be probably the scariest feeling (exaggerating, yes) when I must go into a patient’s room and tell them, “Good morning, I’m Carrie, and I’ll be your nurse for the day!” Rather than: “Hi, I’m a student nurse with your nurse Anne, but I’ll be doing most of the care for you today.” Eeek, even though I’ll still have resources available, I’m both excited yet REALLY nervous for that first patient who has just ME as their nurse!  Hopefully they aren’t as equally scared of my Tweety-Bird matching scrubs! Ha, that’s not going to happen. Sorry but I can’t help but vent about the frustration of finding simple AND cute nursing scrubs that don’t have Sponge Bob’s, ruffles, or weirdly placed arm pockets on them… seriously! So far I’ve only invested in plain colored scrubs, but I’d really like to find some cute yet not over powerful prints to add to the collection. Any suggestions? (Jodi, you better help me on this one!)

Oh, and if any of you are wondering, the first week of work

It’s a Miracle!

I passed my NCLEX-RN!!!! :D  This is the nursing boards exam that allows me to actually practice as a registered nurse! I took it yesterday morning and was 100% sure that I had failed. Yesterday was rough because I had to wait until this morning to find out if I passed or not. I’m sooooo excited!!! It’s a miracle from the LORD that I passed, because I felt like I guessed on half the questions. It was very difficult!! But apparently they think I’m competent enough to be a nurse now, and I’m happy with that! :)  God sure did answer a lot of prayers by having me pass!

Sorry I haven’t posted in a month. I’ve been studying and doing random other things since then, like going to the MN Zoo with my mom and my brother’s kids, going to my sister’s bridal shower, going to my cousin’s wedding reception… well, not that much really, but the past two weeks have pretty much been strictly studying. Now that I’m “free” from the burden of studying, I can do things like write in my blog again! Yippee! Oh and laundry, I get to do that again! ;) My husband will like that. He goes through clothes faster than I can clean them. Since we moved here, what, three months ago? I haven’t been able to catch up with laundry.

So, next week is my older sister’s (my only sister) wedding!!! It’s out in Massachusetts where her and her fiance met and live. They’ll be moving to Iowa after they get married because her husband will start working at Grinnell College, cool huh? Which means, they’ll be MUCH closer to us and the rest of the family! I’m psyched about that! :)  I’m glad that I passed my boards too so that next week I don’t feel down about it, but can just let go and enjoy the week. We’ll be staying in Boston for a day just to tour around, since we have never been there, and then on Wednesday we’ll head over to mid-MA where the festivities will take place and have a couple days before the wedding on Friday. One minor detail… I haven’t been fitting into my bridesmaid dress all that well lately, so I’ve put myself on a bit of a temporary restriction from all things sweet/carb-y…. cakes, cookies, crackers, pretzels, etc. And, I’m going to work out like nutso these next few days before we leave. Hopefully it will be enough to squeeze me into the dress!! It’s very pretty!

Off to eat the turkey chili that I just cooked up…. at 8:30am. :) We had no milk and I hardly ate anything yesterday, so I figured a nice healthy hearty meal/breakfast was in order. I like cooking a lot too, so it’s  kinda a way to celebrate.  :)

My nursing job starts on the 21st! Can’t wait!!

Mish-Mash

So we haven’t technically had internet these past couple weeks, but we occasionally pick up someone’s signal nearby and can maybe check email once a day. I don’t know if that’s considered stealing or not, but I figure if someone doesn’t want others to use their signal, they would lock it up, and perhaps they are okay with sharing it with others. I think eventually we will get our own wireless internet, and I’d be fine allowing others to use it… it just seems silly that there’s probably over 30 people in our building and we all have our own internet when it would make so much more sense to have only a few connections and share it between us all….

But anyway… enough about that…

I’ve been struggling lately to really study for my nursing boards as I would like to be doing. I have just a day under a month now until my exam, and there is most definitely plenty of material for me to cram into my head again, but it is difficult now that I’m done with school to be motivated to study again, especially without any sort of schedule. I just have to be ready for my exam (and know just about everything I’ve learned over the past two years in nursing school, somehow) by July 10th. Must keep plugging away!

In other news, we got a fish last night for our fish tank! It’s a 55 gallon tall tank, so it’s pretty big. For the past week we’ve been letting the water filter and get ready for some cute fishies to inhabit it… and finally yesterday we got our first “hardy” fish, an Oscar fish. We named him Wally, since we got him at Wall-Mart. He’s super cute and enjoying his new home it seems! At first I was all worried about the little guy because he was ‘resting’ at the bottom of the tank and he wasn’t eating any of the little pellets we put on the top for him, but eventually he must have because they’re gone now! This morning we woke up to a very lively and active fishy, and he really likes to swim through all the bubbles that come from the two bubbler strips… whatever they’re called.

And on another subject (I really should make all these different posts, but oh well)… I’ve been blessed to have read some super good spiritual growth books lately when I take breaks from studying (or maybe it’s the other way around… I take breaks from those books to study nursing? Hmm…). One of the books is about humility and it’s been very convicting. I’ve known for years that pride is the ultimate sin and that God opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble. And that he looks to the one who has a broken and contrite heart. I’ve noticed just how pride permeates into so many areas of struggle, whether it be with my words toward John, my lack of confession/repentence toward others and to God, and my laziness in cleaning our apartment and in studying for my exam. It’s all rooted in my own self-righteousness and pride. Some good practical tips I’ve taken ahold of from book (Humilty: True Greatness, by C.J. Mahaney) are to begin each day acknowledging my dependence on the Lord for everything, since all that I have and am given is totally from Him and not myself, and also at the end of each day to thank the Lord for the day and for all he has provided. Pretty basic, I know, but it’s amazing how easily you can stop doing even those two simple things which really help battle the sin of pride. Some other very convicting things… I have been realizing that when I’m critical of others (which I so often am), it’s rooted in my pride and in focusing on what is wrong with others (as if I have it all figured out, ha!)… when I really should be focusing on the evidences of grace and of the Spirit that I observe in others. Of course there are definitely times to discern if one of your brothers/sisters is sinning and is unrepentent of it and then to exhort them, but that shouldn’t always be my focus (or shouldn’t be the majority of what I focus on). How encouraging it can be to others to point out how you’ve seen fruits of the Holy Spirit and of spiritual gifts at work in them and to let them know! I hope and pray to do this so much more, by God’s grace alone.

Oh (yes, more randomness!)… I’ve been running outside more often!  I love running around the area that we live in! Slowly but surely I’ll be gaining more endurance and strength and then I’ll start going downtown with John to the local Y, where he runs to a couple times a week to workout (and then runs back… crazy man). Praise God, though, for helping me get back into a more active lifestyle. Feels great, and I hope it continues.

One last random tid-bit…I am LOVING cooking more!!! Another praise to God! I tried, I think, cooking five new recipies over the past week! I plan to continue trying more of them and compiling a great recipe book for our family, and who knows, by the time we have kids I’ll have plenty of ones ready to go!

Officially official

Well, here’s my last update on the nursing job hunt (a quick one at that). And sorry for my lack of actual deep posts lately, or interesting ones. Being a month from graduating college is understandably taking away all my time/energy for now, and that will probably be the case until graduation comes. But come to think of it, most of my huge assignments/tasks were this week, so perhaps I’ll have more time to post now. Who knows, every time I think that things will lighten up, they don’t…

So the update! I officially got the job today at the hospital I wanted to work at! They had many choices of units and shifts that I could pick, but most of them weren’t exactly what I wanted. Ideally I wanted an orthopedic floor with day/evening shifts, but that was taken by someone already working at the hospital (yay unions…). So, I actually ended up going for the float pool! I’ll have an awesome nurse manager, since she was the one who interviewed me, so at least I know I have a good supervisor already. Also, I’ll go through a 9 month orientation to the many different units in the hospital. Otherwise I’d probably freak out being a new graduate AND a float nurse. If you don’t know what a float nurse is, it pretty much means that I’ll work wherever they are short nurses. Could be just about anywhere, except possibly the ICU and ER, I think. I should have asked that… oh well, I’ll find out! :) The shift will be days/nights… so I’ll work a few days and a few nights, but never back to back. That would be torture! The one added benefit to this position is you get paid a little more to be a float pool nurse and you also get a little more for working nights. That’ll help with the student loans/debt…

So I’m really excited about it! I think it will be a tough job but also very challenging and rewarding. It’ll help me discover what area I want to go into, if I choose not to stay a float nurse. Also, it’ll be fun to be able to meet lots of other nurses in the hospital and sorta feel out the whole place. And if John and I decide to go to China in the near future, it will be good to have a broad background of experiences and also for when we come back it will be easier to get started again! Can’t wait for it all to start on July 21, 2008! Time to start another countdown…