New Year's Eve 2010!

Today is New Years Eve 2010-2011.

I am spending the night with Kyle at home just relaxing and eating breakfast for dinner. We didn't feel like going out with the insane crowds, drivers, etc. It's a nice, quiet night at home and I'm hoping the new year starts and ends that way.. Peaceful, Lovely, and Successful!

I have PLENTLY of new years resolutions.. I have so many things I want to work on this year. I know this should be a work in progress every single day, but for some reason I just can't seem to make it work. So.. I wrote them down as resolutions and I hope I can stick to them.

This year I really want to work on myself, my body, my mind, my spirit, and just getting to know who I really am again. One of my main resolutions is to get to know myself better through writing in my journal (blog) more often (every day if I can possibly do that..). I feel like I've lost a big part of myself in nursing school... All I've become is a "nursing student" and nothing else. I don't even know what I like to do anymore... I just spend my days studying, studying, eating, sleeping and repeating. I've forgotten who I am and I feel a little lost. I want to know myself and what I really love and believe it. For a long time, it's been nursing.. I found passion in it.

Now I am just completely burnt out on nursing school and I cannot WAIT until it's over!!! I finish on May 19, 2011!! I am beyond excited and nervous about 4th semester coming up starting on Jan 21st! I am confident at times, and other times I really want to crawl into a hole and hide forever.. haha. But I am determined to finish and LOVE nursing!! I can't wait to be a RN!

Anyway, my point is.. That's all I've come to love in the past 3 years and it's been such a long journey but hopefully worth it. So when all is said and done with nursing school and I am graduated, I need to find other things to occupy my time (besides a JOB!) and get to know who I am better. I want to start working on these things TODAY - there really is no reason to wait anymore. I need to start working today and stay focused throught the rest of my nursing school, and there after work harder.

I really want a family someday hopefully soon - Maybe I will be pregnant by the end 2011?! Who knows... But I DO know that I need to be a better person, know myself better, know what I do and don't believe and prepare to be a good mother. I am definetly not equpit at the moment to be a mother if it were to happen today. I need to know what I will and won't put up with in life from other people and myself!

I know there will always be downfalls and setbacks and life NEVER goes as you want it to.. But I am ready for this new challenge and excited to work harder on being ME.

Here's to 2011.... It will surely bring times of excitment, joy, sadness, laughing and crying.. Bring it on!!! :)

Finally Finished with Finals!

YAY!! I finished finals on Wednesday Dec 15th by 5pm and headed to eat and get a drink with my buddies from school...WHAT A RELIEF! It feels sooo good to be done, at least for a few weeks!
We didn't get to find out our grades until Monday the 20th.. The waiting is so hard! I knew I was going to pass and be fine though... I DID pass my final and got to keep my B in the class! :) I'm happy for that.
Unfortunately, one of my best friends in nursing school, Kristin, didn't pass :( I'm soo sad for her because she worked SO hard and it really sucks. She didn't pass by 0.2%!! That's nursing school for you.. ugh!! I'm so sad she won't be with me and all of us next semester and through graduation. She will instead be graduating at the end of Summer.. Not that much long after us, but it still stinks she isn't with our class anymore :(
After all that was done and finished, Kyle and I flew out to see my mom, brother Mike and sister in law JaNae on Thursday until Monday! It was so fun and relaxing.. It was nice not to have to think about school, studying, or whatever! We helped my mom pack some stuff because................ SHE IS MOVING BACK TO RENO!!! YAY!!! We are so happy and can't wait!! She will be living with Kyle and I for a while. She plans to move back in the middle of January sometime...so soon! :) We can't wait to have her back!
On the other hand, my brother and JaNae are heading out to Kansas City, Missouri in the next week or 2 so he can attend AA school. We will miss them a lot but it's really exciting also for Mike! What we are going to miss the most is............................................... JANAE IS PREGNANT!!!!! We are beyond thrilled for them and sooo excited to be an aunt and uncle (besides Nicholas :) FINALLY!!! :)!! We can't wait to find out what the sex of the baby is and start spoiling it while it's still in the womb!! hahah..
Well, that's about all the big news I have for now.. :) I'm going to head off and enjoy my little mini vacation while it lasts! I have a huge list of things to do over break, including fixing up my resume and job hunting!! I can't believe I will be a RN in 5 MONTHS! I am soo excited and scared at the same time! I can't wait for this to all be over.. It's been a long journey but will be worth it in the end (I HOPE!).

PS...Sorry I am SO lame and never have pictures :( Maybe someday I'll have something exciting to write about WITH a picture attached!

Rocky Road

It seems like one nice, friendly patient is always counteracted by a grumpy, mean, ungrateful one... how ironic.
One more day of clinical and one more exam.. Next Wed is the final... AHHHH this week is killing me!!
I feel like half of my heart is missing right now.... just gotta keep swimming.

And there are my three totally random thoughts put into one simple blog. Goodnight.

A different perspective

I'm stupidly busy with school and clinical.. but trying to enjoy it! I only have 5 more weeks of the semester and then Winter Break, then start 4th and final semester.. AHHH!! Where is time going?! I can hardly believe it.
I started my first foley today in clinical, and also hung my first IVBP! Yay!! Another one checked off on my list, but hopefully I'll still get more opportunities. I was worried I wouldn't even get to do either of those this semester.. and I've already done an IV and foley in the first 2 weeks.. 4 more weeks to go, YAY!
I had some patients in Oncology today that really made me feel sad but appreciate my life. I cared for a 31 year old man with colorectal cancer that was progressing and the prognosis was pretty poor. It was sad to see a man so young in this condition.. But unfortunately, that's reality for some people. People come and go, people are born and people will die. Although for some people this is what life brings and it made me sad..but he was STILL friendly, smiling, joking and laughing, even through his pain. It made me appreciate life a little bit more today.. Thank you for that. You changed a small part of me today.. You saved my life a little bit today.

Short Update

Ahhh.. Once again I haven't had time to blog at all!
But here is another little update..
I had my 2nd exam on Monday 11/1, and got a B. Yay.. I'm happy with that.
I started my first day of clinical in Oncology on Wednesday 11/3 and LOVED it!! It helped that my nurse was absolutely amazing and SO nice! I hope I get her again next week. I also started my first IV, which was pretty much flawless! I got it on the first stick AND it was patent, flushed beautifully... Double YAY! I'm glad I finally go to do that.
I also got to see some procedures done - one where a tube was placed into the abdomen to drain fluid for a pt. that had acities.. that was pretty neat to see. I also saw a Lexiscan/cardiac stress test which was pretty boring - just a bunch of picture being taken of the pt. heart.. But I'm still glad I got to see both of those.
That's about it.. Until I update in a few months again ;)

PS.. I didn't like psych after all ;) Eww, no thanks!

Blah

Seems to be my theme lately. Just feelng very BLAH.. about school, life, everything. Life is really interesting how it comes in peaks and valleys.
Anyway, another quick update...
I had my first exam.. scored an 89! Woohoooo! I was really nervous going into the exam, but I passed, which is really amazing. The class average was a 70 (not passing), so that's pretty scary. :/ Maybe I needed to get an 89 to make up for what's coming?? Who knows... Next exam is 11/1.
I had my first rotation in Pscyh on Wednesday. It was VERY interesting! Some of the people there are very, very sick.. and others are starting to recover. I thought it was really interesting to sit down and talk to a patient for a while, then go look through the chart/history only to realize what they told you was basically not true at all. Pretty weird. It's very mentally challenging and I'm pretty sure I never want to be a psych nurse, which is funny because I used to think I would love being a psych nurse. HAHA... No thanks. I spend 2 more weeks there, so I'm sure it will be interesting... Then I move on to oncology.

I got hooked up with a nurse mentor! Her name is Jayme and I actually met her today. She works in long term acute care but has lots of experience in intentive/critical care. She's extremely nice, and really enthusiastic about being a mentor! I was so happy to meet and talk to her and just hear about life on the other side... REAL life as a nurse!
We were supposed to get mentors in 1st semester, and here I am now in 3rd just finally getting one.. So that was weird, but it's really good I have one now. She's happy to help me and asked me to call, txt, email whatever anytime I have questions or just need a friend to hang out with. I'm excited to know her and hopefully I'll get to know her better!

That's about it for now.. Off to bed and preparing for class tomorrow. Monday always comes around too fast..

Quick Update

Quick, quick update... I will expand on these topics at a later date..
In the last 2 weeks:
I have hung out with Sarah + Kyle much more.. lots of friend time, had a UTI and got pretty sick, finished my Peds rotation today which also included that I got to go to the Childrens ER! It was really fun, I think I am heading to ER now.... Maybe not childrens ER, which was a bit slow, but maybe regular/adult ER.. We'll see! I enjoyed Peds way more than I thought I would, and I'm happy I got the experience... Also have my first exam of the semester on Friday.. EEK!

Until I update again.

So...

I have decided that I liked Peds! Yay! It was fun, I almost can't wait to go back next week.. Although I get extremely exhausted with 12 hour clinicals, and it tooke me almost all day to recovery from Wednesday. Woohoo! Hope next Wednesday is good also :D

First day in Pediatrics

Well, today marked my first day in my clinical rotation of the semester, as well as my first clinical rotation of Pediatrics. It was hard, frightening, overwhelming, fun, and exhausting.
I don't really know what I was expecting in Peds besides being completely terrified of making children cry! I slept horrible the night before, waking myself up and thinking I had missed my alarm. I kept dreaming that I was making my 2 year old pt. cry! It was weird.. I woke myself up at 3:30am and had set my alarm for 4:45, but couldn't fall back asleep. So I just tossed and turned until my alarm went off. Then I showered and prepared for my rotation to from 6:15am-6:00pm (my first 12 hour shift!)
I had picked out a patient the day before for prep that is 2 years old with Asthma/Respiratory Airway Disease/Acute Bronchospasms. My patient was extremely irritable, crying, fussy, restless and agitated pretty much all day. She talked to me a few times and smiled only a handful of times. She liked playing with my stethoscope and pretending to use as I do. I could definitely tell she was not feeling well.... exactly what my "nightmares" were - a crying child all day long!! I felt helpless and sad for her, but I think part of her crying was not feeling well + manipulation to get what she wanted - cookies, pudding, crackers, juice, etc. Who feeds their children that diet?! I encouraged water and fluids throughout the day, but ultimately the mother feeds her child when the child cries and doesn't want anything but cookies.
I also got to witness a fellow classmates pt. who was 9 months old with fetal alcohol syndrome and failure to thrive. That was definitely heart breaking!! He couldn't sit up or hold his own head up - when a normal 9 month old would be sitting, crawling maybe, interacting, playing, etc. This infant didn't interact and barely responded to stimuli. He wanted to be held constantly and cried when anyone put him down. He didn't respond much to toys, snapping your fingers, his name, or really anything. Very sad for him.... :( It made me want to cry. But hopefully he will continue to improve and grown and develop.
Wow.. Peds was a totally different experience than what I am used to, taking care of adults. It was fun in a way - I got to give my first IV push medications - but at the same time, exhausting and long. I didn't want my pt. to cry but she just wasn't feeling up to anything. I guess it was just "one of those days" and that's what you get. I did learn A LOT and I thought my instructor Jami-Sue Coleman was awesome! She was so supportive, nice and didn't stand over my shoulder every 2 seconds... It really made me feel like maybe I can do this......Maybe!
Who knows... Maybe Peds will be my place, Maybe not. I haven't decided whether or not I like Peds yet but maybe in the next 2 short weeks I will take a better liking to it. :)

Just a few happy pictures

Here are a few pictures of my mom and Nicholas, and me & Nicholas..

Happy pictures!! He's changing so much already. I love this little buddy :)

Letter #1

My first letter to..
#17 - Someone you know who's going through the worst of times:

Dear S -
I know you are going through so so much right now. I can't imagine your pain and what you are feeling - shock, confusion, anger, pain, relief, love maybe. I'm not sure. I'm glad you shared today with me because I know it must have been hard for you. I love you so much friend, and I know you will make it through J's death. I can't believe he's gone and that it's all over in a blink of your eye. Who would have ever thought it would end up this way - I didn't. I feel so much heart ache for J and for you. I don't know what happened or where everything went wrong, but I know everything happens for a reason somehow.
I know you are going through other things as well, and I know life is really hard right now. Stuck somewhere in between, but you will make it through. You are so strong! I can't believe the bravery you showed me today... I don't know if it was just shock, but I am proud of you. You are handling things well. However, if you need ANYTHING you know I am here!! and so is Kyle. You have so many friends and family members who care about you and are there for you, and I know you see that.. but I hope you know you are my friend too and I am here any time you need me. Even if it's just to sit on my couch and be silent with someone.
Love you so much S! Stay strong - you will get through this too, just like you always do.

xoxo < 3
Kelly

A Letter A Day

I saw this on someone else's blog that I don't know but I thought it was a great idea. I don't know if I can do a letter every single day, but I want to try and write all of them at one point or another. You are supposed to write a letter to each of the below once a day until you write one to all of them. It's supposed to be "Free Therapy" and I think it's a great idea to do if you have ever had feelings you were never able to say! Here is the list:

1. A stranger
2. Your spouse, or your future spouse - even if you've never met them
3. Your child(ren) or future child
4. Your first love or crush
5. One to each of your parents
6. Someone in your life who has caused a lot of pain during your childhood
7. Your sibling(s)
8. Someone you've hurt
9. Someone you don't understand
10. Someone deceased
11. The person you'd want to take care of your children if you & your spouse are no longer alive
12. Your best girlfriend
13. Your dreams
14. Someone you don't talk to as much as you'd like
15. Your 13-year-old self
16. The person you miss the most
17. Someone you know who's going through the worst of times
18. Someone that caused someone you love (not you) a lot of pain when they were a child
19. Someone that changed your life
20. Your reflection in the mirror

I don't know if I will write them all in that order, but I'll get to each one sometime. I'll post them on here (even though I know no one reads this) but without specific names - maybe just first initial :)
I'm kinda excited about it!

As far as school goes - I've been trying hard to study study study, but it is hard. I am distracted and sleepy. I am almost ahead for lecture on Monday but tomorrow I will finish the readings. Tonight Kyle and I are going to Shaun's house for dinner/football/hangout. Should be fun after a long day of 4+ hours of reading Med/Surg about TB and COPD! Ahhhhh!
I also start clinicals next week, starting with my Peds rotation. Excited & Nervous for that one!

Yikes!

This is how I'm feeling right about now...WHOA. Today was really overwhelming. I had back to back orientations for pediatrics and psychiatric rotations. My brain feels fried and overloaded!! I'm taking the entire night off (even though I just took off all weekend to spend with my mom) and pick back up tomorrow with study, study, study time. I am way behind and now even more so, but that's ok......

I am headed to pediatrics, psychiatric and oncology (for Med/Surg rotation) this semester. Along with all the lectures...I am feeling excited about where I am going, but majorly blahhhh tonight. Thankfully, tomorrow is another day!!

I had a great weekend with my mom here! She was soo helpful and I miss her already. We ate tons of yummy food (including the rib cook off) and watched movies, hung out with Jenna/Teresa/Nicholas, painted an accent wall in our house an ugly green which Kyle and I are in the process of repainting, and just relaxed. I wish she could have stayed WAY longer but back to reality I guess. Miss you and love you mama!

Also - I'm really loving this song right now: Breakeven (Falling To Pieces) by The Script.. Just saying.

6 hours of studying?...Check

Well, today I didn't have class, but that doesn't mean anything. I did have 6 hours of studying to do anyway! Ahhh...to be a nursing student.
I had class yesterday from 8-5. If you read my last post, you know that I woke up at 4am to rush to the hospital and see my nephew be born :) but that doesn't mean I wasn't tired ALL day! It was so worth it, but I was really distracted during lecture (8-12:30). I couldn't concentrate at all - all i could think about was seeing and hold that little cutie and visiting with Jenna and Tanner. So anyway, I was distracted, exhausted and over school already. haha.. But I had to push through it. I scarfed my lunch down in between 12:30-1 and then had to be in lab from 1-5pm. After school was finished I went back to the hospital and held Nicholas forever and visited Jenna from 5-8pm! I was pretty exhausted by the time I got home and totally crashed around 10. I felt kind of bad visiting Jenna for so long, since she was the one that was really exhausted, but I just couldn't stop holding Nicholas! He is so perfect. Well the entire day was worth it, but I don't think I learned one thing in school.
So instead, today I got to spend 6 hours studying and reviewing all the things that I should have learned in school yesterday! It doesn't matter though, I would have had to study 6 hours either way.
I have tomorrow off school also and I won't have as much studying to do as I did today, but I'll still do some. Then......... MY MOM IS COMING!!!! I am so excited! What a great week I'm having :) She will be in at 5:30 and staying until Tuesday morning. I wish she could stay longer but I'm happy she gets to come at all! I have school Friday from 9-5 and work Saturday 9-5 but other than that I'm going to be with her the rest of the time. I wish I didn't have work on Saturday, but that's reality I guess! Anyway, I am really excited to see her!! :)

I have a nephew!!!

Nicholas Cruz Epstein made his arrival on earth on August 31st, 2010 at 7:41am. He weights 7lbs 8oz and is 21inches long! I love him so much and his mommy and daddy will be amazing parents!!

We have been waiting for this day for soo long now and he is finally here! I am so glad Jenna let me be a part of her special delivery and it was really amazing!

Jenna called me at 4am on Aug 31st and told me she was having regular contractions and that she was going in to get checked at the hospital. I of course said Are you KIDDING me?! I had to be to school at 8am with no exceptions! She told me she would call me back and let me know. So then 5 comes around and I get a call from her saying she is 5cm dilated and ready to do this! I throw on some clothes, and raced over to Saint Marys! I didn't think he was going to be born before I had to leave for school but I wanted to be there anyway. They broke her water around 6:30 and by 6:50 she was 7cm dilated! I was soo excited and anxious thinking I would actually get to see him be born. Well... by 7:20ish she was 10cm and pushing away! He was born at 7:41 and I was SO happy I got to see him be born. Unfortunately, thanks to school, I had to rush and leave and actually made it to class by 8:05.. not bad!

I'm so happy for Jenna, Tanner and Nicholas and I know he is a very lucky little guy!

I love you guys! Congratulations :)

Here We Go Again..

Here we go again...
Today I started my 3rd semester of nursing school. It wasn't so bad at all.. We did have a quiz first thing in the morning but that ended up being not so bad! Other than that, we were lectured on bipolar disorder, suicide and some of schizophrenia.
I hated the psychiatric readings before class, and really didn't think I would enjoy the psych lecture but I actually did. I thought it was pretty interesting, so hopefully psych rotations through clinical will be interesting and "fun" as well.
Tomorrow I have class again to finish up schizophrenia, then moving on to Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia (ALL). Moving along quickly... They always "front load" us, meaning they give the most work in first 1-2 weeks of class, but soon it will tapper off a little - I hope. I'll be in class on Mondays and clinical on Wednesday...Which doesn't seem so bad.

Anyway - Before school started I had a pretty good weekend. I finished working at the Damonte Dickson Realty branch on Friday and was really exhausted from the entire week. But I told myself I wasn't going to let that hold me down from enjoying my last "free" weekend for a while! So.. Kyle and I did some shopping after work and then went to a friend's birthday party for a little while and enjoyed some friend time. Saturday was spent doing more shopping, making a million homemade jalapeno poppers and then we did MORE friend time! We hung out with Jenna, Tanner, Jay and Teresa for a fun night. We are just awaiting Nicholas Cruz's arrival any day now... We are all so anxious to meet him!!
Sunday we spent cleaning, organizing, preparing for school and basically lounging. We had a little lunch out with Sarah at Pho, which was surprisingly yummy!

That's about it for now...

WOW..

Holy Cow.. It has been almost a year since I wrote on this blog!! WOW.. That's how insane, intense, overwhelming, life consuming nursing school has been. From now on, I am going to try to update this once in a while. Although, I don't think I will always write about nursing school.. even though that's the biggest thing in my life right now. So, most likely, it will be mostly about school and what I'm up to, but I'll try to write about other stuff also. :)

Well - for a school update... Where to begin.. I successfully finished my 1st semester of nursing school with "A's"! Woohoo! I am very proud of that, but in the long run, all I really care about is passing in general. It's hard to even remember what else I learned in 1st semester.. a LOT of basics, normals and generals. In January I started my 2nd semester. I had 2 hard classes - Nursing Care 2, and Pathophysiology + clinical once a week. It was a MAJOR step up from 1st semester.. SO much harder and more overwhelming... But once again, I can say I successfully passed (with B's this time :)!!! We learned how to do IV's which is really fun. I didn't get to put my IV skills to use during 2nd semester and give anyone an IV, but I am really looking forward to when the day comes!! I want to poke some so bad LOL. 2nd semester was really big struggle for me. Not just academically, but also physically and mentally. I was one of "the chosen" people of 3 (Sarah, Crystal and myself) who got randomly chosen to double up on clinical. While everyone else started clinical at the beginning of Feb, us 3 got put off until March, where we had to go to clinical on Tuesdays in Orthopaedics AND Wednesdays for OB for 4 weeks. Then we scaled down to just Ortho on Tuesdays. WHEW... Now THAT was a challenge - physically exhausting, mentally challenging and emotionally draining! I also go to bserve one day in the OR - which I LOVED! I got to see a total knee replacement and an elbow replacement.. Awesome!!

Besides that, I sprained my ankle at the end of February (thank goodness I didn't start clinical until March!) and I came down with pneumonia at the end of April. I have never been that sick before and it was miserable. I missed one day of class but the rest I had to force myself to go to. After 1-2 weeks of being miserable, dizzy, nauseous, and temp of 102+ almost every night, I finally felt human again. It took 6+ weeks to get completely over my sickness, but I made it. Yay!
Those are pretty much the highlights of my 2nd semester. I really enjoyed clinical and caring for people. It was the hardest and most stressful semester so far, so we will see how 3rd semester compares.

Now.. for my summer that I had off of school, I spent most of my time working. I went back to Dickson Realty and have been doing reception work for the summer there. I am very thankful they had work for me to do. There were NO nursing apprentice positions available anywhere. I was extremely disappointed in that, but what can you do? I decided to apply and get my CNA license instead and try to find a job working as a CNA for the summer. Well, turns out that I wasn't able to even test for my license until August 14th. UGH! That was a bummer... but I had already paid for it and it was non refundable. So.. I scheduled my test date and took my written and skills exams. I am officially a CNA now, but what to do with it? Nothing for now I guess. The most exciting things I have done this summer were visit my mom in Utah for a week in May after I got out of school, see Tool in Sacramento with Kyle, and have a baby shower for Jenna! All of those were really fun but I wish I got more friend/family time this summer... Oh well!

I will be starting my 3rd semester in 3 days. We already have our reading assignemts for the first week, which include 300+ pages of reading. We have a quiz the first day, and will continue to have quizzes every day of class, so the reading must be done! Nursing school has been SOOO much reading and studying, but hopefully it will pay off.
That's about it for now. I'll leave with an assortment of random photos acquired over the last year..There are WAY more, but I'll post more later.

Amber and Michelle C

Matt, Ashlee, Gail

2nd semester

Yaya, me and Crystal hanging out

Hooray! We made it through 1st semester!!

Me, Brian, Crystal hanging out

Michelle C, Rachel, and Gisella


Stephanie C, Gisella, Jackie, Michelle D

Kristin and Jackie!! Love them

Crystal, me, Brian.. Pretty much the ONLY picture of me in my scrubs.

Me, Brian, Crystal... the original 3!

Crystal and Me.

Almost the entire nursing family.. The last year I've spent basically all my time with these people!!