Need my own house!

Don't know if I explained this before but we have a multi generational home. This means that there is 8 people in this house!!!

This picture pretty much shows how I feel about being in this house.... squished!!!

Now if we all actually ate at the dinner table - we would probably look like this....

I can't wait til I'm done my RN degree and we move to Texas!!!! Bring on a GIANT home, where only the husband and I with the kids live. Oh to dream of the peace and quiet!!!

I suppose it wouldn't be too too bad if we had a living room and a den or seomthing where hubby and I could escape the drama that ALWAYS ensues in this house!!!

My husband was born in Pakistan and therefore the majority of talk in this house is Urdu - the main language in Pakistan. So just imagine yourself surrounded by people who don't speak the same language talking at the same time, or as my MIL does - raise her voice, talk REALLY fast and often yells. UGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH I just want some peace and quiet!!!

THAT is why I can't wait to have a big house alllllll to ourselves!!! For now, we're just biding our time.

The "types" of doctors we have

At our hospital, we use hospitalists. They're considered MRP's or Most Responsible Physician. Frankly, I could do without several of them! Let me tell you of a couple of the ones I dislike....

Dr. A - Anything us nurses have any concerns or issues to bring up to her, she directs us to her "board" where she wants us to write them down - 3/4 of the times she doesn't even deal with the issues. She's rude and rather abrupt and does NOT come off as caring or sympathetic. VERY poor bed side manner. ANY time you need to get a urine specimen, she will ALWAYS refuse a request for an in & out. Difficult to get to speak to families.

Dr. B - Type of doctor who comes into the unit, deals with VERY little, doesn't check in with his patients and if you don't catch him while he's ON the unit, he's next to impossible to get a hold of via telephone or pages. Patients and families feel out of loop in terms of communication and doesn't tend to get a hold of families to answer questions.

Dr. C - Thinks that she's superior to nurses simply because she's a doctor (not unusual) and ANY suggestions in care go unheeded, even if it IS in the best interest of the patient. Patients and nurses alike feel that she speaks AT them.

A couple of the ones that I DO like...

Dr. D - Handsome and approachable. Too bad he and I are both married. LOL. He will actually takes nurses' suggestions, even if he thinks that it won't help (ie. lactobacillus acidophilus for a pt with C-diff). Is on the ball in terms of patient care. Spends HOURS on our unit to make sure that his patients are spoken to as well as families.

Dr. E - Just like Dr. D - is wonderful and approachable. You can tell that he cares about the well being of his patients. Will listen to nurses and implement suggestions from nurses. Is the "guru" in the physician's group - not the oldest of the doctors but nurses and doctors alike speak about him and his care, as well as his approach (in excellent terms). The running joke is that he's the ONLY doctor who orders flushes for his foleys (that works AWESOME btw at reducing the days that a patient has a UTI, and reduces the chance that a person will need CBI [continuous bladder irrigation]).

Dr. F - The ONLY female doctor that I like. She tries to talk to every nurse and seems to have a genuine interest in those that take care of her patients. She will ask for input from the nurses on the care of her patients and whether they think that her patients need anything. If you put something on her "board" you can rest assured that she WILL deal with it. ALWAYS sees her patients. ALWAYS returns pages and phone calls promptly. Is just a lovely person and doctor. She's the type of doctor that you WISH you have if you have to be admitted to a hospital.

Dr. G - wrote about him yesterday. I think that he'll be a good doctor but we'll see for sure in the upcoming weeks and months.

I have a story for you about Dr. A - I'll try to write about it later tonite or tomorrow.

A new doc - interesting one too!!!

I hurt all over from my personal training session today. My trainer's name is Megan - and man does she know how to make me hurt! I guess that's a good thing, I suppose it means that I'll build up muscle and trim down the fat. Now to just see the big changes!!!

On a different note... we got a new doctor to our unit/hospital. I like him! I like that he's down to earth, that he's willing to ask a nurse what they think about a treatment plan, that he's not afraid to ask questions when he's unsure about something, that he's a fellow muslim (though you would NEVER know that since he has a GERMAN last name... like SERIOUS german last name!). When I was talking to him, I found out that he was born in Pakistan and was adopted by a german couple - when I asked if he was christian/catholic or muslim (>95% of the population of Pakistan is muslim so the odds are good that he would be as well) and he indicated that He was muslim, and when I asked what his parents were, he indicated that they were also muslim. INTERESTING!!! I wasn't quite prepared for that one, but like I said, he is a VERY interesting person.

I'll try to write another story tomrorow... an interesting one about a doctor actually doing what is good for the patient, even if they aren't the MRP (Most Responsible Physician/GP).

A bit off the grid I know

I know I've been off the grid for a bit - sorry about that, it's not that I have been working (much), but rather studying my ass off and working a bit of my ass off (haha).

The little tyke went to England for 12 days, she just got back last friday, and of course I had to work all weekend - and not for lack of trying to trade out of it either! So I saw my little girl very little for the past 3 weeks-ish.

While she was away, I signed up for a gym membership. It's about time that I lose this extra weight. When I had the kiddo 10 yrs ago, I went from being 130 lbs to 198 lbs. It took me about a year and a half to get down to 160 lbs-ish and I felt pretty good. Then I had all that crap with school and the teacher and gained a bunch and then went on anti depressants and gained to the point that I weighed 210 lbs. I said to myself "screw this crap, the anti depressants aren't really helping cuz I'm depressed that I weigh so much." And I was even exercising daily AND watching when and what I was eating, and I was STILL gaining weight! So I went off the anti depressants an lost 30 lbs in a month and a half!

I had married my hubby at this point and we decided that we were going to start trying to have a baby. So I wanted to lose as much as I could before getting pregnant and I got down to 175 lbs when we found out that I was pregnant with the little tyke. I gained 35 while I was pregnant, which I thought wasn't too bad but could have done better. Now I weigh 193 lbs and figure that no time like the present to do something MORE about my weight. I convinced hubby that going to the gym is the best choice for me and he was okay with me getting a personal trainer. Having the little tyke away in England was like the perfect time to start because I could go to the gym at any point, not mattering if there was someone to watch her. ALSO, the gym that I go to has 4 days that they're open 24 hrs/day which is perfect for me as I get the desire to exercise later at night, sometimes as late as 2am! I know, I'm a weird one but I just go with it.

So I've had 2 times with the personal trainer now and she's focusing on getting my abd muscles stronger and my arms, since I told her that I do leg strength weights on the days that I don't have the trainer. And HOLY CRAP did my arms KILL after she's done with me. Last week I had one session with the trainer and I had to work the next day, WOW was it hard to do my job!!!! Sometimes it felt like my arms weighed a million pounds and it was just an effort to even lift my arms, let alone push, pull, or lift a patient! It's been 3 weeks (as of yesterday) since I've started, and although I've gained a pound, I can see a change in my body already. My tummy has gone down a little bit and my butt is tightening a smidge, and my boobs have gotten smaller (SUCH a shame I tell ya!!!).

MY new years, a little late I know

My "happy new years" was quite an interesting one, I spent it working. Though I wondered if it was a full moon!!! The 30th & 31st I worked 12 hrs each night... and boy were they interesting!!!

The evening started like most nights, vitals then meds then diaper changes then sleeping pills for everyone and tucking them in for the night.

Then at like 10pm my co worker comes to me all worked up that her patient had peed all over the floor, was SUPER confused and needed to be restrained. Sure enough, we went in there and the floor on the side of the bed was SOAKED.

Thankfully he didn't put up much of a fight and we sucessfully restrained him.... but that wasn't to be the end of restraints...

I helped finish restraining one patient, just to be asked by another one of my co workers yelled for assistance from one of her rooms because one of her patients was trying to hit and kick her. When I entered the room, the patient was naked, poo was in multiple different spots. Thankfully I'm STRONG...

And I got the patient tied.... poor guy, once we had him tied he was sounding so pathetic.

My co worker and I were able to use team work and thankfully protect us and the patients.

We brought in the new year with non alcoholic bubbly and TONS of food. One of our patients even brought us new years hats and mardi gras type bead necklaces

which we LOVED!!!! And we were loud - not that our patients noticed as we rang in the new year together.

Too bad our celebrating didn't last all shift as the same patient that we restrained earlier in the night had a full blown, grand mal seizure - lasting 11 minutes.... my first one. Nice way to cap our shift huh?!

Anyways, HAPPY NEW YEAR everyone out there, I hope it's everything you wanted it to be and soooooooooo much more!!!

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays

Merry christmas everyone!

Last night the family went to a cousin's house and had christmas eve dinner there. We didn't get home until about 10:30, put the kids straight to bed and hubby and I watched some tv via the net. I told my eldest, who's 10yrs, that he couldn't wake us until 8am. And he ALMOST listened - he woke us at 7:45am.... too bad I didn't get ANY sleep last night. Unfortunately it wasn't for lack of trying either....

Little tyke sprung a fever in the middle of the night and was sporting quite the diaper rash, so she woke me up being MISERABLE! I changed her bum and of course, she woke up enough that she thought that we should then wake up.... uhhh I don't think so!!! She made me make her a fresh bottle and back to bed we went.

When kiddo woke up, he first went and had a shower (like I had talked to him about having the night before) and then he came to wake us up... poor mommy made him wait the 15 minutes to open presents. Such torture I know, but hey, I learned from the best - MY parents. Hahahaha

Then I allowed little girl to turn on the tree and we opened gifts. Since kiddo's the oldest I let him be responsible for handing out the gifts, not that I didn't have to give a few reminders that he had to take time to enjoy people OPENING their gifts.

All in all the kids enjoyed opening their presents. They enjoyed what they received and I had a ball watching them through the entire process. I even got a couple of pictures. Too bad I don't know where my camera is right now and I had to use my new phone (which I'm still working out the kinks for), so we'll see what kind of quality I will get.

Now if you didn't already know, I AM a muslim - but that doesn't mean that I have to leave my roots - my culture behind just because I found myself a different religion. This is something that my husband and his family struggle with. They equate celebrating christmas to celebrating another religion's holiday. HOWEVER, the way I was raised was that there was no religion in play, just simple giving and receiving of love, presents, time and happiness....... oh and a good ol' homecooked turkey (which I'm having tomorrow since I'm a bonehead and forgot to take it out early enough.

Well there's more to say, but I have to get to bed, I have to wake up early to get my turkey ready for the oven.

What nurses talk about....

At the end of my shift last night, a bunch of us nurses gathered to talk about a couple of things.... we talked about one of the new hire nurses (got hired at the same time as I) experiences and how it differs from the veteran nurses experiences - more like what one would do vs. what another would do.

The situation was this.... if you did a bladder scan on a patient because they were complaining about fullness and pain - found that there was a substantial amount that was being retained, would you do a straight in and out THEN call the Dr for the order OR would you call the Dr, report the finding and request an in & out, also, what would you do if a Dr refused it....

Veteran nurse said that she would NOT have waited for a Dr's order, would have done the in & out and called the Dr for the order - neglecting that policy indicates otherwise... and even said that she didn't care if she got fired for it because it was in pt's best interest.

Newbie nurses (I included) - have called Dr's for such FIRST - but this is seen as us not having a back bone.

So what would YOU do?

When I have called Dr's for in & out's, I have already done a bladder scan and feel that information is a girl's best friend. I think it's like arming yourself for when questions get asked. Now, if I had a pt who required an in & out but a physician was refusing to give one (did happen to that newbie btw), I think I would go to the unit leader/charge nurse to speak about it, since having the leader on your side is like arming yourself - it's peer review and support. I know that the nurses on my unit support one another, and their patients - and ultimately would do what's best for the patient. Even if that means going against a Dr.

The newbie kept paging that Dr. for several HOURS, probably not realizing that the other option available to him was to do the in & out without the order and that one could be obtained later from the MRP (most responsible physician).

We also talked about our past patients and where they are... one of the nurses generally checks out various units within the hospital, as some of our patients end up on rehab units, we like to know if they're still there or not...

Last night this nurse revealed that one of our patients.... the one I told this blogging world about - the woman with the MASSIVE CVA (AKA stroke). Turns out that she aspirated at home - from the family trying to feed her! And she was back in ICU, intubated and STILL not a DNR (Do not resuscitate)... it amazes me, truely astonishes me that a family would WANT to watch someone suffer. If that was MY family member, I would NOT want my family member to be a full code if they are going to have crappy quality of life. If they can barely move, can barely communicate, and are entirely dependent on others for EVERYTHING, and that the family isn't all that interested in learning to take care of this family member.

It's crappy when people keep a loved one around for THEIR need, not caring about how it is for their family member. I guess this is something that I will learn to live with, because there is NOTHING I can do about it.