Standing Tall: June 2008

Not So Restful

I woke up this morning with a stomach ache. It’s not uncommon for my stomach to object to eating early in the morning so I worked though it. I ate me breakfast, got dressed, and headed to the T. My stomach still was bothering and the smell of T did not help it. I tried to fight it but as soon as I walked onto the unit I went to the bathroom and lost my breakfast. Throwing up is never fun but it is especially not fun at work with nursing students listening in.

So I packed up everything and headed home. I was hoping to rest most of the day but since our house is under construction and I’ve had to put up with drilling, routing, and sawing as I recuperate. I was able to sleep through some of it and I felt a bit better in the afternoon.

Now I’m feeling much better and not eating all day is catching up with me. I’m ready to head back to work.

How He’s Helped

I am so lucky to have Steve in my life. I came home last night from work a bit panicked, I’m having friends come into town for the weekend and our house was a mess. I had originally taken today off so I could clean our apartment from top to bottom but at the last minuet switched shifts with someone to have more time off near the 4th of July.

So last night, despite being exhausted from working all day and not sleeping the night before Steve cleaned the entire kitchen including mopping the floor. Then this morning he woke up early with me and cleaned our guest room. He was such a big help and now our house is clean.

At times it seems like he knows exactly what I need to stay sane.

A New Post

I haven’t posted for a long time for many reasons (excuses). I’ve been working a lot to catch up from all the time I spent in Minnesota and it’s been really hot here. The heat has prevented me from doing anything that requires more energy than walking to the kitchen for another class of water. Now that it’s cooled down and I can think I have a post I’ve been meaning to write about for awhile.

I know BBF from work. She is higher up on the chain of command then I am, and while I wouldn’t say she is my boss I do take orders from her. If something happens to a patient she is ultimately the one held accountable to the surgeon. She is the one who gets yelled at and belittled from the doctor. Not me. She has a tough job because she is the middle man between the doctors and the nurses. Usually things are smooth and we can all work as a team for our patients but recently we have had a differing in opinions on how to work in the best interests of our patients.

Usually in any friendship there is a level playing field. Both people are of equal standing, but this is a new ground for me. When we are at work BBF opinion is the important one. Nurses have the tendencies to rally around each other if they are trying to get something ordered that they think will help the patient. When the nurses started to rally around me against what BBF’s opinion earlier this week I started to feel nervous.

It was awkward and I felt bad for playing that card on BBF. Luckily, she is awesome and understands that we all do what we feel is right, she held her ground, but later that day called me and we had a long talk and “made up”.

This is a bit of a different type of friendship but it’s a good one and I think one that will help me grow.

Bask

Home was great. The first day Steve and I were there he said “I need to come here in the winter, because it’s always so beautiful here in the summer.” It was beautiful and while I have to trudge back to work this next week I’m going to enjoy pictures of home.