Thought for the Day

The problem with having a studio is that after you make dinner the whole place smells. It permeates everything! One dinner of teriyaki chicken cooked on a grill pan and the whole place smells for days. I even opened the window to let in the gale force winds that Baltimore is currently blowing but all I ended up with was a stinky windy apartment. Now I suppose that there are worse smells than cooked chicken but still . . .

From Babies to Psych

I finished my labor and delivery rotation today and next week I am moving on to psychiatric nursing. I will be working at a hospital in an inpatient unit where they have a wide range of disorders (schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, etc). I can't wait for my first post after that! I have heard from the group that did psych the first part of the semester that basically I will be solidifying my ability to ask questions!

Anyway, a final update on how my labor and delivery rotation finished up. I did finally get to see a vaginal delivery! It was an amazing experience but honestly not all that different looking than the videos! My patient received an epidural so even my doula skills were not that useful since she couldn't feel anything. I put in her catheter so more experience there. My patient was particularly lucky because she only pushed for about 15 minutes and had no complications at all! It was a baby girl, 6lbs 1oz and she was adorable. I again got to do eyes and thighs on the baby and vitals every 30 minutes.

I am happy to be another step closer to graduating! I can't believe that half the semester is already done and it is getting close to Thanksgiving! Thank goodness time seems to fly by!

It's A Boy!

I had my first baby today! It was a repeat cesarean section. The baby boy was born a healthy 8 pounds. It was a fantastic experience and I loved the OR experience. Here is a bit about my day:

• 7:30 introduce myself to the patient and her husband and hope she likes me enough to do her foley.
• 7:45 put in my first foley! It was an interesting experience but it went pretty well. It is a little tougher than you might think but my patient didn't complain and she had no anesthesia so it couldn't have been too bad.
• 8:00 into the OR and out of the way.
• 8:05 watch the spinal placed . . . very cool.
• 8:15 again out of the way as much as possible with the best view possible and they start to cut. I am always AMAZED by the human body and to be able to see the inner workings makes it even better!
• 8:30 baby out and over to the pediatricians. I have about five minutes from this point to try and remember everything I am supposed to do and put on my gloves.
• 8:35 do "eyes and thighs" which is the babies very first shot (sorry) and the eye ointment in both eyes. I also did respirations, heart rate and the official foot prints
• 8:40 swaddle the baby and hand to dad so that the mom can see her little bundle of joy!
• 8:50 doctors finish closing and we move into recovery
• 9:00-10:30 stay in recovery, hang out with the family and take babies vitals every 30 minutes.
• 10:30 mom headed to postpartum and I am DONE!

It was such an amazing experience. I am hoping for a vaginal birth tomorrow!

Two Different Shoes

No, that is not the name of a song . . . I actually wore two different shoes today. I got to class and looked down at my foot and thought, hm, I didn't mean to wear that shoe. This caused me to look at my other foot and sure enough I had on one shiny black shoe and one not shiny blue shoe. Fortunately at least they were the same brand. OOPS!

Another Week Done

So I finished another week! Starting on week 6 this week and getting really close to the halfway point for this semester. I am definitely not used to semesters. This 14 week thing seems awfully long!

My Friday was good. Still no babies BUT I did get to be a part of the labor process. The woman I was working with on Friday went from 2cm to 6cm while I was there but the end of the day came to quickly and there was no baby while I was there. It was great practice for birth companions though!

The Cake concert I went to Thursday night was lots of fun. Below is a picture.

Anyway, my weekend was spent studying, a Friday run to get sundaes and a little bit of shopping. It is back to class tomorrow with a big Pharm test on Wednesday!

The Placentas Go in There . . .

Last week I did orientation to the labor and delivery (L&D) department for the start of my L&D rotation. The tour went like this . . . these are the L&D suites, this is the OR, here is the staff restroom, here is the nutrition room, supplies . . . oh and the placentas go in here. For some reason I haven't been able to get that comment out of my head!

Anyway, today was my first day of L&D and it was quite uneventful. My instructor assigned patients starting with the first of the alphabet and since my last name starts with an "S" I didn't get a patient today. It was a pretty boring day of sitting around but I did get the chance to see a spinal and a tubal ligation (tubes tied) which was pretty interesting.

I have never seen a spinal and it was pretty crazy. You definitely hear a "POP" as it gets inserted into the right place and there was definitely cerebral spinal fluid dripping out for a second after it was placed BUT the lady felt NOTHING from the armpits down so I guess it did the job.

Tomorrow is day two of L&D and me and the other girl who didn't see a birth today have been promised a woman who is fairly well dilated . . . should be a good Friday! Oh and I am off to a Cake concert this evening so I get to have a bit of fun as well!