It’s been one week since my summer break began and the possibilities are endless. I feel myself blossoming again with ideas, motivation, excitement to explore the world and people around me. My kids are really in for it now.
I smell camping in the air, I hear birds, I feel the grass on my barefeet and dirt under my nails again. For 3 months, I get to set aside the rigor of my studies and be…. Whatever I want. Not just a full time student and full time mom (part time crazy person).
I am on solid ground with my life. I wear the promise of a new life with a man I love on my left hand, I have the gift of laughter and parenting (yes really, it’s a gift) with my kids and every month, every year, I climb the ladder ring by rung to where I want to be.
See, a lot of people think I got a late start in life, but I didn’t. I just hadn’t learned how to juggle and balance like I do now. I actually accomplished a lot since my first son was born (before that I have no qualms wondering what on earth I was doing) I was bogged down by bad friendships and lived in a place that didn’t help my mind. That is all cleared now. I have a really amazing safety net of support around me.
School is out and while I will enjoy the piss out of this summer, I am actually really excited to do classes and school again, to accomplish even more next year.
For now, I relish in my barefeet, my dirty nails, my ability to read a book that is not about the medical field, and be free to play.
I deserve every single lazy, beautiful, wonderful day.
Respiratory Physiology Exam is Thursday. Did you know that smoking one cigarette causes 20 minutes of bronchoconstriction and paralyzes your cilia?
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Finishing up year one.
I am 18 days away from finishing out spring semester, making this my first complete year at WSU. It’s been a hard semester, I have worked myself to the point of exhaustion to get the high grades I need and the skills I want to do well next year.
I PASSED MY HESI! First try. This is the nursing entrance exam and allows me to officially progress in my nursing program. I surpass my expectations of myself each and every time. Being in these classes, working in lab to learn every square inch of the donor bodies……holding human hearts, brains, and lungs in my hands as though it were normal everyday routine….it’s humbling, it’s amazing and I don’t want it to end.
I have become so fascinated by the anatomy program at school that I have signed up for a highly select, human dissection class where I will experience hands on, the process of cadaver dissection from beginning to end. It is literally enough to make me smile from ear to ear (though I try and contain that excitement around folks who may not be real keen on understanding my love of the insides of human bodies).
As I sit here, drowning in the physiology I should be studying right now, there is a huge sense of accomplishment and also a strong, healthy dose of respect and fear for what lies ahead. I know it will get harder, I know getting my BSN is NOT going to be easy in the slightest, but I am prepared for battle. The scrubs will be my armor and I won’t bat an eye about taking on the challenge. I have to, I have come too far to turn back or walk away and, quite honestly, I can’t see myself doing anything else now.
So here’s to all the nights of caffeine and gum, here’s to the hours of ambient music I’ve listened to so that I could study, here’s to the countless meals I have shoved down my throat without thinking about it, and here’s to me….finding potential where I was unclear there would be any. I took a chance, jumped off a cliff into a brilliant, beautiful sea that I am not scared of anymore.
Here’s to the amazing and frustrating journey that is nursing.
….and I’m ready for round two
I have made it into the 2nd semester of A&P!!
This semester of school will test my every fiber and also excite me like never before. I am taking a human diseases class that seems like it will correlate nicely with my A&P work I’ve already done. My teachers have pushed me hard and I have met every challenge and have not gotten below a B in my courses.
I began work with the donor bodies and spent the last half of the semester (and already the beginning of this one) studying, touching, and learning every square inch of muscle, tissue, and bone within them. I have only had a few moments where the smell made me feel a little queezy, but I worked through it and am overcoming most of my weak stomach issues. I will say….I haven’t quite gotten used to dead feet. Yikes.
I love what I’m doing. It’s hard and challenging and pushes me to the brink of exhaustion at the end of the terms, but I wouldn’t trade it. I am happy.
So bring it on 16 credit hours, four classes with four labs, projects and 7 papers. You don’t scare me any longer, my determination and my headstrong tenacity will eat you alive.
It’s a new year, another 365 days in my life to achieve great things. Lucky 13, I have a good feeling that this is the beginning of something beautiful.
It does not matter how slow you go so long as you do not stop.
— Wisdom of Confucius
In my brain, I always picture me, glasses on, books open, studying away pleasantly while relaxing music plays and I ace test after test, being the multitasking queen who cares for and raises her children and achieves in school. I envision my ease of commuting back and forth from school while my kids also excel in their classes and we all co-exist with textbooks and flashcards and merrily earn our A’s and B’s. I picture the days as a mesh of happy dinners and cuddling while also typing up papers and learning my A&P info, which the kids gladly help me with.
In reality, my sanity has been pushed to the brink as I try and doggy paddle my way through a brutal Statistics class, travel back and forth from school twice a day, ensuring my little olive gets to and from school to be with her brothers before I head back to campus, and I am trying like hell to keep up with my kids school work and dinner and a house all at the same time. Now, I am also tending to my man who underwent a pretty ugly surgery this past week and, at best, shambles around groaning like my own personal zombie. Much to my dismay, surviving the first round of semester classes is harder than I had imagined.
But, even through getting C’s on a test here and there and dealing with my son’s detentions, accepting the dirt and clutter as signs of commitment to my program, there are beacons of importance that shine through, letting me be acutely aware of just how amazing this experience of school and striving for excellence has been on my children.
Just the other night, I was at class, had been slightly stressed about the house and caring for my post-surgery zombie and came home to a completely clean kitchen. The kids had dedicated their evening to cleaning up so I wouldn’t have to, to make that one evening just that much brighter for me…..for us all. I couldn’t have been more proud that they not only cooked dinner for the family, but didn’t leave it for me to do. It showed great respect and even more, it showed me love in action.
We may be busy, our social lives may suffer, and we may not always be able to ace everything in our school careers, but when it comes to my family…..we are on honor roll every damn day. I am so proud of who my kids are becoming, who they show the world they are, and how much support we all provide for one another.
Photo reblogged from Medical School with 504 notes
Anatomical preparation of human ears
Acquired or prepared by William Hunter (1718-1783), from the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow, Scotland.
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