Fealling a little better

Well, it's been a long week. My weeks are Thursday through Thursday hense, my week is almost over!I've somewhat calmed down about my grades and with a lot of prayer, I know that things will work out in the end. I think sometimes I work so hard, and spin my wheels and forget to give it over to God and let him take the burden. This week we finished up our long term care rotation and I have one more assignment to complete for that. Mostly it was a boring rotation but full of lots of busy paper work and not a lot of hands on care. I love the hands on stuff, so this wasn't as fun. I guess I'll never be a nurse manager! Now I have two weeks off of clinical before we start mental health rotation. I'm so exited to actually get two extra days next week to study! Tomorrow's the end of life test and I'm busy getting our class presentaion together for that, so it's another full night, but tomorrow after class I'm actually going to relax and watch a dvd I ordered. The Proposal, can't wait!

Feeling like I'm drowning in the work

I may say this every quarter, but this seems like my hardest quarter yet. I have not done well on any of the tests and I can't figure out why. I've never had the thought in my mind that I might not pass a class but I am having those thoughts now. I hoping by the grace of God that I can make it through the next 8 weeks. Her tests are quizzes that are worth 15 points every week. The problem is there are usually 13 questions covering well over 100 pages of reading, and she makes them up. They are not out of a test bank and figuring what she 's looking for has turned out to be difficult. If you miss three, you've pretty much failed the test and the average needs to be a 79% Doesn't seem that bad but with such high stakes questions the stakes are high. I've never had a class like this. I'm just praying, praying , praying and working so hard I don't know what else to do. The constant stress level in starting to get to me and I don't stress out easily.

Few, first test down seven more to go

All in all this was a good week and I'm SOOO glad it's Friday! Our first test was on Thursday and I did okay, not as well as I'd like. I felt like I knew everything and had studied well but some of the questions were worded really strange and of course there are always a few trick questions, fortunately I got those right. As long as I keep above a 79% average for testing, I'll pass the class. Usually I can maintain a 90% average and then count on other projects and activities to pull up the grade to an A so I hope I can do that again this quarter.
I've got work tomorrow and I always look forward to that, it what keeps me going when I get bogged down with school stress, I look around and tell myself, one day I will just have go to work and come home and that's it. I am blessed to work with wonderful and generous nurses who enjoy having me around and don't mind all questions!
This week we were given the opportunity to fill out the sheet that tells school where we what to go for our preceptorship placement. Part of me wants to stay where I'm comfortable, such as a CCU environment. I truly don't want Med/Surg but, I know that I would learn a lot and would be pushed out of my comfort zone. The instructor also mentioned that I should go to a place where I could gain knowledge for NCLEX. She has a point, an area too specialized might not help me when it comes to the test, and that of course is the whole idea. If I don't pass, nothing else matters! So, I've got some thinking to do, until next time have a great weekend!

Starting mental health and long term care

This week was full of some definite highs and lows! The first day back was great, seeing everyone and catching up with how their summer was nice. Then tuesday was our dosage calculation test and clinical orientation. Unfortunately, I missed one extra problem on the calculation test and had one more try to take it which I did today. Fortunately things went well and I got 100% but that was way too close for comfort. If I got less than a 90% I would have to miss clinicals for this quarter and I would not be completing the program with my group, just three months later. While this wouldn't be the end of the world, it would have been devistating to me.
This quarter we will be at the local VA hospital to complete our LTC and mental health units. I sat in line for 4 hours the other day to get my security pass and my fingerprinting done. Now I kind of know how someone feels being booked for jail! Anyways, I've got tons of studying to do and a test on thursday so I better get started, till next time!