22

So...I'm officially 22 today. God I'm old. On the bright side, with my age I've learned to embrace my awkwardness instead of fight it. This is truly a gift, considering some of the nursing conversations I've been able to have. For example, I spent my spring break on a service trip working with Indian Health Services in Mescalero, NM. I spent one day shadowing the school nurse at the local high school, and that day she happened to be running an immunization clinic. I was assigned the task of doing alcohol and abuse screening questions and then doing the teaching about the Gardicil vaccine. This was right up my alley, because there's nothing I love more than using words like "vagina," and "sexual intercourse," while addressing a highschooler. The first girl I spoke with was 14, and during the screening she admitted to me that she was sexually active. I started talking with her about gardicil, and I asked her if she understood why it is so important. She didn't know. I explained that gardicil can prevent specific types of STDs which can later lead to cervical cancer. I asked if the girl knew what STDs were...and she shook her head no. I asked if she knew what her cervix was...and again she shook her head no. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned, but it seems to me that if you're going to have sex you should at least know all of the risks, or at minimum the body parts that you are working with! At this point I decided to go back to basics. I told the girl that penises and vaginas can get diseases just like any other part of the body, and that these diseases are spread through sex. She squirmed a little bit in her chair, and I could tell that she was painfully uncomfortable. I believe that if you're old enough to have sex, you should be old enough to talk about it like a grown-up, so I continued on. I told the girl that you can get painful oozing warts or sores that last forever , and that sometimes your partner might not show any symptoms at all but you can still get an STD. I explained what the cervix is and where it is located, and why cervical cancer is such bad news. The girl seemed to understand, and went on to get her vaccination. She also told the nurse that she really liked the way I talked to her. I guess that nobody had ever sat her down and spoke to her about sex in an honest or open way without showing judgement. I'm really thankful that my nursing clinicals have forced me to talk about uncomfortable issues openly, because it really comes in handy. Later that same day I had to ask another high schooler if she had thoughts about hurting herself, and I had to ask another girl to tell me about her drug use. None of these were easy, but the conversations were necessary and I'm glad that I was able to handle them.

Summer Job

So, after weeks of looking, I managed to find a summer job. I'm going to be a nanny for a 7 year old girl and a 9 year old boy. I'm pretty interested because the boy is a Type 1 diabetic and has an insulin pump. The mom sounded incredibly friendly and welcoming over the phone, and I'm scheduled to visit the house next Thursday. I'm a little bit nervous because I have very little babysitting experience. When I babysat in high school I just brought my little sister and made her play with the kids while I "supervised." I'm keeping my fingers crossed that 2 years of playing with my boyfriend's nephews and niece will be enough experience. It should be fine as long as I have free reign to pack up the kids whenever I want and take them to the beach.
The mother did mention that she and her husband are in the middle of a "friendly" divorce. He will be moving out in May to a different house in the same subdivision. I'm not entirely sure what kind of impact this will have on the kids. I'm assuming that they will need lots of stability and love.
I've been watching a lot of Nanny 911 lately to brush up on my parenting skills. For those of you who don't know, Nanny 911 is a show where a British nanny comes into a family with out of control children and helpless parents and takes charge of the situation. By the end of one week, the parents learn how to discipline their kids, and the kids learn how to behave. Nanny Deb has taught me a lot about interacting with children, although I was quite bummed when I learned that lacing Kool-aid with NyQuil is an inappropriate way to get a child to take a nap. I also received a call from Macy's today. They want me to come in on Saturday to interview for a position as an on-call sales associate. I was surprised to get a callback because I have zero sales experience. I'm honestly super stoked about the possibility of working someplace that does not require me to change adult diapers or clean up vomit. In fact, the thought of going 4 consecutive months without having to wipe somebody else's ass makes me feel all warm and tingly inside.

Besties

As a girl, it is natural for me to feel the need to dress up and take awkwardly posed pictures of myself with my best friends. Whenever my sister and I get together with our cousins from Florida, we love to dress up and go out for no reason. We always end up going someplace kind of lame, like Chili's, and we enjoy coming up with elaborate reasons for why we are dressed up.
This picture was from our little black dress night in Florida in 2007. I think we lied and said it was somebody's birthday, and that we'd be hitting all of the clubs in Tampa afterwords. Instead we came home, changed into PJs and watched Mary-Kate and Ashley movies. At least the people at Chili's think we're cool...
Even when we're on vacation at Houghton Lake, the five of us girls designate a night to get dressed up and drive down to Mt. Pleasant for a nice dinner and a night a Soaring Eagle Casino. I'm quite positive that we do this solely for the photo-op.

For years now, I've always assumed that this was strictly a female thing; that it came naturally with having ovaries and veins flowing with estrogen. It seems so natural to be obnoxiously girly, wearing matching outfits and taking hundreds of cute pictures. Now, imagine my surprise when I came across this picture on my camera taken during my sorority formal. This is Wade with his "bestie" Tyler. Tyler is my friend Julia's fiancee. They met at our sorority date night last semester, and it was "bro love" at first sight. I wish them many happy years together, with many more cute photo-ops!

STRESS!

I should be working on one of the many things that needs to get done in the next 48 hours, but I'm far too stressed to really do anything. I find when I'm this overwhelmed, it helps to make a list of everything that needs to get done in order to stay sane.

Today:
Now-figure out what to do for lunch, maybe work on something.
12p-2p- Psychology Theory class
2p-4p- Write another 4 page chunk of my lifeview paper, due at 6pm. I'm in a far too sarcastic mood to write anything worthwhile right now. My lifeview is currently that the nursing program is just an elaborate 4 year hazing designed to drive me crazy. After writing some soul-stirring paper, I need to finish up my debate for tonight. I'm debating that the NCAA should set a minimum GPA for all athletes to compete in any division. I hate sports, and I resent having to debate about something that does not matter.
4p-5:30p- Get presentable for my debate, find time to eat dinner with Wade
5:30p-6p- Get to class early, have a panic attack because I have to give a 9 minute speech. Pray that Julia sneaks Bailey's to class in her coffee mug again.
6p-7p- Julia and I each give our presentations about why there should be a minimum GPA, while 2 random guys argue that there should not be. Julia and I will win, because she's going to law school and is awesome like that. Also, we baked cookies for our prof last night, and who can turn down cookies?
7p-9p- Suffer through the rest of my senior seminar and feign interest in talking about Pete Rose.
9p-12a- Find time to finish watching the movie Wit for my special topics class, write a critique for a nursing research article, and become certified in human subjects research online. Maybe write a paper about Wit, or get up early to do it tomorrow. If I'm feeling exceptionally motivated, I can finish up making the gift I have to give my sorority daughter tomorrow when I pick her up for the first night of pledge...or make her that sign that has to get done by tomorrow night.
Well, I wish I could say that I feel better now that I've made my to-do list. Somebody please pray for me.

How to store anything

Before heading back to college, I decided to visit with Wade's sister Amanda. She's already been through Hope's nursing program, and she works in the NICU, which is where I'd like to work when I'm done with school. We also both love coffee, scrapbooking, and dirty jokes, so we have no problems finding things to chat about. We decided to hit up Starbucks and then head over to Archiver's to look at all of their scrapbooking supplies. For some reason, everything we saw looked really dirty. Amanda thought she saw a sticker that read, "Boy on Boy" and I found a William Shakespeare quote that made me blush at first glance. Then Amanda found the jar. She ran over to me giggling, and I knew that I had to sneak a picuture. At least now we know where Amanda will be keeping all of her spare teats. Thank you Archivers, for making it possible to store anything.

Indy!

So, Boyfriend approached me last Thursday morning and told me that we were taking a surprise trip to Indianapolis. You would think that as a responsible nursing student, I would have asked to wait until Friday at 4pm when I was done with classes. Instead, I shouted, "Hell yeah! How soon can we get out of Michigan?" So, I skipped about 3 classes but going to Indy is so worth it. We get to stay at Wade's house with his sweetheart dad, his cute Dachshund Heidi, and his mom, whose cooking puts Paula Dean to shame. On top of that, I get to sleep in this amazing king size bed and play with all of the adorable grandkids.


See...they really are freakin' adorable! This trip couldn't have come at a better time. College has been getting really hectic and stressful for both of us, and we really needed a weekend retreat to refocus and just have fun. I'm very happy to say there was no shortage of fun on this trip. From playing with Wade's nephews and niece to hitting the bars on Broad Ripple to shooting shotguns, we had an incredible time!

You have how many siblings?!?!?

Chicago was incredible. If you can't tell, the woman on the right is Kate Gosselin from Jon and Kate plus 8. She answered questions for about 45 minutes and then did a book signing in the entrance of the church. I bought a book, but the line was way too long and I did not stand a chance at getting her autograph.
Sadly, the next day I was back in Michigan and ready for another day in a psych hospital. This week I was on the adult unit, and I got to take care of a man, B. He was a good ol' country boy who loved welding and fishing. He had a drinking problem in the past, but had been sober for 6 years. B. had been unemployed for 8 months and living off of his wife's income...2 million dollars that she had won in the lottery. He wanted her to buy him a $2,000 welding machine so that he could get back to working and feel useful again. She said no. 20 minutes and 2 fifths of peppermint schnapps later, B. tied a noose around his neck, threw the rope over a rafter, and hopped on a bucket to "prove a point" to his wife. She called the cops, and B. was tackled and brought to the mental hospital.
Some fun facts about B., he was the 17th child out of 22 children. After number 18, his mom started giving them away like kittens. She gave birth to all of them, and only had one set of multiples (triplets). He has two sisters that he's never met and says that he's not close with any of his siblings. B. spent a total of 12 years of his life in prison. He also has a thing for beating up child molesters and taking 2 by 4s to wife beaters.
B. was very nice to me, and willing to talk openly about his life. B. has mellowed out quite a bit since his prison days, and now he has 4 daughters and 5 grandkids. He loves his family dearly, and tries to spend as much time as possible with his grandchildren. It was weird for me to counsel a man old enough to be my father. I do not mind taking on a leadership role in the child and adolescent unit because I'm older and smarter and have more life experience. It's uncomfortable for me to walk into an adult unit and assume an authoritative position. What could I possibly offer a man like B. who has gone from a criminal alcoholic to a grandfather who built his own house? I like to think that just listening to his stories helps. B. told me that he has a lot of knowledge that he would like to share with the world. As weird as this sounds, I've learned so much from people that I've worked with on different psych units, and B. was no different. He was just a nice guy with a crazy life story.

Going to Chicago!

Tonight after our Rush event, I will be heading down to Chicago with my Kappa Chi sister Katie. She lives in Chicago, and Kate Gosselin from the show Jon and Kate plus 8 will be speaking at her church Sunday morning! I'm obsessed with the show, and I'm so excited to hear Kate speak. She is a great mother, and a former nurse, and she's raising 8 of the cutest little kids I have ever seen! It's kind of embarrassing, but I can tell the sextuplets apart and I know all of the kid's names. I can't wait for tomorrow morning!!!

Psych

I just started my Psychology clinical this semester. I refer to Mondays and Tuesdays as the days that I get to play with crazies. I will be working with children, teens, and adults with a variety of problems at the mental health center. The location of my practicum is only for people in an acute state of crisis, which means they must be a danger to themselves or others. Most patients only stay for 4 or 5 days before they head back home. Even though I enjoy psychology, the practicum is pretty intense. I have to remember to always be between the patient and the nearest exit, and we were told to wear shoes that would allow us to sprint easily. I've sat in on therapy and heard a 7 year old boy say that he hates himself because he beats up his mom. I got to work with a 6 year old who cleans constantly and witnessed his father beat his mom. I even got to watch 5 staff restrain a boy who went into a fit of rage and tried to attack one of the employees. My friend Laura was able to counsel a woman who tried to commit suicide after her 16 year old killed himself while only his 4 other siblings were home...and that was just my first week on the unit.
Last week I was able to watch ECT, or electroconvulsive therapy. That was by far one of the coolest things I'd ever seen. Apparently the nurses will sometimes convince the client to fake a seizure at the wrong time just to scare the shit out of the doctor. The doctor who ran the ECT was a sweetheart, and one of his schizophrenic patients even wrote him a love poem, which he read outloud before inducing her seizure. The seizure itself is not violent or painful because of the meds and anesthesia given to the patient. Recovery only 20 minutes, and appears quite painless. The nurses swear by this procedure and say they've witnessed miraculous improvements in many patients. The best part is, we have no clue how it works.

Arin's Party

Recently, Wade and I attended Arin's 34th Birthday party, and everybody was in the mood to celebrate. Dr. and Mrs. Neucks were especially excited to let loose for the evening; I'm pretty sure the Thomas hats were what made them so playful. I spent the evening listening to their stories and playing with Spencer. He really loved those balloons! However, the best part about going to Arin and Jobie's has got to be the coffee. Jobie has a coffee problem, much like myself. It is nice to know that there is always a pot of coffee on and multiple coffee creamers to try whenever I visit them. Maybe that sounds weird or kind of shallow, but the woman makes a mean cup of coffee!