Leave Me Alone!!

Any free time that I have this week, someone has tried to steal it away from me.  Some people just need to suck it up and work their shifts as scheduled.  I remember very well when I was about to drop dead from exhaustion, no one was willing to help me out.  And guess what? I sucked it up and worked my shifts.  It may not have been a pleasant experience, but I got through it.  This is the first weekend off where I had both days off completely in what feels like forever.  And as strange as it may seem, I have plans made for this rare and unusual occasion.  Especially given that my next weekend off after this was taken away from me with not so much as an offer to work a shift for me in exchange.  I'm so incredibly frustrated.  I have a life, I have a husband who would like to see me and spend time with me every once in a while.  I need rest, I need time where I don't have to put aside my need to go to the bathroom for an entire shift because my residents need me.  I need sleep.  I'm sorry that you got the virus going around at work and have to work 8 hours, but I can't always put everyone else's needs before my own.

I just wish I had the ability to stop the guilt I feel for standing my ground, and not sacrificing myself and my life for the sake of work every single freaking time someone asks me to.  It's not my job to fix this problem.

*sigh*

Ok, now that I have gotten that out of my system.

Our Christmas was lovely, as usual.  Lots of good food, lots of big laughs, lots of good presents.  We even got to Face time with my family this year while opening presents Christmas Day, which was awesome.  Everyone must have been good this year. :)  My favorite gift was a retro Nurse Barbie Mike got me.  I've had my eye on it since I graduated, and finally got my hands on one of them! :)  Mike's parents also gave me a little stuffed Nurse Bear, which I adore.

I finally figured out how to get my ticket paid, and now am registered for online traffic school.  It is sooo incredibly dull, but whatever.  Less scary than having to go to traffic court, so I can suck it up.

I need to sit down and figure out my New Year's resolutions.  Unfortunately, I am working a ton the next few days, so probably won't get to it until next week sometime!! :)  I think I've done a good job o my resolutions this year, so it won't be too hard.

:)

3 Shifts Until Christmas!!

It is my weekend to work again, and I'm up bright and early.  I could sooooo productive with my morning.  But what am I doing instead?  I'm spread out on the couch, under my favorite blanket, and sipping my coffee.  I am basically just a lazy bum today.  That's ok.  I have been productive enough this week to make up for my lack of productivity today.  :)  The only thing on my to do list is figuring out how to pay my darn traffic ticket online.  I just want to pay it online and do traffic school, and be done with the whole thing.  The cop told me I could go to court, and it would likely be dropped, but the thought of going to court is just intimidating.  I'd rather just hand over my money, please.  But my ticket isn't showing up yet.  I'll call on Monday and figure out what I am doing wrong.

I am all ready for Christmas.  :)  I have my gifts wrapped, cards sent out, supplies to make my favorite Christmas goodies.  Hair done, nails done, and plenty of wine to make wine slushies! :)  Presents to my family shipped.  We had a wonderful time downtown last weekend for our annual downtown extravaganza. lol  It was so nice on Saturday when we went with Mom and Dad-in-law to see Wicked, but when we went the next day, it was freeeeezzing.  But we warmed up with hot chocolate, and warm wine and bratwursts at Christkindlmarket at Daley Plaza.  Seeing Chicago lit up with Christmas lights is my favorite way to see it.  Oh, and tea at the Drake was amazing again as well.  They had a holiday menu this year, and while I was disappointed to miss out on my egg salad and roast beef mini sandwiches, what they served instead was just as delightful.  Turkey salad with cranberries?  My favorite. :)  The little girls in their party dresses at this time of year is just so adorable.  I would have loved to have tea time like this when I was a little girl.  

Side note: I'm glad there aren't any Garrett Popcorn stores out here in the burbs.  I've learned I have absolutely no self control around their Chicago mix, and will finish off an entire bag of it by myself.  Actually, I want more of it, lots and lots of it.  

I am in love with my North Face jacket.  It is incredibly soft, and it is warm.  I wore it when we went downtown on Sunday, and it passed the test.  I didn't think a fleece jacket could hold up so well in this Chicago winter, but this one did!  I have wanted one for a really long time, and just never could fit into them.  I hate wearing winter coats, I don't like how bulky they are or how they restrict how much I can move my arms.  So, I am very happy with my purchase.

I am gonna try to stop being lazy now. :)  Have a Merry Christmas!!

Sleep Deprivation

I am so running on fumes right now.  I don't mind working doubles at work, I get a 3 hour break between my shifts, so it is really not bad.  It would be worse if I had to work back to back 8 hour shifts like other places have nurses do.  But it is really, really, reallllllly hard to feel like I'm at the top of my game when I only got 5-6 hours of sleep the night before, and then I get stuck almost an hour past my shift because of things completely out of my ability to control, and come back to work at 700.  I'm exhausted physically and mentally, and yet, all I can do is think of my huge to do list:

Laundry
Address Christmas Cards
Wrap presents
Shower/Get ready for Wicked tonight
Be awake for Fedex delivery I managed to negotiate for 5 today (after they were late, and I missed both attempts thus far)
Spend time downtown tomorrow to see the lights, and afternoon tea at the Drake.
Ship presents for my family to TN
Plan Christmas goodies bake list and buy needed supplies
Start making and baking said goodies
Prepare goodie bags for nurse coworkers
Get nails done Friday-ish, maybe Monday
Get hair touched up
Figure out how to pay traffic ticket online
Declutter kitchen counter

And all I want to do is sleep!!  I'm so over everything I need to get done and just want to say eff it, and sleep.  But I won't do that.

I also got into a car accident yesterday during my break from work.  Just a fender bender, some jerk stopped suddenly to turn left as soon as we got through an intersection.  Luckily, no one is hurt, cars are fine, just some scratches.  In fact, maybe it is because of the snow, but the scratches one my bumper are hard to enough now.  But, this is what insurance is for.  So it will be fine, as long as the driver and his brother (the owner of the car) don't try to contact me again.  They got all of my information on the police report, and apparently felt it was necessary to to call the second I drove away to ask me to call their insurance with the info they already had.  My guess, is the guy's insurance lapsed, because otherwise they could have given their agent my information themselves.  But I don't know how any of that stuff works.

I did get my Christmas shopping done, despite the challenging week I have had.  So one thing can be crossed off my list.  However, my hubby is sick, and when it started, I totally brushed it off as just a scratchy throat.  Now he has hardly any voice left.  I feel bad, but there is also probably not much that could have been done.  It's most likely viral, but I still feel bad.

I must get moving!! More later maybe.

I've Got the Christmas Cheer!!

This has been an interesting week.  One of my coworkers put in her 2 week notice.  In the long run, I think this will be for the best.  I have been growing tired of her complaining about how she never has time for anything anymore because of her schedule, when I work more hours than she does, and I work  PMs, where she works days.  Her leaving may help the other complainer stop complaining so much because she'll be on day shift now.  So, in the long run, it will be a good thing.  Short term, it is going to suck, because that is a full time schedule we have to try to cover now.  And the newbies really aren't ready to start working more than what they are, it just makes for a disaster in my opinion.  My other worry is that if the other nurse quits, too, I could lose my Christmas off.  That was the main reason I allowed myself to get put on for so many shifts, because I was told I would get those days off.  I will be really upset if it gets taken away from me.

Other than that unsettling development, its been a good week.  We got our decorations up, and watched a lot of our favorite Christmas movies.  We started our shopping on Thursday.  We have his parents pretty much taken care of....actually we have mostly everyone on our list taken care of.  We need a few more things to finish up Mom-in-law's gifts, my little sister, and the White Elephant gift for Christmas Eve.  Of course, we do still need to shop for each other, but that will be done on our own time. :)  I also got my nails done in my favorite sparkly red color.  My residents will love them. :)

I just need to start addressing our Christmas cards so I can send them out this week.  I am waiting on a few things we ordered online to arrive, and once we finish shopping, I can wrap and ship the gifts we got for my family to TN.  I also have to start deciding on what Christmas goodies to make this year.  My yearly things are always my Santa cookies, Puppy Chow, No Bake Cookies.  Mike wants to make more than that, so I have to come up with some good ideas. :)  I'd love to get really good at making fudge.  That may be on my list now.

I just have to get through this week, and then we get to see Wicked with Mike's parents on Saturday.  I am soooo incredibly excited for this.  I love love love love love that show!  The book was really good, too!  Then we will spend the day downtown on Sunday, taking in the lights and window displays, and having afternoon tea at the Drake.  This is absolutely my favorite tradition we have each year, going downtown in the cold (hopefully snowy :)  ) weather, see how beautiful Chicago is when it is lit up with Christmas lights.  We did this the year we got married, and have done it every year since.  We also started collecting ornaments for each year when we got married, and I love it.  We have to get our 2013 ornament sometime soon, but I love our little collection.  It is still so hard to fathom we have been married for over 5 years now.  I feel incredibly blessed that this man fell into my life 12 years ago, and never left.  I never thought 12 years ago that he would end up being the man I get to sleep next to every night, and I'd be living in Chicago with him.  In fact, when I was 17, I didn't imagine my life to be anything like it is now.  But I am truly thankful it is far different from what my 17 year old, depressed self saw my life going, and Mike is responsible for so much of that.

Today I work.  And tomorrow, and the next day.  Blah!!

Memories.....the Not So Good Ones

The new grad I have been training got let out on her own the past few days.  I feel for her so much, because it has been rough for her.  Dealing with a re-admit on her very first shift alone, and having no one really tell her what she needed to do and how to do it, it just wasn't fair.  It is hard enough find your rhythm when everything is going well, much less when you are dealing with a resident who was sent back to us in an unstable condition.  So, her second shift alone wasn't much better, she had a lot getting thrown at her, and I helped her finish her med pass, and then walked her through how to do an incident report, how to chart on it, where you have to log it at, etc.  Explain to her what to do with discharge orders, and show her the errors she made so she can learn from them.  I felt bad, because I know how easy it is to beat yourself up over your mistakes....but if you don't know about your mistakes, you can't learn from it.  So, I think she knew I was just trying to help her, which made me feel better about being the bearer of the bad news.

Oh man, but did it make me remember my first shifts on my own.  It is so terrifying, especially as a new grad.  You second guess yourself so much, you waste so much time.  I remember the panic, the freaking out because you are late getting to people, late getting out.  Worrying you forgot something.  Worrying about the mistakes you made, and the ones you made but don't know you made yet.  Thinking the other nurses are bat shit crazy when they tell you it gets better, how the hell do they just walk around all slow like this is a piece of cake?  How are they not freaking out every single minute?  Why do they insist on repeatedly effing telling me it will get better?!?!?!?!  I remember crying on my way home the first night I was by myself practically because the person training me just left me to my own defenses.  It is so hard to get through that time of feeling unsure of yourself, and doubt over whether you would ever really get good at doing this.  I want so much to just pour everything I have learned in the last 10 months into her brain so that this time in her career is easier.

It didn't help that the dermatologist picked last night to see a bunch of our residents, and left us orders for all of them.  I should have been able to get to them except I had to help my coworker get through her shift.    So then I had to show the other new girl who is working overnights how to take off orders, and threw a bunch of them at her, and I felt bad, but it had to get done.  If she makes mistakes, it is ok, none of the orders were critical, so it was a not so bad place to start.  I hope anyway.  Today I am off, so today I will not worry about it.  Tomorrow I can deal with any of the problems that came about from my call to have the overnight nurse do the orders.  

Speaking of, I have the whole day off today with my hubby, and that makes me happy.  We have some errands to run, but otherwise I just want to enjoy the day with him.  :)  I have another double tomorrow, so I gotta make today count!

The Holiday Season has Arrived!

I do love this time of year so much.  I love decorating our house for Christmas.  I love the Christmas music.  I love making Christmas goodies. I love going downtown and seeing it lit up with lights.  I love the daily chocolates from our advent calendar.  I love shopping for gifts, even though it can be hard to figure out what to buy sometimes.

Thanksgiving was weird for me this year.  I felt like it was just show up, eat, and go to work.  I wish I could have stayed longer, but this is the life of a nurse.  My shift was definitely weird, a lot of my residents were out with their families, so it threw my entire routine off.  I usually see 8-9 people from 3:30-4:30, and only 2 of them were there.   So I took my break early so I could just get going as people starting coming back.  It all worked out, with only 1 person getting back really late.  I had a plate of my Mom and Dad in law's Thanksgiving leftovers to eat while I did my charting at the end of the night, and it made being at work not so bad. :)  Plus time and a half is nice, too, I guess.

Once I got home today from work and took a nap, we started on our Christmas decorations.  Everything is pretty much done except I need to buy new ribbon to put on or cabinets to hold the Christmas cards we get in the mail.  I had saved what we used last year, but it unfortunately isn't smoothing out to my liking.  And I want to buy some more poinsettias to kill again this year. :)  I'll take care of that all on Tuesday.  I will also get started on getting the Christmas cards addressed, too.  Then I have to start getting serious on the shopping.  I started on little goody gift bags to give to my coworkers, but nothing for family has been bought yet because we have no one's lists yet.  Story of my life.  It sucks, too, because we have to ship gifts this year to TN since we aren't going to be able to travel.  It will all get done one way or the other.

The biggest struggle?  I married my father, the man who doesn't "really want anything".  Last year was easy, because we got each other iPads.  So, I'm gonna have to put on my thinking cap and get to brainstorming.

This is the last week of overtime for me, I think.  I work a double tomorrow and Wednesday, and then it is back to normal for the most part.  My schedule is a bit mixed up because of the holidays, but I go back to my normal amount of hours each week.  Also, no more training, the new girls are on their own starting today, so I think all of us a (cautiously) relieved.  I hope they feel supported, I wanted nothing more than to make them feel comfortable with me so they weren't afraid to ask the "stupid" questions we all have to ask when we are starting out.  I am only one person, so its out of my hands after a certain point.  

So that is my update for now!  Just gonna relax with da hubs tonight since I won't see him tomorrow.