I Suck at Blogging.

I really am. I am horrible at reading them, horrible at updating mine, and wish I was better at both.

So! Since my last post, I did indeed pass my ped rotation. Although, when I took my final, I was sure I had just failed. Normally, after you take a final exam, you get to leave....but not in this class. We had to give presentations on our nursing articles with our groups. I was so devastated after feeling like I had failed my exam & the class, that I started to sob as soon as I turned my scan-tron in. My group was the last to go, and I thought "this is good, I can get it together by then".....but no, I went in and out of crying all the way until it was our time. I completely sucked when I had to give my part of the presentation.

I truly was so upset. I have never been that upset before over a test. And even when the grades were finally posted later that day, I started crying when I saw that I had a near perfect score on my exam. I was crying in relief, releasing all of that stress and fear. It really did take some time for it to sink in that I passed. It certainly didn't help when my clinical instructor (who I truly believe is the most socially awkward nursing instructor yet, even my OB instructor was encouraging and didn't make you feel like you were stupid) started out my final peds clinical evaluation by saying she shoud have failed me, yet she was giving me a B. I had an incident that I am not going to talk about, but a mistake happened, and it was not due to me being careless, or not being aware of my surroundings, and I punished myself for it far more than anyone else could have. Yet, I received no formal warnings or remediation slips at the time of the event, and was assured by my instructor at that time that mistakes happen and I did everything right once I realized my mistake. So, yeah, I was kind of ticked she started out my final evaluation meeting with that because of that I should have a received a 1 in Safety (4=a, 3=b,2=pass, 1=big fat fail), and 1 in this category is a fail, regardless of your scorings in the other 9 categories. She gave me a 2, and had she said "I really felt you deserved a 3, but because of that incident, I had to give you a 2", I would have been ok with that.

I passed Peds, and thank heavens, because that class was just too much for me. OB, on the other hand......LOVE. I loved it. Big, fat, puffy heart, loved it. Labor & Delivery is by far the first area where I felt "OMG, I need to be here!!!". I can't truly describe what its like to be there when a baby cries for the first time, yet stops crying the second their daddy starts to talk to them. They literally are like "Hold the phone!!! I know you!!" when they turn their little head in the direction of their daddy's voice, and try to open their eyes. I was in tears with every birth I got to be present for. It didn't make want my own lil bun in the oven ASAP, but I just felt like it was such an amazing experience to get to be a part of.

So yeah, loved OB. I am 2 weeks away from starting my 4th and final semester of nursing school. I have homework to do already, lol. I am still in disbelief that the end is nearing. May 20 is our graduation day. When I saw them setting up the tent for graduation 2 years ago while I arriving to take my final for Physiology.....I actually started crying. I knew that tent was going to be in MY future in a couple of years. I can't explain how important it is to me to be graduating, even if I was majoring in something like accounting or pottery. Not having a degree is something I have felt embarrassed of. Not because everyone should have a degree, but its because I know I am capable and smart, and to not have one means I simply didn't follow through. I let life and circumstances delay this for me. So, it is important for me to be finally completing this. Even though I will be going on to get my BSN, I can do that online, and take a class at a time. I won't have to do this 2 years of taking over my whole life again. So, just finally receiving that degree with my name on it is an accomplishment that I need to validate something in me. It just happens to be even better that this degree makes me a nurse, which is beyond exciting for me that I will get to actively help people, instead of just being the phone answerer or butt wiper.

I am also really excited for getting back to life with Mike and I in our own place. There are hard moments living with your in-laws, but I can say that I am fortunate to have the in-laws that I do. I have friends who have in-laws who would make you want to pull your hair out just listening to their stories. My in-laws don't know how much I am in gratitude for helping me accomplish this dream of mine. I did not have this kind of support from my own family (although if money grew on trees, I know things would have been different). This has given me the opportunity to go to school and only stress about school, and actually be a full-time student, and be a rock star at it.

But even with that said, I miss having my own place with my husband. Its actually really exciting to think about looking for places again, and getting to unpack our stuff. Getting to walk around in my undies without worrying about if my in-laws are home or not. And just getting to make a place our home. I am ready for that so much.

So 4th semester comes to my life with Critical Care (ICU, Emergency, Oncology) and Roles Transition. With roles, we start preparing for the job search basically, and its a lot of busy work from what I hear. But then there is our Capstone. We get to say where we would like to be placed (such as cardiac, post-partum, peds, psych, etc), and we get placed with a nurse who will be our preceptor for 8 weeks. We work their schedule for about 24 hours a week. I am soooo undecided on where I want to be for this. I have L&D is not a good experience, but then they can't place you in ICU/NICU, which are other areas I would be interested in. So, I'm not sure yet. I definitely don't want to do something boring like a general med-surg floor. I may very well end up working med-surg when I graduate because I will take what I can get. But I want to have an amazing learning opportunity for Capstone. So we will see!