If anyone needs me, I’ll be in the backseat drowning in a pool of my own tears.

Leaving the hospital after my last day of immersion in the ICU.

I AM HAVING SO MANY FEELINGS.

Sundays are so chill. Damn I love it.

I made the huge mistake of giving the ICU nurses a description of my on-campus job.

Now everyone calls me Fish Killer.

I was in the ICU (as a nurse, not as a patient) for 4 days of back-to-back 12-hour shifts this past week and I JUST LOVE IT SO MUCH. The unit, the staff, the patients, the stress. I am absolutely fucking tired, but I could go there everyday if I had to. I wouldn’t mind at all. I’m actually a little sad that I’m not back on the floor tomorrow. I miss my preceptor and I wanna know how our patients are doing. I don’t know why I’m telling you this, Tumblr. I guess I’m just so happy to be in love with what I’m doing. 

I had my first neurotrauma patient today. 18-year-old visiting from up north to check out colleges. Unfortunate freak skateboarding accident. He had a craniectomy, and the piece of skull that was taken out to decompress his brain was temporarily placed in his abdomen to keep up its blood supply. I still remember hearing about this in class and freaking out over how crazy awesome it is, and today I actually got to feel the piece of skull inside the abdomen! 

Anyway, I learned a lot today, including how to deal with frustrations and bitchy neuro doctors (srsly though). I also spent a large part of the day secretly watching our poor boy’s mother, because really really how agonizing is it to be 300 miles away from your son and find out that he’s fallen on his head and he’s in an emergency room about to go to surgery. And you thought he was just leaving for a weekend to look at university design and architecture programs. Some days your heart hurts more than your feet. 

• I got to the ICU and was told that my nurse was being floated. So I floated with her to the cardiac unit.
• One of our patients was a 101-year-old lady. She was our healthiest.
• She was in for pancytopenia. Other than that, she was completely alert and oriented, walking and talking. 
• I helped her walk to the bathroom. When I asked her if she needed help in there, she was like, “No! I’ve been doing this for a hundred years!”
• When I was putting lip balm on her lips she puckered up and made kissy noises. OMG such a fantastic old lady.
• Also her 60-year-old son came to visit and he is also the nicest.
• I felt like an idiot many times, especially during the first half of the day. Especially when I spilled 2ml of dilaudid all over the med room. Uuugghhhh vials are slippery little assholes.
• I got three slaps on the back from the Australian nurse who reminded me of Steve Irwin. He was thanking me for doing all of his q2hr blood glucose checks. SLAPS ON THE BACK. Like I was one of the boys or something. I was trying to be cool and said, “Of course, no problem!” but inside I was screaming. 
• Everyone kept talking about how great UCLA’s hospital must be and I replied with tales of the spacious rooms, each with it’s own monitor. We decided that UCLA is the Waldorf Astoria of hospitals.
• I was putting on a condom catheter for the first time and my nurse asked if I’d ever put a condom on anyone. I answered no after a pause and we both smiled because my virginity was discovered on my first day of immersion.
• One of the care partners was talking to me about how she just finished nursing school and is taking a Kaplan review course for the NCLEX. She said, “For one of our review sessions, the instructor couldn’t come so she had an emergency substitute. Do you know Barbara…”
• And I said, “Barbara Demman?! OMG YES!”
• And she started freaking out about Barbie the way anyone who has ever met Barbie freaks out about her. “She’s AMAZING. She is just unbelievable. She is SO GREAT.”
• Major Barbara Demman fangirling.
• And last but not least, I drove and I didn’t die.

petit-tournesol:

no seriously. When I think of our grad party and NOT going through nursing WITH this people when I get hired, it’s like unfathomable omg its the worst.

We went to a friend’s b-day party and we just ate cupcakes and sang Santeria and Fuck You and joined in a circle and sang “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” by Sinatra and I wanted to dieeeeeeeee. Except we put our own lyrics to it, “suck it” mainly. 

• Working on our quality improvement projects. 
• Break to make food. We had chicken, beef, and pork (tocino!). 
• No vegetables. 
• After eating, conversations always turn to diarrhea and vomiting. Naturally.
• Then pedophilia and how disgusting it is.
• N: “They should get their dicks cut off.”
• L: “How will they pee? OMG! Through their butts!”
• And so here is our old friend, CONTINENT DIVERSION. 

Lyder

Cardin

Gabster

Demman