Second Semester

Well, school started again 4 weeks ago and I am constantly amazed at how different this semester is from my first. One thing that remains eerily the same is that I should be studying for my Psych test tomorrow and instead I'm goofing around on the internet, but that's neither here nor there. Last semester was a non-stop frenzy as they tried to turn us "lay people" into some semblance of a healthcare professional, and this semester is quite a bit more relaxed and now we're learning how to talk to the crazies and do research papers. Its surreal. I do have two hard courses, though, my med-surgical class and my Pharmacology class *full body shiver.* I'm doing my clinicals at MUSC for my med-surg and I guess this semester we don't do bed baths or vital signs because there are paid nurse-techs for that (yay!). Thats mostly what we did last semester and only a few of us got to do anything impressive like bandage changing or injections. On my friend Elizabeth's first day of clinical this semester she got to insert two foley catheters and suction a tracheostomy. Whoa! I guess the catheters went smoothly but her instructor told her after her first one on a man she needs to "grab it like she means it." Haha! Caitlyn got to change an ostomy bag (bag that catches poop as it seeps out of an artificial bowel opening in the abdomen). The man's wife was there as she did it and told Caitlyn that her favorite thing is when it shoots poop in your face as you're changing the bag. When she later asked her instructor Nicole (same one we had last semester), Nicole said what has since become my class's unofficial motto, "Sure, you can shart through and ostomy."
By sheer chance I am in my 4th week and have yet to have a med-surg clinical (first one is tomorrow at the crack of 6:45) and now I'm a bit terrified. Who knows what trouble I'll get myself into. Our new skill so far is IV insertion which I've always been horribly phobic about it, but when we practiced it on the rubber arm with veins and blood I was the only one in my class who did it correctly. Maybe there's something to be said for facing your worst fears and plunging blindly ahead in a silent panic!
My favorite class so far is Psych, and we do our clinicals for that class at the Institute of Psychiatry and work one-on-one with the inpatient crazies. FYI- if you ever bump into a person wearing paper clothes who you suspect could have possibly just escaped from the IOP, walk briskly in the opposite direction without making eye contact. Trust me on this one.
I was able to get into a Woman's Special Interest group, and we get to do about half of our clinicals working with women around Charleston at such places as the Florence Crittendon House (pregnant teenage runaways), Charleston Center (working with pregnant women with alcohol and drug addiction), Magdalene House (recently incarcerated women), and My Sister's House (women's shelter).
Yesterday we attended a seminar presented by People Against Rape and it was my absolute favorite day of nursing school thus far. They have a huge volunteer network of women who man the crisis hotline after hours and even meet women at the emergency room who are there to have rape kits done. We heard from the woman who runs the support groups, and one of our clinical assignments is to attend the monday night Adult Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse support group and act as her co-facilitator. This is one of the coolest things I've ever been involved in and I think I'm going to go through their 25 hour training on February 19th to become one of their volunteers. I can't believe this has been in Charleston for the last 20+ years and I didn't know about it!
We also heard from a Forensic Nurse Examiner who is the one who performs rape kits in the ER. I didn't even know this job existed, and it was fascinating to hear about what she does. Apparently women used to be made to wait in the waiting room for hours only to have whatever medical intern who happened to be rotating through the ER do the rape examination while a male detective stood in the room, which as you can imagine sufficed to totally re-traumatize victims. A nurse in 1973 identified this problem and single-handedly changed the way these situations are handled and now there are Forensic Nurses who are legally trained to collect evidence that will stand up in a court of law and who even testify as expert witnesses for the prosecution. She said that its important you be a confident and professional person since survey after survey shows nurse's to be the #1 most trusted profession (second only to fire fighters for 2 years after 9/11) and their testimonies in court account for a 98% conviction rate. How awesome is that?! This is something I could be trained to do in a few months after I graduate in December. Who knows?
Speaking of which, I graduate in 10 short months. Ahhh! I've decided to go straight on through and pursue either my Master's or Doctorate degree in midwifery. Its currently phasing from a Master's to a Doctorate in Nurse Practitioner degree, so things are very fuzzy about it right now. I do know that it will be another 2-3 years of education, but its mostly online so I will be able to work as an RN as I do it, thank goodness. I had originally though that I'd work a few years, pay off my substantial student loans, then go back and finish my education. But I've realized that I'm 28 (again) and do not want to wait till I'm 40 to be doing what I want to do. I want to work hard now and have as long a career in midwifery as possible so that I have time to accomplish all the things I want to do. Its a long list. :)