food coma has set in :)

first off, i hope you all had an amazing thanksgiving with friends and family. since i couldn’t get time off to go back home, i decided to try my hand at making thanksgiving dinner.  at first it was just going to be m and i, but my friend jenny’s husband was back home so i invited her over after work, along with another friend eric.  now, i’ve never made thanksgiving dinner and really i’ve never watched anyone make a thanksgiving dinner.  my mom has always brought over mashed potatoes to the Van side, so i knew i was a shoe in for mashed taters–everything else made me nervous. i scoured the internet for recipes and made the sweet potato souffle, apple and sage dressing, and cranberry sauce the night before.  even up until the start of turkey time, m and i were trying to decide “to bag or not to bag”, haha.  he swore up and down that his mom makes her delicious turkey with a bag.  however, when he was on the phone with her when the turkey was about done he mentioned that we put a bag around the turkey… she asked why?! lol. she said she’s never used a bag, and continued to describe the way she does her turkey (the way i was planning on it). so i told m that if it didn’t turn out good, it was his fault.  anyways, dinner was amazing.  everything turned out delicious, and we have plenty of leftovers.  now i sit here having already taken a nap and in that food coma.  here are some pics of the turkey day feast… knocked off a bucket list item also in the process, yay!

I’ve got my “BIG GIRL” panties on now :)

I’m off orientation! yayy! which means im a ‘real’ nurse according to the army… i still feel like i don’t know nearly enough but i guess that is what happens when you go to a new specialty floor.  it will just take time and more experience under my belt before i feel 100% competent, but even then i don’t think every nurse knows everything about nursing… there is always something new to learn. Luckily I work with some amazing women who do know ALOT about labor and delivery and they are a wealth of knowledge that i can use as a resource.  But i’ve got my big girl panties on now and it feels AMAZING!

insomnia or lack of sleep

being a nurse has its perks, however there are downsides to working long hours as well.  the L&D floor i currently work on does alternating schedules between night and day shifts.  we usually do 6 weeks on days then 4 weeks on nights.  having said this, my sleep mechanism gets all screwed up. it usually takes me about three weeks to finally get my sleep schedule back to normal, however i never feel like i get a good nights sleep.  for the past few months i’ve gotten an average of 4 hours of sleep a night, if that.  most of this is due to the fact that when i work at night, i still need to do things during the day like grocery shopping, army briefings, doctors appointments, working out, cleaning the apartment (my neighbors hate when i do this at night), and just plain anything because the world doesn’t run on “night shift” schedule. 

i LOVE working nights, if only i were able to sleep.  i’ve tried black out shades. trazadone. visualizing a dark black room.  melatonin. everything i can think of, but i tend to just stare at the clock and watch the hours tick away until i finally just give up and get out of bed.

having said that, i find it funny that i write this at 6am after having finally fallen asleep at 1230, to only have stared at the clock, hope you have better luck than me 🙂

please visit me in triage if…

I absolutely LOVE working in the triage for the reason alone that people have the craziest and wierdest reasons as to why they come in, therefore making my day/night.  However, most times they are crazy and really didn’t need to be there taking up one of my beds, having said this i don’t do STUPID.

so please come see me in triage if…

1) you didn’t listen to your doctor when he told you there is a chance for spotting after a cervical exam or stripping of membranes.

2) you felt a “contraction” and needed to come in.  when i ask you how far apart your contractions are, you continue to inform me that they come “maybe once an hour” and when i ask how bad the pain is you tell me “oh i really can’t feel them, but i wanted to come in in case im in labor”.

3) you really are just tired of being pregnant, and rather than going through the labor process, you’d like to have a ceserean section and right now. –oh follow me this way, we have an OR specifically for this reason.

4) you are having contractions every minute and insist that i make them stop.

5) i especially love it when you tell me you are spotting/bleeding, and when i ask you if you had sex recently you tell me “my husband is deployed.” –well that’s awesome, but i asked if you had sex recently.

6) your husband/boyfriend decided at 3:30am he really didn’t want to go to PT this morning, so you came up with a reason of chest pain to come into triage… honestly, thank you because i love getting to practice my EKG skills, needle sticks and monitoring you for no real reason.

7) i do your cervical exam for the second time today because you swear you’re progressing. when we find out you haven’t and decide to send you walking for two hours; please, continue arguing with me that you think walking will not do anything.  you have two options, you can walk the hospital for two hours and i can then recheck  or you can walk yourself to your car and leave.–personally sometimes i prefer you do the second, but its your choice.   

8 ) when you come in to be checked, please bring every family member you have within a 50 mile radius and when i tell you we only allow one additional person in the triage room, please argue with me asking where they are supposed to go. –for starters maybe the waiting room?!

9) speaking of waiting rooms, when i tell you “my beds are full at the moment, if you’d like to have a seat in the waiting room i’d be happy to come and get the next person in line as soon as one opens up”, please tell me all the reasons why im mean for putting a pregnant lady who’s about to have a baby in a waiting room ALL THE WAY DOWN THE HALL.–well tell that to the other 8 pregnant ladies i sent before you when you get there, thanks!

10) you come in because you are tired, fatigued, have back pain, have swollen feet, can’t see your feet, or any other reason. –have you not noticed that your pregnant? this comes with pregnancy, just so you know!

🙂

It’s beginning to look alot like Christmas :)

I absolutely LOVE christmas. I love everything about it, minus the cold.  I wish I lived somewhere it snowed, however I am a cold-blooded person so I bundle up in 60 degree weather, which means I am not condusive to cold weather. I’d DIE! Lol. However, I love the look of snow on the ground, it just gives it more of a holiday feel.

Since Texas doesn’t get alot of snow, I will have to decorate in order for it to feel like christmas.  When we move into the new house in two weeks, I want to get a christmas tree.  M says no, but he won’t be able to say anything when that tree is already in the house 🙂 lol.   I also bought a Christmas CD, which I think he will soon be requesting “Can we listen to something else, please?” haha.  Well, I went to Walmart and Target today to get some last minute items for the care packages I’m making for Shuluk and Grant who are currently deployed in Iraq.  I walked around the store for what seemed like hours.  I mostly stayed to listen to the Christmas music and just happened to look around and find the items I want to get in a few weeks.  But I can’t lie, I ordered my stockings a few days ago from pottery barn kids. lol.

I’ve always wanted real wool stockings for christmas, so I’m really excited that I’ll have some for my first “adult stocking”.  Now to just get moved and get the house decorated so I feel at home.  Hopefully my house will soon look somewhat like this…

… well enjoy decorating for the holidays as this is my favorite season of the year! I wish that you all will enjoy your time with family and friends.  Being so far from my own family and friends, I truly am grateful for the christmas memories I have from the past and can’t wait till I get to be “home” to make some more.  maybe next year… 🙂

packing up my books…

So with all the packing that I have attempted, I have procrastinated my extra room the most. Not only is that my “storage and throw around room”, it is also the location of my bookshelves.  I learned today that 1) I have way toooooo many books, 2) I have books I didn’t even remember having, 3) most of the books i have yet to read, 4) sadly, i know i have two large boxes tucked away at my mom and dad’s full of books, and lastly, 5) i have been procrastinating because all my books were in alphabetical order.  I filled one of my “Rambo army Tuff boxes” full of books and it doesn’t even look like i touched the bookshelves.  oy vey!  8 medium boxes later I successfully have my entire extra room emptied of books, nursing books, kids books, and all 5 of m’s books. hahaha

crafts and holiday seasons

today i was packing up my extra closet and came across my scrapbooking and card making plastic container.  it got me to thinking that i could possibly make my own holiday cards this year before it got too late… then snapped back to reality and decided differently.  However it got me to messing around on the computer looking at different handmade holiday cards to get some ideas *for the future* :). Once I started searching for the cards, i veered off track and started looking at different kid crafts on http://familyfun.go.com/crafts/holiday-seasonal-crafts/ and http://crafts.kaboose.com/holidays/christmas/christmas-crafts.html.  Great websites by the way. Anyways, it got me to thinking that one day I want to be a FUN mom who gets my kid(s) to do crafts during the holidays. As a kid I loved making turkeys out of the shape of your hands, snowflake cut outs, santa beard with cotton balls, pumpkins, ghosts, pilgrims, etc. (you get the idea)

Well, until that day comes… i guess i can still make the crafts if i want to 🙂