Confused and Busy

 Hello All! I have been staying a bit confused about things of late. I think running like a crazy woman with my hair on fire almost entirely from the start of Christmas break to now (there were approximately 2-3 days of blissful, relative rest in December) has left me incredibly discombobulated. Ah, apparently talking to myself awoke the Queen- my normally docile and silent cat just sent a despaired meow my way! Now she is sitting next to the laptop purring; she like to help me type, so I'll blame any typos or oddness (excessive oddness for me) on her! OK, scapegoat established, on to what I was saying. There are many instances, but yesterday I sometimes knew it was Monday and other times thought it was Tuesday, but regardless, I believed the following day to be Wednesday. I'm not entirely certain I should be allowed to drive, function as an adult, or take care of other people, but here we are! At least I have today off to catch up on QAing, schoolwork (it never ends! 😫😧😧- Her Royal Highness wants credit for the emojis), and maybe decluttering the place. I would love to get at least my room looking more like a somewhat organized human lives here instead of a displaced troll. My hopes and wishes are excessive, I know!

  Anyway, they are calling for Snowmageddon tommorow and over the next few days. Fortunately, Snowmageddon is the much friendlier cousin of Icemageddon, our usual winter visitor. Unfortunately, Icemaggedon is tentatively planning on visiting her cousin. Apparently the two have not visited in quite some time and Icemaggedon needs a new pair of shoes for some Unknown Winter Event looming in the future. Maybe Icemaggedon will get caught in traffic? One can always hope! 

  Asides from crazy and confused, things haven't been terrible. School is school. At this point, we all appear to be very apathetic regarding it. I'm feeling less certain about being a nurse. I know I'll learn a lot, and the hours are much, much better than being a full time medic, but I don't enjoy it as much most of the time. It doesn't help that I received my assignment for the preceptor-led 120 hours of clinical, which will also extend 6 months past graduation for me (I took a position in a new program that hospital is doing; I will be paid for the 120 hours of clinical, which they will count as part of my onboarding, in exchange for 6 months of work). I was hoping for, and requested ICU (their ER stinks), but I got a Step Down Unit instead. Step Down is somewhat better than normal med-surg (God bless all med-surg nurses, clinicals have taught me that it is not compatible with my will to live, especially if done long term), but it is definitely not ICU. I'm one of those weird people that does better if trained for the position I intend to work in long term- if I move to ICU later (which I deeply hope will happen), I'll have a hard time not reverting back to the Step Down stuff on the things that differ between the two. Inconvenient, but apparently my brain was not wired for my convenience. I do have a friend that is going to talk to her supervisor to see if there is any way I could transfer to the ICU after graduation. The folks on the floor I've been assigned to were nice in the summer when my group did clinical there, but it is not work that filled me with an abundance of joy. (There was still fun and cool people- patients and employees- to meet with, but still not the type of work I love.) 

  I've also been working on boarding practice and new-hire ride time for the ambulance service I got hired at. Boarding appears to be terrifying. We get some practice, but my group is huge, so not a lot, before we actually board. If you pass, yay, you get to work! If you fail, you either get sent through again, or lose your job. So, no pressure. Ride-times have been really good though, I like the two preceptors I have had so far. Boarding practice has been very informative, but I don't have much time left for practice, and definitely am not doing things their way yet. 5 1/2 years experience is great for a lot of things, but makes it hard to change some things. 

  I'm still QAing (from home!) at my original company. I'll eventually pick up a shift, but their new schedule (48 on, 96 off) with the 3 full time trucks makes it hard, especially with my limited schedule. They do page out last minute a lot, but I can't do last minute,  my entire month is planned beforehand right now. If I mess that up, its for school or family at this point. 

  Not much stitching here lately. I received some projects for Christmas that are in my Really Want to Stitch list, but no time just yet. I did finish the heart project. I can't remember if I shared it here or not, so here is a picture. Fortunately, it hid my mistakes well! 

  Other than that, not much else to report. The furry children are mad I don't have much time for them, but they are making do, and help me study quite a bit!

Smokey looks like he scared himself telling a ghost story!

(Not suppose to be there...)

  What have all of you been up to of late?

  Happy Stitching!

  Emmy

Gorgeous Sunrise

   

The sunset was gorgeous the other morning!!!!

  So, a quick update, I did get a job at the company my boss works for. They traditionally don’t hire people PRN, but she can be very persuasive, and God gave me a miracle. I did online training for it yesterday, and online training on the 27th for a program/job at the place where I do clinicals for school. I start two weeks of academy style training for the job. I think I’ll get a bit of free time in between the academy stuff and the start of school though!!!! 

I also finished this yesterday!!!!! My fingers ended up a bit bruised from forcing the needle through on the last stitch of each hole, but it was totally worth it!!!

 I hope that youns are all doing well!

  Happy Stitching!

  Emmy   

Good news!

 

Good news!!!! Since I've been awake-ish since 3 today, my partner and I went for coffee at a neat new place in Monett. A very sweet couple in front of us paid for our coffee, which is a huge blessing for the day!

A bit scattered (and depressing) update

 Hi everyone, just wanted to pop in with a quick update. Things got incredibly beserck in end of August-beginning of October. Truthfully, they got a little crazy before, but it all worsened then. School became busier, and there started to be rumors that there were going to be changes at work that would impact me greatly, as well as everyone else. 

  Long story short, we found out that my grandparents had been in the hospital for approximately 3-5 days (Grandma B. went first, then Grandpa followed) for Covid. They remained hospitalized for a few weeks before Grandpa went on comfort care, ironically the week after I learned about it in class. Grandpa passed shortly thereafter; Grandma went comfort care the day fter Grandpa's funeral (Monday) and died the same day. I wish I could say that the hospital they were at took great care of them, and did their best to keep them comfortable in their last days, but sadly I cannot. The family had to pitch fits just to get them pain medication once in a while; normally, with comfort care, the goal is to keep them as painfree and peaceful as possible, but not at this hospital. There were a couple of great nurses that did attempt to do so, but sadly that was the minority, not the overall experience. I might write more about that later; I'm not really sure at this point. 

  Thankfully, my boss was amazing with all of this, as were my classmates and instructor. All three made a point to check on me frequently, and are probably the only reason I did not end up on a 96 hour hold. I was suppose to have a exam over comfort care and cancer the day after Grandma passed, but thankfully my instructor allowed me to push it off until the next Monday. I got a little misty-eyed taking it then, there was no way I was going to make it through it that Wednesday without crying, so I am incredibly thankful for that. 

  The day we first went to their house after they had both passed was a hard one. Family had came in from out of state, and an uncle occasionally lived them, so it did not look like their house. That combined with them not being there hit me hard. Thankfully, the bathroom was open, so I hid in there to a take a moment; I only say this to say that a classmate, a fellow stitcher, had the misfortune of texting me at that time and got stuck having to talk me out of the bathroom, via text. The poor guy was so sweet to do so!

  Unfortunately, that same day, on the way home I found out that I will need to have a second job by the end of December. The board decided to switch the full timers to a 48-96 shift (not safe), and make the 12 hour truck a full time truck (probably needed long before now). While the 12 hour becoming a fully-staffed truck that will run 24/7 is best for the district, it means that all of the PRNers, including myself, will likely not have many, or any, hours once it is staffed with full time personnel. My boss very sweetly did not want to tell me this until after my Grandma's funeral, but a coworker told me when I asked what the meeting they wanted all staff to go (never a good thing) to was about. I also found out that she was going through her own rough time; the board decided that they would not be renewing her contract (we basically rent her from a large hospital/ambulance service in the vicinity). There are a lot of unknowns, and she is required to train her temporary replacement through the end of the year, which I feel is insult to injury, but she is doing amazing with her attitude about it. Fortunately, the way her contract was set up, she still has a job at the company she is from. 

  Things are going a lot better now. I'm still dealing with all of the normal emotions of grief. My Mom is having the hardest time; losing both parents so fast is something I cannot even try to imagine. She appears to be doing a little better now, but prayers for her would be appreciated.

  On a more positive note, while my grades have slipped some, I am not in immediate danger of failing out of nursing school! We have to keep our grades at a 74 or 76%; I forget which. While a bad test score could drop my grade dramatically, it tentatively looks like I just might be in the portion moving on! 

  Sorry this was not a more uplifting update. I had to be up at 3 to come in early for a coworker, so I'm not in a sunshiney mood just yet. I'll try to post something happier soon. To be honest, I knew this would be a harder post to write, which is why I have not updated in a long time. I hope that all of you and your loved ones are doing amazing; please, tell me what you have been up to!

  Happy Stitching,

  Emmy

Nala's Self Image

  This is what Nala thinks she looks like:

And this is what Nala actually looks like:

   She has a very healthy self-image; she is always shocked and angered whenever I pick her up. She's bigger than me and could eat me for an afternoon snack if she wanted to, so it always shocks her whenever I hold in just my hands. :)

Me too, cat, me too

  Perchance, do any of you have a Emmy-sized box? Granted, my problems are not that bad. They're more annoyances that my dramatic brain blows ridiculously out of proportion. Then cue the anxiety! That said, I would appreciate prayers about some work stuff. My boss has been incredible about working with what little availability I can give her, but the board may be making some changes. One of the changes would be making the 12 hour truck into a full time truck. For the district's sake, it needs to be, but it would likely be a full-time crew then. Which would stink for all of PRNers. And would likely mean that I would need to pick up a second job somewhere. Which would totally not be the end of the world, but I don't want to spend the time and hassle of looking, applying, and learning a new job, especially while in school. I'd rather procrastinate on that until I'm a RN and can procastinate no longer! It will likely be a month or two until they decide, so prayers for my sanity would be appreciated. After all, youns know just how much I just  love the unknowns of life. 😒 Oh well, life would be boring without them! 

 

    Poor Ladybug was really feeling the stress yesterday. Mom has been sick since Sunday, and Lady is very much a Marmoo's girl, and has been keeping a close eye on Mom almost 24/7. Plus, my normal state is a sliding scale of stress, and she does her best to keep me grounded. But that poor girl hit her max yesterday! She was freaked out, did not want left alone, and refused to leave my bedroom for almost all of the day. She would peek her head out of the door, get scared, and immediately run and hid in my room. I ended up turning the lights off (when I wasn't in there studying), keeping the doors closed, and turning the sounds on my alarm clock on to the river setting to get her to calm down. Approximately 30 seconds after starting that, she moved from the foot of the bed to the pillow (the brat!), and fell asleep. She stayed like that for a very, very long time and awoke her normal chill self. 

  School has been going good overall. My instructor and classmates are absolutely incredible!!!! I have made friends that I am much closer to than people that I have known for many years! :o  & :) I did fail a pharm test, which was weird, because I don't fail tests. That said, I was super stressed about work, did NOT sleep much that week, and did not study for it much at all. I did do amazing on the Peds HESI that we took that day though. The HESI is an indicator of how likely you are to pass NCLEX (the test that must be passed to become a nurse); doing well on it was nice, but I would have been given a second chance since this was our first time taking a HESI. I shoulda known that I'd choose the wrong test to fail! ;) On the upside, it was a nursing school fail, not a normal fail- for nursing school, it has to be a 75% or higher to pass; I got a 74%. So I'm just a partial idiot at least! 

  I don't really have much else to tell youns. I have no clue when I will stitch again; I am going to have to make time though, my sanity is wearing thin, and I haven't read a book for fun in a long time, so I need to decompress somehow soon. At work on Monday, we were dispatched for a male with dementia "acting crazy" that killed his dog. I really, really did not want to run on him. Fido-murderers are not my favorite. Plus, if he hit the point of killing his own dog, then there is precious little to keep him from wanting to kill me, especially since I am incredibly annoying. (I am told this frequently by patients. And other people.) Thankfully, we were cancelled while staging in the area. I do not know if Fido lived or not. Hopefully, he was not murdered, and it was all a big misunderstanding. 

  That's it, folks! I hope things are going amazing for you. Feel free to tell me all about it! 

  Happy Stitching (please stitch extra on my behalf!)!

  Emmy 

Hello, Friends!

   I truly thought that I would do a much better job of keeping in touch you, but we can see how that has gone. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that none of you are surprised; while we have never met in person that I know of, you seem to understand me better than I understand myself. I'm glad someone does at least!

  School has been busy, but good. My nursing professor is super cool, and my classmates are like a second family. When I got into EMS, everyone talked about how your coworkers are your family- they really aren't. A select few, sure, but not everyone like "they" said. But this class? Very much so. The only time I have felt so safe before is with select family, friends, and youns. Its a weird, but really nice feeling. Like being cuddled in a fuzzy blanket with a cat on your lap while watching it snow outside. I'll try to post occasional updates of random things that I have learned- that counts as studying, right?

  My house is coming along. Dad (bless his heart) has gotten almost all of the electricity ran inside the house, and the plumber finished almost all of hte inside stuff week before last. I'm hoping he shows up this week to finish tying in the water line and sewage (I really can't decide which one of those is more important). If all goes well, I can hopefully hire someone to do the insulation (I'm going with blow-in foam insulation) soon! Between you and me, I seriously hoping that I can move in over Christmas break. I have no idea if that is realistic, but that would be so amazing!!!!!!!

  On a similar note, does anyone know how to find a handyman, or whatever the proper term is nowadays? I am not really  able to help with school, and it isn't fair to ask my Dad to keep working on my house. If I can hire a handyman to take care of the necessitites, that will move up the move in date, and my Dad might actually let himself sleep more than 5 hours. 

  I'm very needy today; I have yet another question for you, my friends. A good friend from my class got married on Saturday. Does anyone know of any affordible embroidery or cross stitch kits for a newly married couple that would be a quick stitch? All suggestions would be appreciated!

  We had an interesting call a little bit ago. A young man was moving trash when he stuck his arm through an old window, resulting in a nice laceration to his R wrist. He had a makeshift tourniquet on, and the officer had placed his tourniquet on. We took the makeshift one off, and placed another one of ours. He ended up getting TXA, and brought to Springfield. A nice bit of excitement for the day!

  Whelp, I guess thats all she wrote! I hope youns have an amazing Labor Day (I forgot that was today until I got to work- time and half, woo hoo!!!!), and I look forward to hearing what you have been up to!

  Happy Stitching!

  Emmy