Breaks aren't always restful

I noticed I haven't blogged in a while. It might say that this blog is from Dec 19th. I am actually writing it on Jan 4. Mostly because I didn't think anyone read this.. but now that I know that Rachel, a friend of mine who goes to school in TN is an avid reader, I must continue to update on my life and clinical stories. I'm sad to report that I haven't come across any funny patients or situations at work lately. I am probably weird to be excited to be going back to school on Tuesday. I'm excited because it means I'm that much closer to graduating!! I've also been pretty tired of being on break. That sounds stupid I know, but it's been exhausting. I got the flu for the first part of break. I felt miserable, lost my voice and had no energy to even get out of bed. When I got better, I worked a lot up at the hospital and babysat when I wasn't working. Then I happened to pick up this nasty stomach virus from some friends of mine.. apparently it had been going around a few of the families I babysit for. The stomach virus had me couch/bathroom bound for 2 days but lingered a couple days longer. I worked some more. OH I ALMOST FORGOT! I do have a patient story to share! I'll add it to the end of this post after I share what else has been going on. I thought I'd end my break the same way I started it-in bed, not doing much of anything. I have been needing to have my wisdom teeth pulled for almost 2 years. I have been avoiding it for quite some time. Since some of my plans fell through, I called to see if they could schedule me before I went back to school. Of course the day they decided they could torture me by drilling into my mouth surgically to remove four of my back molars..had to be new years eve! The swelling has come down dramatically and the pain isn't too bad today. What worries me is the tingly feeling I still have in my face. Half of my lip is still tingly and if I open my jaw too far this sharp pain shoots through my face towards my chin. This doesn't feel pleasant. I will be checking back with the dr on Wednesday. We'll see if this is permanent or not (they warned me it could be).

OK..this is a story about a crazy child that needs some serious deliverance.
I went into work Christmas Eve morning and clocked in at 6:50 to give me some time to get to my assigned floor and get a brief report. The lady in CSO (Central Staffing Office) told me I would be sitting on the pediatric floor for the day. This excited me! I LOVE working on the peds floor. I knock on the door to the room where I'll be sitting and the sitter who had sat there for the night shift quickly stood up and hurried to get her stuff to leave. I asked her for a slight report on the kid but she didn't have much to say other than "He's been up all night. Good luck!" This has me slightly nervous. It's not usually a good thing when the person you are relieving looks frazzled and has nothing to say but "good luck". I walked over to the 5 yr old and asked him what his name was. He seemd ok to me. I told him who I was and that I'd be hanging out with him all day. This is when I saw it! T H E F I R E I N H I S E Y E S! As soon as the sitter before me left the room the boy sprang up out of bed and was across the room throwing things at me. He said to me "GET THE F*** OUT OF MY ROOM!"I was shocked! I walked over to him and squated down to his level (you know, like super nanny would do) and said "Young man, YOU will NOT talk to me like that." He said, "WHO THE F*** ARE YOU? DIDN'T YOU HEAR ME? GET THE F*** OUT OF MY ROOM YOU STUPID SH**!" At this point I was really not sure what to do. If he were my kid, I'd spank him and put him in a corner. Instead I got my calm and backed him into a corner and put him in time out. At this point I walked away to pay no attention to him. He spat on me. Gross! Then he took the window paint and started painting on everything but the windows! I took the paint from him and put him back into the corner. I squated down and said "Little boy (not really what i called him), why are you acting like this?" His response was "Because I am ANGRY (with a smirk on his face) and I Hate you!" I said, "ok" and walked to the other side of the room to clean the red paint off of the walls. He began SCREAMING so loud and high pitched that I had to close my eyes. A nurse ran into the room to see what was wrong. She looked at me first, but it was obvious I had not touched the boy, he was all the way across the room. She went over to him, picked him up and put him into the bed and said "THAT'S ENOUGH!" and he was quiet. Then I sat down. I looked at the clock, it was 7:18.

Thumping and Bumping

So as I have discovered that no one really reads my blog I can probably blog about anything I want. It is 5:48 in the morning and I'm getting ready to go to work. I have noticed some weird things going on with my own body lately. I've had a migraine that has come and gone a lot over the past 3 weeks. I have been getting light headed often when I stand up. But those two things aren't that worrisome as it could mean I have just not been getting enough fluids. The thing that has me a little nervous is the thumping and bumping I have been feeling just below my sternum or 3 inches up from my belly button. It's a pulsating feeling. When a lay down or just sit it pounds very hard. When I stand I can feel it slightly, but it mostly goes away. It feels like an alien living in my lower chest/abdominal cavity. When I push on the alien it hurts. I am going to run this by some nurses today at work and possibly one of the passing doctors. I think I could possibly have developed an abdominal aortic aneurysm. I don't really fit into age group for having one seeing that I am not over 60 and male. I just don't think its normal to be feeling the way I have been lately. Off to work.

Somehow still standing!

It was not easy, but I made it. I made it through my fourth semester of nursing school! Many were uncertain when we hit the submit button on the computer to "turn in" our final Monday morning. I had never been so worried in my life! I studied my butt of for my acute care final that was Monday. I am not sure I studied that much over the whole semester combined.... Or even for any other test I've taken in nursing school. I think my total was 19 hours of study time for my acute care final. Well, it didn't matter how much I studied. I bombed that final. It was by far the most difficult test I've taken in my entire life. I have gained quite a bit of knowledge from nursing school, but this test was not a test of our knowledge. This test was a test of everything they haven't taught us in nursing school. Students that are A+ students got scores in the 60's on this final. Somehow I managed to pull off a 76..which is still failing (a passing grade is a 77 or higher btw). Today we took our maternal/child/OB final. I chose not to study for this final. I decided that the acute care final was going to kick my butt so I needed to spend every waking hour studying for it instead of the OB final. Turns out the 20 min I spent looking over notes before the final was sufficient enough. I pulled of an 84. It's not an A, but it's not an F! 20 minutes compared to 19 hours well.. let's just say I'm not so happy with the nursing instructors right now. To all of those who were exited from the program due to S T U P I D finals, my heart goes out to you! Keep your head up.

My brain hurts

I don't know, but it is possible that I could have a breakdown at any moment. I have studied for about a total of 16 hours this week for my acute care final on Monday. This could be more than I have studied all semester! This semester was supposed to be one of the most difficult of the 5 semesters of the nursing program. I did not find it to be incredibly difficult or any more difficult that the 2nd semester was which was said to be one of the hardest. I have not stressed (about school) nearly as much as I did in my 2nd semester. Yet this week I have done nothing but study, drink redbull, and sleep. My ability to concentrate on life skills and other things has become nearly impossible. I am sorry to anyone who might be reading this whom I may have snapped at, given a look to, or just been plain rude to in the past week or so. I am hoping that after Tuesday(my last final) that my life will calm down and my emotions will return to a normal state. I'm sad to report that I was in tears 4 times today. I will be back to the fun, silly story tellin' Kathy by mid next week! I will be working at the hospital pretty much ALL of December and will be FULL of great stories to share with all of you!

Finals Week

So I don't really have any funny stories to report since I haven't been at work too much and my clinicals are over for this semester. Last week, I did work on my birthday on a really busy floor at Shands. The other PCA's (buttwipers) told me that I was the best PCA they had up there in a long time and asked if they could get my schedule so they could request me to be sent to that floor everytime. It was quite the compliment. Although, if you ever go to AGH you will find my face on a plaque by the lobby elevators that says I'm PCA of Excelence ;).. I know I'm hott stuff! I don't even work at AGH anymore. I also worked on Saturday and got the pleasure of sitting for a 12 hour shift in a room on the trauma floor with a patient who was in a really bad car accident. This guy got out of restraints multiple times and almost hit me a couple times. He had a very bad brain injury so he didn't really know what was going on. After he would get really agressive he'd get really sweet and tell me he was sorry and that he loved me. Aparently Tim Tebow came to visit us in the room that day, and Hank Williams Jr. Being a PCA is more than just buttwiping-it's also listening to crazy stories, and lots of wrestling. This week is the last week of class and then we have our last final on tuesday! WOoHoo for Christmas break! I can see it now- the light at the end of the tunnel! One more semester to go.