honestly

Sometimes I wonder if maybe I'm going through super duper early menopause. I am only 37, but the mood swings I have every once in a while are driving me madder than I normally am!

Just this afternoon I felt it as it was happening.

This morning was reasonably uneventful as I readied for the day, once dragging myself out of bed for the final time. After arriving at school I was still in a pretty decent mood, you could say I was in a fairly good mood.

Then it was lunchtime, and I had just eaten....and wam-bam-thank-you-ma'am!

SWING!

It was all I could do to make it through the rest of our day in lab, and then rush out the door at the end of the day without saying goodbye.

Even still this evening I feel sullen, and as if having my own pity party would be a vast improvement in my current state of mind.

The dean still hasn't posted our test grades from yesterday. Either we've been really spoiled by her having the grades posted by late afternoon on test days, or something's up.

It doesn't help that when I arrived home this afternoon I went upstairs and was greeted with a putrid diarrhea-type smell. I was not able to find the source, and pretty much gave up thinking maybe one of the dogs had passed gas...

Yeah, no such luck. Dogs have a keen sense of smell...and a need to roll themselves in that which is pretty much disgusting to us humans. I went back up to find out what Minnie was doing, and she had pulled LB's comforter off his bad and had pretty much raped it!

Voila!

That's where the smell had been coming from. One of the cats had pure liquid diarrhea on it, and that's why I couldn't see anything when first looking-it had soaked through the black material of the comforter. Lovely.

It was an old ratty thing, so it automatically went into the garbage.

Risk for Insanity r/t current life stressors, and disgusting habits of live-in pets

Oh well...

It's time to go relax. It's very much indicated!

so far we've gotten our grades for our Nur105 exam....and I pulled a B! I am so utterly shocked, you don't even know.

waddaday....What a day!

Today we had exams in both Nur100-Intro, and Nur105, Basic Skills lecture. The dean (she's teaching our Nur100 class because of the instructor turnover that happened just prior to classes starting in August) is stepping up the difficulty level of the tests with each one we've taken. I will admit this one gave me a run for my money. In fact as I walked out the door, toward one of classmates who had already left the room, I said, "There goes my A". After we did our collaborative testing and then the dean went over it, I feel a little better, not having done as poorly as first thought. We'll see what the final outcome is once grades are posted.

After all of that, and for the remainder of the class we had a guest speaker. The speaker was from the main campus and she was there talking to us about "caring communication". She had come in while we were doing the coolaborative testing and had observed our collaborative state of stress. So she at first had us do a focus exercise. She had us close our eyes, and then she spoke us through envisioning different places on our bodies-"knowing and naming, not judging". We started at our scalps, down the front, worked our way down to our feet, and then back up our backs, ending at our scalp. I have to admit it was very relaxing. Then she had us watch the following video. I highly recommend you watch it if you want to see a powerfully moving example of human fortitude.



I nearly had to leave the room because I nearly bursted into tears. That would have been just wonderful, but I maintained control. What can I say I'm emotional? I watched last week's episode of ER yesterday intending to relax before studying and I ended up bawling...sheesh!

Back to the matter at hand.

The whole experience with the speaker and the video was great, except for we were still facing our second test of the day. wonderful!

If we're not stressed enough we've just watched an emotionally riveting video. Not helpful!


Since this was our first test with the "new" instructor, who is actually an old instructor...hopefully you already know the story, if not read this, we were all more nervous than we have been since we took our first nursing exams....and with good reason. I thought I'd bombed the Nur100 test??? HA!! It was a consensus! We all felt the same way. We quickly went through it after everyone had finished and returned to the room, and I think I did better than I had thought at first, but still not very good.

STBTF?
I'm thankful to have no more exams until the final exams.

Oh! I am also extremely thankful for the college awarding me equivalent credit for A&P I. Now I just have to take A&P II and will accomplish that during the summer next year.

STBTF

Everyday I'm thankful for the health of my loved ones, especially my children.

our first trip to Venezia-2001



our trip to Ravenna, Italy-2004



These are my goofs, and it was taken in 2005. I'm a little quirky, so I definitely like abstract viewpoints.

meme for a break

Decided to fool around in blogland for a break from the studies, and before I go to study group, and came across this meme on my newest blogfriend Tiffany's blog.

Crazy Eights
8 TV Shows I Love to Watch:
1. Greys Anatomy
2. House
3. Survivor
4. ER
5. ANTM
6. Big Brother
7. What Not to Wear
8. Jon and Kate+8

8 Favorite Restaurants:
1. Griolis
2. Cafe Asiatique
3. Applebees
4. Bennigan's
5. Red Robin
6. Red Lobster
7. The Crab Shack
8. Joe's Crab Shack

8 Things that Happened Today:
1. woke up without a HA
2. said goodbye to LB's friend AM as he left after sleeping over
3. said goodbye to LB's friend DR as he left after sleeping over
4. wrote out more not-so-flashable cards
5. ate breakfast of cinnamon and spice oatmeal
6. organized materials for study group
7. showered
8. ate lunch

8 Things I Look Forward To:
1. becoming a nurse
2. seeing my boys grow into well-adjusted adults
3. building our own home...someday
4. sunshine
5. going to the beach next summer
6. going to CO for my HS reunion next July, 20 years!
7. seeing Mom and Dad at Christmas
8. Dec 5, my FINAL final with UMUC! and Dec 16, my last final exam for my first semester of nursing school

8 Things on My Wishlist
1. things would stop breaking down with our house and cars-it'snot like any of them are old!
2. when DC, my 15 yr old cat, passes away (it will probably be sooner than later, he's hyperthyroid) he goes peacefully and without suffering
3. when LB drives he drives with caution and care
4. to pass all my exams
5. my butt wasn't so big
6. the boys would clean up after themselves when they have sleepovers
7. Ipod
8. new carpet

STBTF

Today I'm thankful that I woke up without a headache!

turning in knots

So much has gone on this past week, with the sudden departure of one of our instructors and my indecision as to whether I will transfer or not. It's pretty scarey because what if I quit my current program, apply to another one and then I don't get in!? I did receive the package from one of the other local CCs.

I've also been dealing with trying to study for the two exams we have this coming Tuesday. We have one in Nur100-Intro and Nur105-Basic Skills. The basic skills exam is over Kozier chapter 36, Wound blah, blah. Nur 100 is over 9 chapters (our biggest as far as volume of chapters goes), and they range from 15-23...documenting to growth and development, and all the stages! Yippee!

We are having a study group today. There is probably going to be about 6 of us there. I'll have to make sure we stay on task. I've been making up flash cards, which are more like not-so-flashable cards because of how much actually has to go on each. It's not always as simple as defining a term in nursing school-it's about application and concepts! I was hoping to make it into a jeopardy game, but haven't had time to do that. I would want to maintain the info on the cards as well as using them for the game, you know putting dollar amounts on each in some fashion. Not enough time I say!


Speaking of which I better get off here and get back to the not-so-flashables!

it was awesome!

Yesterday I took part in a greater than great experience. I witnessed my first open heart surgery. I wanted to be down in the OR sooo bad!

The local high school that my son attends as a sophomore takes their Health and Medical Occupations classes to one of the major hospitals in Northern Virginia to watch open heart surgery. This hospital has a grant program that allows for this.

So the 19 students, 3 other parents, the teacher and myself headed up north at 5 a.m. Yep, we had to be at the school at 5. Evidently all the school busses in VA have been set to 45mph, and wont go over it. This was the maiden voyage going this speed to the destination we were going to, so we had to leave early to allow for traffic, and the lack of speed. We made it in about 1 hour and 10 minutes. So we had about 50 minutes to spare before we could go into the hospital.

We stayed on the bus to allow the kids some more sleep time, and then we headed in.

We were ushered into a conference room where the nurse in charge had us sign the privacy statements, and then she told us the particulars of the procedures to be performed-mitral valve replacement and MAZE procedure. She then took us into the room. In the center of the room is a huge rectagular dome of windows, on two levels.

The bottom level you can sit right up against the glass and watch, the upper level you sit in a chair and lean into the railing as far as you possibly can so you can see as much as you can. You can move around the room so as to see different things.

We missed them opening up the chest, much to my displeasure-I wanted to see EVERYTHING!

At first I sat up on the upper level, with a bird's eye view of the heart. I saw the first surgeon go in and prepare the area directly around the heart. After the first surgeon did his thing another stepped in and took over. He did the MAZE procedure. He also did the mitral valve replacement.

Come to find out they also had to do an aortic VR. The first surgeon came back in to complete ths aortic VR. Awesome, awesome stuff I tell ya! If you're a medical freak like me, who can't get enough of this kind of thing, you will love to see these procedures.

The MAZE is cool and everything, but becomes a little boring after a while. They're just going around the heart freezing off certain nerve pathweays, because those nerves keep firing in more than one direction.

The VR's were exceptionally spectacular! They first of all go in and put a ring of suture around the area just superior to where the valve is located. It looks like a web with a hole in the center...or maybe some sort of embroidery project. Then they set the new valve into the bottom of the web, suture into the fabric ring around the top of the new valve, and then push it into its new permanent location. Intricate would be the word to use to describe valve replacements.

I watched as much as I could, including the nurses, the perfusionist, the CRNA, and anybody else who did anything in that OR!


The kids had various different reactions. Mostly they were in awe and were very fascinated. So many of them in the class are planning careers in the medical field, so they weren't as incredibly mortified or grossed out as one might assume. They did become bored, about the time of the duration of the MAZE procedure, since it took a while. Some slept, some just chatted. Some flirted.

We had a couple of people come in that were other surgical staff. One in particular is a perfusionist who was getting ready to go in on another case. Needless to say HE was kind of cute, and the girls could not ask him enough questions! Funny stuff. He was very accomodating though, and answered tons of questions, including mine and other parents' inquiries.

After the aortic VR was completed they attempted to start to close, but the area surrounding it kept bleeding so they had to keep waiting, and packing in gauze sponges in the mean time.



When I say packing, I mean packing. It was shocking to me in my surgical virgin state. I've assisted in minor surgeries, mainly of the podiatric variety, as well as stood in on some other surgeries, but nothing like this! They stuffed gauze into that area to where you couldn't see the heart any longer, it just looked like a package ready to be mailed! They couldn't get the bleeding to stop, and by this time we had stayed even past the arranged departure time, so we had to head out.

We not only didn't get to see them open, we didn't get to see them close either! BUMMER!

today's the day!

Today I am thankful that the day for the local high school's Health and Medical Occupations class's field trip to go watch open heart surgery is finally here! I'm going as a chaperone!!! Yippee! More later....

weirdest thing

At least once a month I head to Quantico to do our grocery shopping at the commissary. The route we take is all rural highway and is about a 45 minute drive, usually. Today it took a little longer.

As I'm rounding a curve I see some vehicles up ahead that are creeping along at a snail's pace, so I figured there was an accident since it was raining. As I get closer I see a sheriff's car with it's lights going, but there's no mangled automobile anywhere to be found. Instead it was this monstrosity, as you can see from the following pictures. It was in a line of vehicles, from the rear forward, that included the sheriff's car I just mentioned, the monstrosity being pulled by some whacked out semi, some weird looking truck in front of it, and another sheriff's car.

When I say creeping, I mean creeping. We were going about 10 mph at best! It was wild! There was no point in getting mad, since there was nothing that could be done about it!

Now I've seen my fair share of oversized loads, but never one that takes up the whole road, being led by the sheriff's car that was ahead by at least 1/2 mile. The deputy was signaling to oncoming drivers to pull over. That's easier said than done considering there aren't anything you could call shoulders on this roadway, for a good part of it. Many times they had to pull off into the sporadic driveway or a patch of grass.

We've been stationed in places where it's not uncommon to come upon a military movement transporting nukes. This didn't look like a nuke anyway. It kind of spooked me because I had never seen anything like it. I did take notice of the fact that there were no army tanks around. So that was reassuring.

The point we were at where I was able to take the photos was a turn. It took forever for the semi to make the turn, and once it did they pulled off to the side and let the line of us that had become a part of the caravan move on. Thank heavens! That was definitely STBTF!

As I passed I took notice of the GE logo, so it's apparent it is just a big component from some power plant around here.

In the second and third photos you might notice the poor guy who was riding on some sort of seat at the rear of the trailer.