The one thing that intrigued me about nursing was Pediatrics. As I've come along in this program, I've also become interested in the Labor and Delivery aspect of it. And, even though, it was a struggle, I'm glad it played out the way it has.
Because the program is so intense, after Christmas they split our class in two. One half did what is affectionately called OB/Peds; the other half (mine) did Older Adult and Adult Health. In the most miserable months of the year (January and February), I had to study the most boring and depressing content so far. (Aging...yuck). The good part is that it's now out of the way and it's time for OUR part of the class to go to Ob/Peds. I can't believe how excited I am. It's even made me miss flying less.
The room we were in for Jan. and Feb. was a computer room in the basement of the hospital....it was HOT and had no windows. The clinicals were on 4N, which was med/surg, and we had a brief two week stint in ICU, which was miserable. On the first day of ICU, I got the nurse from Hell. My clinical instructor had to end up pulling me from her because she was so nasty.
I did Older Adult clinicals at a fitness center in Raytown. It wasn't my cup of tea but at least it wasn't a bunch of sick people.
In the middle of the term, we had to take the HESI exam. This exam is supposed to tell us how prepared we are to take N-Clex but more importantly...to us, anyway....is that the school uses the results to place us for capstone. We had taken the exam back in the fall as a preliminary kind of thing and I did very poorly on it. In fact, I was one of the five lowest scorers in the class; it shook my confidence. Needless to say, I tried to bone up a little by going over some case studies beforehand but I felt like dead man walking going into the exam for the 2nd time. I could not believe it when the score came back and I had not only made benchmark (850) but exceeded it and got a 973!
The school says if you don't make benchmark and you want a specialized area for capstone, they will probably feel you're not ready for that and put you in med/surg. Ugh....I hated the idea of that because I think I want Labor and Delivery. So, now I at least have a chance at it. Of course, I'm competing with some pretty smart cookies for that area.
So, now we head into OB/Peds which meets in the administration building of the college. The classroom is a beautiful loft space with windows and lots of natural light. It's on the 3rd floor which means exercise. It has a kitchen area which means we can bring healthy food. The content will be better; the clinicals should be fun. I'm not in the best clinical group due to the fact that two of the people in my group are very nasty to each other but I'm going to ignore that part.
Hello Babies!!!
