Week 1 DONE!

This week has been really busy yet at the same time incredibly easy for me. There are 3 terms to the year that I'm here; summer, fall and spring. This first term I am taking 17 units, that's 5 classes. At first I was a bit nervous about taking that many all at once but cone to find out, it's all split up. There are 16 weeks in a normal semester, so each of my classes only runs 8 weeks long. So these first 2 weeks I have Pathophysiology, Pharmacology and Health Assessment. I have already taken these classes and passed with flying colors at Samuel Merritt; I feel pretty on top this first term.

In fact, in our lab for Health Assessment (basic vitals, bedside manner, head to toe charting etc.) I helped the professor teach the students who had zero experience with vitals. It felt really good that the professor would look to me for assistance. 

Lecture tends to get a bit boring because I know a lot of the material we are covering. In one lecture we went over 6 chapters! I found that a lot of students are not familiar with how accelerated programs are run. But I feel confident since this is how I have done my entire undergrad and pre-reqs for nursing. I'm sure it will get difficult at some point and I look forward to it, I’ll learn something new and I'm always up for a challenge.

All the students that I have met have been really nice. Last night we all went out to this place called the Beer Market, they literally have a 15 page menu of beers and 75 o tap!! Speaking of which, since I’m only 10 houses away from it, I can hear the band playing…no cover charge here!  This has turned into Wills favorite place. However, while I was out with everyone, I noticed how old I really am. They all wanted to go bar hoping afterwards... I'm 30, I'd rather go to bed and sleep or watch movies lol. I cannot keep up with these kids, I would say that half of our cohort is between 21 and 25. The other half is more like in their old twenties/early thirties. We actually do a have a few adults in the program too (adults being 40 and older...you're a pre-adult in your 30's, and if you're in your 20's you have a completely separate category "life exploring").

Oh this week we also did our scrub fitting (white top and navy blue bottoms)…basically we all tried on scrubs in one large ass room and took our pre-nursing photos (not sure what these are for). I was lucky and didn’t have to spend any money on this since I brought all my blue scrub pants and a friend that graduated the program in August gave me her scrub tops. All I need to do is sew some elastic on the back of the tops to give them a little more form, it’s like wearing a box currently.

Our clinicals have not started yet, I think they start during our second half of the summer semester. I’m really excited to get back into patient contact. I did find out though that we actually don’t get to practice any of our skills (blood draw, IV placement, catheter placement) on actual patients during this program. I feel really bad for those who have not had any experience in the health care field. My friend who went through this program told me that sometimes in clinicals you have the opportunity to have hands on experience but you have to be your own advocate and ask to do things. So I will definitely be doing that. I miss drawing and doing IV’s. Placing a catheter is going to be interesting :/

Well we have our first exam this coming Friday and I should probably study for it. My goal is to get a 4.0 and graduate with honors and all that fancy stuff you can wear…I WANT IT ALL!! I worked too hard to get to this point to just get C’s, even though they say C’s get degrees. True but I want to come home to CA and have the option of going for my DNP…Doctorate in Nursing. This bitch has goals dammit! I got’s to earn the $$ so I can get a houseboat on Lake Shasta and an RV of our own to camp where ever we want, and to build the house of our dreams. This house includes a 10 stable barn, covered arena and round pen, a barn for rescued pit bulls and needs to be on at least 50+ acres, oh and the house is needs to look like a plantation house/Victorian house from the outside but completely modern and roomy on the inside.

And that’s my dream folks!!