Hope and Blessings...

532 days to go...

2009-11-08T18:10:00.002-05:00

Monday and Tuesday clinicals... up at 5 am...
Assignment due Wednesday...
Test on Friday, ...
Assignment due Friday...
Work on Virtual Clinical Excursions (VCEs) all through the week AND weekend...
ACLS class...

Sometimes, it seems like it will never end, but knowing that God is on my side makes it better. Also, as the countdown to graduation continues, enduring the next 532 is certainly possible.

It seems almost impossible that there are only (well not really 'only') 532 days left til I will be walking at graduation!! That is exciting. :D It seems like just yesterday when I was a green student at Davenport University... It just brings to light how good God is and how faithful He is to carry us through situations where we think there is no hope...

Well, that's all I have...I know it's abrupt but oh well! Al I will say is...

GOD IS GRACIOUS!!!!!!!

Happy New Year!!

2009-01-31T13:06:00.002-05:00

Hi All,

I know it's the last day of January but I'm still going to say 'Happy New Year' anyway. Sorry I haven't been able to update my blog since September last year but life has been busy. Nursing school is taking over my life class by class, day by day and hour by hour. (Really, I'm not exaggerating).

I make sure I have time for friends as much as possible. (right now, I'm trying to spend some time with a friend I haven't seen since last year sometime). I know I have to be home and studying cos I have 2 tests next week (on the same day) plus i have laundry to get done.

In the past few months...

1. I had an accident on the 23rd of October which totalled my car. I escaped with ONE cut on my hand.
2. I bought a 'new' car, or should I say minivan, on the 28th of November.

The above are just two of the biggest things that have occurred in my life since I last wrote.

Oh and Peter sprouted more teeth, took his very first steps, (he's now toddling around like he has been doing it for years).

I hope to update on here as often as I can. Between school and work (Oh i don't think I'm complaining but...) and all other things that may come in between those... I promise to do my best

Have a wonderful month of February!!

My 21st Birthday!!

2008-09-24T14:15:00.004-04:00

Thanks Sarah, Shari, Carolyn, Lori, Charity, Hanna, and Amorkor for making my day awesome!! :D Love y'all.

Correction..

2008-09-08T21:34:00.002-04:00

PS: I meant vitals AND oxygenation, NOT vitals ON oxygenation.. Oh I need to SLEEP. The joys of college life! :D

Updates...

2008-09-08T21:25:00.003-04:00

So...yeah I'm supposed to be studying but...well, it's getting kinda boring, not to mention the fact that I'm putting in less hours of sleep than i need. I've been back in school now for...2 days, and already i have 5 weeks worth of homework, 3 tests a WEEK and...yeah you get the idea. Ah!! And there goes my rambling mind or is it fingers... oh!! Both I guess.

Tomorrow I have a test on vitals on oxygenation. Hopefully I have that down (KINDA). :D I'll let y'all know how it goes. (If I remember to since I have a pharmacology test the next day, which is Wednesday).

I guess the one thing I'm looking forward to in the next 14 days is...my BIRTHDAY!!!! YAY!! Can't believe one year has gone by. After this b'day, I'll be praying to God to slow down the years. Oh well...

I think I have rumbled and drumbled (Is that even a word? Ah!! Let's just say I have created a 'Claudia Word'.) enough. Gotta get back to studying or else SOMEONE is going to come lecture me!!! Toodles!!

26 Down, 74 to go!!!

2008-08-30T22:47:00.003-04:00

I consider myself a reader...and my friends can attest to that. It has been said that the average person has read only 6 books out of this list (to come!) But I have read 26 of them. Does this mean I'm 4 times an average person? Haha..I wish!! :) Well here is the list with those I've read in bold!! I actually thought I had read only 18 of them but as I was going through the list again, I realized I had read 26!!! Cool huh?

1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19. The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34. Emma - Jane Austen35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. Dune - Frank Herbert
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones' Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte's Web - EB White
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Just a little (OK looooooong) note..

2008-07-09T22:51:00.002-04:00

OK this may not make sense to most (as usual others would think I am going nuts) but it's funny and I had to put it on here. It's long but it's fun. Please take the time (like 15 mins) to read it... :D

You know you're a Nursing Student when...

1. you can discuss the most disturbing topics over lunch
2. you say everything in this setup: "____related to____manifested by____"
3. you think a cystocele or a rectocele are possibly the funniest, most serious things ever
4. hearing the word "pessary" makes you laugh. really hard.
5. "almost passing" a test is a joyous occasion and calls for celebration
6. You're not tired...You suffer from sleep pattern disturbance related to late night study sessions
7. you have a test on a 6 hour lecture...less than 48 hours after the lecture
8. you honestly believe you have every disease you learn about
9. nothing embarrasses you anymore
10. sitting up til 2 am doing a care plan is your idea of a "light" night
11. you really do know that anythings possible
12. You get a stomach ache and jump to that conclusion that you might have ulcerative colitis, crohn's disease, or any of the other number of GI disorders you studied about over and over
13. Your friends are planning a trip for spring break and you are planning on sleeping then getting a head start on next quarter's reading assignments
14. You own at least one backpack with wheels.
15. Once a straight A student, and now your new motto is "C means Continue!" or "C's get Degrees!"
16. when you clean everything with the alcohol swabs you stole from the hospital
17. when you was your hands before going to the bathroom
18. when you cant sleep bc you're afraid your alarm wont go off
19. when you give in and set the alarm on your phone too. just in case the power goes out.
20. when 'c' with a line over it is second nature to you, even though other look at you like you're crazy.
21. Someone tells you they have a headache, backache, stomachache etc.. you ask them to rate it on a scale from 1-10, what's the quality, how long has it been hurting, what makes it better or worst etc
22. you can write an entire sentence with just abbreviations. in fact, it seems ridiculous not to.
23. you start using validation on everyone
24. every time you start out a question with 'why', a little voice in the back of your head is screaming "NOOOOOOOOOOOOO"
25. when someone asks you whats wrong, "ineffective coping" seems like the obvious answer
26. you will never, ever forget that aspirin thins the blood (or that you give Adenosine for bradycardia!!!)
27. and that if a blood glucose goes below 40, you have a problem
28. if knowing where the narc keys are is your primary concern when leaving clinical
29. if you snicker at "pinch an inch"
30. you've learned the importance of an IV clamp...the hard way
31. you see your classmates 3 times as much as your family
32. you've learned to check the volume of the catheter balloon before aspirating the NSS and pulling it out, the hard way
33. when you want something nutritious for lunch so you go with the unsalted pretzels in the vending machine
34. You know exactly what they're talking about on ER.
35. your practice tying a tourniquet relentlessly
36. when you walk past someone at the mall, and they couch/sneeze without covering their mouth, so you cover yours
37. when you have 4 planners, all of which you use religiously
38. when you spend $200 on a PDA, just so you can download a drug book and your tabers on it to take on clinical
39. when you ask your dad to pull the car over after driving for 2 hours, cause you're scared you're all gonna get a DVT
40. when having an entire conversation with a manikin does not seem weird
41. when one of your friends is sick, you find it perfectly acceptable to ask when their last BM was
42. you freak out when you touch anything blue..before realizes it probably wasn't sterile to begin with
43. when your sense of humor gets more warped with each passing week
44. almost everything seems comical...eventually
45. you look at random peoples veins and think about the ease/difficulty of putting an IV site in it
46. you have replaced sleep with coffee and red bull (or rock star!!!)
47. you use military time more often than not
48. those drug commercials you used to change the channel for? now you take notes
49. when you call someone a "finger painter" you know they aren't using paint
50. when you hear someone has a necrotic spot and the doc needs your help debriding it, and the first thing you grab is a mask
51. you have ever lost track of time, looked at the clock and suddenly diagnosed yourself with a Stage 1 decubitus r/t a 7.5 hour study session on your couch
52. you truly believe some patients are alive only bc its illegal to kill them
53. you JUMP up when a bed alarm goes off, run into the hall in a panic, try to follow the sound to whichever room its coming from, adrenaline pumping...while all the nurses take another drink of coffee, close the scrub catalogue, get up, check the heart rate monitors, and slowly make their way down the hall
54. you don't even think twice about discussing a stage IV decubitus at the dinner table
55. You think it is acceptable to use "penis" and "vagina" in a normal conversation
56. you and your (nursing school) friends have contests to see who can come up with a diagnosis the fastest
57. you've ever had a stethoscope hanging from your review mirror
58. you've ever had to leave a patients room before laughing uncontrollably
59. you go to radio shack and try on the electronic BP monitors
60. while talking to other students you have ever said... "Hey I have a foley catheter insertion lined up for us to do" and they become just as excited as you are
61. The letter N-C-L-E-X are the 5 most important letters in your life
62. you hear the word "intervention" and immediately grab your care plan book
63. when you say "that patient needs some TLC" and you don't mean tender loving care (Thorazine, Lorazapam, and Compazine)
64. air goes in and out. blood goes around and around. the end. that's all you're concerned with.
65. You call subcutaneous emphysema Rice Krispies
66. everyone pulls out their tape recorder for every lecture
67. You hide on Thursday nights so you don't have to translate all the terms on "ER" for your friends/relatives
68. While using a public restroom, you wash your hands with soap for a full minute and turn off the faucets with your elbows.
69. Everyone, including complete strangers, tells you about each and every ache and pain they have
70. You can tell which people in a group are nursing students, because they're the ones laughing hysterically, while everyone else looks at them like they're crazy.
71. You have dreams at night about being in clinical (for a week in a row).
72. You carry flashcards with you EVERYWHERE.
73. Your kids ASK to hear weird things that happened at the hospital today.
74. You can think of SEVERAL nursing Dx that apply to yourself.
75. You've diagnosed yourself throughout school with whatever ailment you happen to be studying at the time.
76. The only clothes in your laundry basket are white uniforms and those hideous pentifores. I wonder if i can ever still wear my street clothes?
77. Someone compliments the photo on your driver's license and you realize it does look better than you these days.
78. Your kids offer to help with your assignments
79. You inform your instructor that you need psychotropic drugs for the voices inside your head during test taking- first one says "Pick that one, it was your first choice and the other voice says "no, it's that one"! Helpful hint always go with your gut-the first choice!
80.You know you're a nursing student when you APIE (Assess, Plan, Intervene, Evaluate) for grocery shopping.

Hope you enjoyed it. Any questions...just ask!! :D

Happy Belated birthday Carolyn!!

2008-07-04T22:55:00.000-04:00

Happy Belated Birthday Carolyn, I know this is late in coming but just wanted to wish you anyway. Hope you had a wonderful day. God Bless!!

Happy Birthday Cheryl!!!!!!!!!

2008-07-04T22:51:00.000-04:00

Happy Birthday Cheryl, Hope you had a wonderful day!! Must be awesome that you have it on a holiday every year! God richly bless you!!

I'm ba-a-ack!!

2008-06-30T18:20:00.000-04:00

Hi! OK so it's been a long while (so bite me!) It's just a short note... I have 6 mins left here at work (WHOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!) and had to write a few things down. :D I was in the Caledonia parade on Saturday and it was sooo much fun!! (I've never been IN one before) then afterwards, I went and watched the fireworks...Oh it was very memorable.

OK so I have to go now but I'll be updating soon (nothing like this boring post [oh sanford!])

Catch y'all later...

Happy Birthday Shari!

2008-06-05T09:59:00.001-04:00

Happy Birthday Shari!! Hope you have a wonderful, God-filled, joy-abundant and blessed birthday!!!

Happy Memorial Day!!

2008-05-26T09:27:00.000-04:00

Hi All!! Happy Memorial Day!! I'm looking forward to having fun today. It may not be as much fun as I had yesterday though.

So...since I know you want to hear about yesterday, here goes. After church, I spent the day at my Bergy Family's home. Yup! There my third family!!!! :D (Whether they like it or not!! Ha Ha!). After dinner, we just lay around, some took naps, I read, others went over to their cousin's to play. It was nice having some down time.

Afterwards we went out to see Sarah's splash rockt. That was fun too! Thanks for the entertainment Sarah! :P Then came time for the bonfire! Ashley and I played a game of ladderball, which I won (Whoo hoo) and then as I was eating my Carolyn-made hotdog, I was brutally attacked by a bee!! ( Ok so it landed on me and I screamed to high heavens 'til Seth came and rescued me from the evil bee). I made Peter cry too :'( Sawwy Peter, I didn't mean to!). After my attack, we all went inside and some of us played a game of Shanghai Rum which I...won from the bottom!! I had a whopping 900 points and I was never redeemed!! Oh well!

So...I hope y'all have a wonderful day...I know I will!!

Update...

2008-05-15T15:14:00.000-04:00

OK so I said I was going to be back like a day ago if i remembered. The thing is I've been so busy (Yeah I'm sure you want to know why). Between work and school and other stuff, it's been quite hectic and tiring.

Tuesday, after work, I stayed behind to finish up on some last-minute homework. I got out close to three o'clock and made my way towards home. The call finally came that Seanta's water broke. So I went to pick Kayla up and went to Seanta and Aaron's. To cut a long story short, (I know I love cutting the stories short but I don't think y'all want to know the sordid details), I stayed with the boys all night long and finally Seanta (without any epidural, mind you), gave birth to Raihna Rodel Predum, 8lbs 2 oz, 20 inches long, at 9:40pm (Sarah, I think my mind was still an hour behind when I told you the time).

Raihna, and Seanta come home today, and they're both doing great although Mom is still tired.

I'm still here at work and also trying to finish up on homework which I've been working on since I got to work this morning. (Yeah, it's THAT difficult. Trust me!). But then, I've been distracted by phone calls, emails, not to mention the almighty FACEBOOK!

I guess it's time for me to quit dilly-dallying and get back to work. So...ciao all, till i remember to update my blog!

I'm back...

2008-05-12T17:27:00.000-04:00

Ok so I went into a long hiatus but I'm back now (hopefully for a looong loong time). My return was somewhat forcefully enforced by Carolyn and Sarah ( Hahaha...Thanks guys :D). A lot has happened over the last..what?...3 months. YIKES!! Was I gone THAT long?

I've been busy with school and work and other stuff but I'm sure you're all not interested in all that boring stuff. I finally found a permanent place to live (Thanks you-know-who for having me)!! It's exciting! Now I don't have to keep carting my stuff around. Seriously I've developed some good sized deltoids, biceps and triceps brachii and external obliques (haha...Sarah, that's dedicated to you!)

I'm still here waiting for Seanta to go into labor (She saw her doctor at 2:15 but I haven't heard anything as yet...so no Raihna yet). Work is boring as usual and I'm simply not in the mood to do my case-studies. Yup FIVE of them. I mean what was the instructor thinking?!?!

Oh did I mention I'm taking summer school. Ooooooooh yeah. Fun stuff. There's nothing like sitting in class on a bright sunny day, 75 degrees out, birds chirping, humans laughing, dogs barking, and an instructor droning on about erythrocytes, macrophages, cardiac tissue and action potentials. Yup. From 9am to 4 pm. Good thing it's only one day a week.

Ok so...hope you enjoyed my rambling, I'll be back tomorrow (if I remember to). It's a wrap!!

Busy weekend 2

2008-02-02T22:43:00.000-05:00

Ok today, Saturday...

We get out of the hospital about 6am, and I finally get home about a quarter to 7. I sleep 2 hours and phone calls 'pour' in. No more sleep for me. I then go to Sarah and Amorkor's apartment to keep an eye on them and just stay with them. Amorkors legs are really swollen and need to be iced down. Fortunately I got a bag of ice on my way in. Sarah's back has began to hurt as well.

Funny though from what I've been able to gather, the accident happened like this:

Sarah crossed the intersection and was on her way when suddenly someone rear edned them. A direct hit. Not sideways. Yet, Sarah was given a ticket...??? Why? Oh well. I guess we'll have to find out when we go to court next week. I promise to keep all updated.... Got to go catch a few zzz's

Busy weekend

2008-02-02T22:25:00.000-05:00

This weekend has been a very busy one. It hasn't been a very happy one either but I'm so grateful to God for the lives of my 2 good friends.

Late Friday night, about 11:53pm, I get a call from Sarah, a close friend. I cannot believe it when she tells me she's had an accident. She goes on to say Amorkor, her roommate and our friend was also in the car and had to be rushed to the hospital by ambulance. I begin to pray, throw a pair of jeans over my PJ bottom and a jacket over the PJ top and rush out to meet her at the scene.

Whn I get thre, I see her car is totalled and is going to be towed away. The cops are still on the scene as well. I stay till everything is settled and then Sarah and I head on to the hospital where Amorkor is at. When we get there, Sarah is taken to be checked for injury while I head on to see Amorkor. She has on a neck brace and I immediately start praying that there's nothing seriously wrong. A doctor comes in to examine her and the extent of her injuries are contemplated. Her head, neck, both her legs and an arm need to be CAT scanned and X rayed to see of there're any fractures. An hour later the tests arrive and nothing is broken (Thank God).

Six hours later, we leave the hospital with the following diagnoses:
Amorkor: sprained neck, contused arm and legs.
Sarah: contused hip.

I'm so grateful they are both ok even though I've had a total of 2 hours of sleep in the last 48.

The New Year

2008-01-21T19:22:00.000-05:00

This new year has been great so far. Divine health has been my portion since the first of this year. i have no reason to complain. God has granted me travelling mercies and I am alive today to testify of His goodness.

The weather here is terrible (Sorry Lord-but it truly is:-( ). I just thank God that even through the slipping and sliding of both body and car, His protection is still over me like a shield!!! I have just one thing to say for all this...

THE LORD IS AWESOME!!!

Random...

2007-11-29T10:59:00.000-05:00

God is so good...
First of all I am so grateful to God for my life and for my health.

This past month has been one of the toughest but God has seen me through.

First of all I think I should keep reminding myself of the scripture in which God tells us..' Be anxious over nothing but in EVERYTHING by prayer and thanksgiving, make your request known to God'..

I continually remembered this scripture and though it's tough to keep from worrying, my faith in God has kept me strong. I am glad to say that he has pulled me through and I will continue to put my trust and faith in Him.

GOD IS GOOD!!!!

2007-11-20T11:45:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving!!

2007-11-20T10:56:00.000-05:00

This semester has been stressful and I am looking forward to the long Thanksgiving weekend. Come to think of it, I should not be complaining so much. I have a LOT of things to be thankful for.... let's see...
1. My life...
2. My family...
3. My friends...
4. My faith...
5. My job...
6. My home...
7. My car...
8. People who love me...
9. People I love...
10. The food I have to eat...
11. The little things I have not mentioned...

I am sooo grateful...

In all things, by prayer and suplication with thanks, let your request be made known to God, and the peace of God which passes all understanding..... Ph 4 8

1 Thes. 4 18...In all things, give thanks...

Now...what things are YOU grateful for?

Good friends...

2007-11-13T09:31:00.000-05:00

Good friends are like jewels
they add a sparkle to ur life.
Good friends are always there when u need a helping hand
or someone to talk toeven at odd times of the day.
Good friends are always there when you cook food
to 'samle' your cooking.
Good friends cannot be found just anywhere, at any time
they appear in your life at just the right time.
Good friends are people like you
always ready to listen to me complain.
Good friends are forever
I love y'all.