Memories of nursing school.....

[wv_nurse 2003]

I was reading through some of the new posts, and one about being humiliated for being late for class just brought back all kinds of memories from nursing school.

We had a girl in our class that was ALWAYS (I mean every class without exception) at least 15-20 minutes late for class. She would litterally blow in, dropping papers, apologizing, but always having some grand tale of why she was late (which she chose to share with everyone--right then). Her car broke down, she had to stop and assist at an accident, her hair wasn't right the first time she did it (yikes!), her neighbor needed CPR (I am not exaggerating!), her coat got caught in her car door, and she couldn't reach her keys to unlock the door ! I don't know how she survived these daily traumas! It drove me insane, but the instructor never said a word--she did eventually fail, because after she did get to class 50% of the time she would then fall asleep!

Another fellow-student was the ultimate "anal retentive" nursing student. She would collect at least 3 different students notes after class--take them home, transcribe them --color coded--!!

Anyone else have funny stories of nursing school? I'd love to hear them!

[frannybee]

:chuckle

[DIPLOMATICRN4HIRE, MSN, RN]

I laugh as I say this Im a color coder...... I have to... My mind goes in so many directions at once, if I color things it keeps in tract. I even use it now working on my other degrees.... Its still funny though.

Was only late once, and of course it was with the Hilter of the instructors I had. I hit a deer on the way to school, my car looked like I had run it through a meat grinder but I did what I could and moved the deer off the road with assistance from the man behind me, and we pulled my front quarter panel off my tire so I could contiue on to school. I was covered blood, dirt. I was filthy and was too far from the house to turn back it would have just made it worse for me, so I drove on into class. I sat outside the door waiting for break so I could enter the class. The Instructor made it a point that she would embarrass me as I entered. On how I was late, and it was inexcusable and I had no excuse worthy of her ears, how she would dock my grade for it as well. Then she looked up. There I was covered, blood on me, disshoveled, and a nervous wreck. One of the other students went to another instructor and mentioned what happend to me. The other instructor came in and brought me some scrubs to change in, called her husband to come look at my car to make sure it was ok. I didnt see Hitler that afternoon, but I did see the Dean of Students..... She had also heard what occured. I had never once been tardy. She excused me for the day and gathered my assignments and made sure I called her when I got home. Im glad that I didnt change , Im glad I looked like hell warmed over, and Im glad the instructor had a nice chat with the Dean of Students...

Zoe

[NiteNurseRN]

Boy, do I remember! For one thing, I am HOH, wear hearing aids, and had a hard time in class taking lecture notes. I had to wait til the teacher moved away from the board to see what she had written, plus she had her back to me so some of the words were hard to hear.

One time in class, we were talking about saline locks. Someone changed the subject, & the next thing I heard was "sublingual". I said, "Ewwww, a sublingual Saline Lock! That must have hurt!" Everyone ROARED, fell out of their seats and laughed their butts off Totally!! I had to laugh too.

I had a MEAN teacher who was always not around in clinicals. One time I said (when I saw her in the hallway), "Oh there you are. I was looking for you." The teacher said, "What are you insinuating? That I just Left you there, abandoned you, what do you mean?" Finally, I just told her, "No, I must have looked in the wrong place." She kept the pressure on me, told me I wasn't going to make it, etc. I just got in her face and said, "YES I AM."

I went through LVN & RN school. I've heard someone say they'd rather be in a car wreck than go through Nursing School again. I do not regret the choice I made and I always do everything I can to help NSG. students when ever they show up at the hospital.

P.S. I didn't become a nurse until I turned 40. I'm 49 now.:imbar

[ERNurse752, RN]

My A&P prof was talking about purulent drainage one day, telling us to always use the word "purulent," and then wrote on the board, "xxx," telling us to never, ever use that word...we about lost it.

[MidwifeWannaB]

I am a current first semester AD student and I really don't have any good stories yet, but I just wanted to say that I have laughed harder reading these posts than I have in a couple of weeks. I'm starting to feel stressed out and worried that I'm not gonna make it through this madness called nursing school, but reading these posts has helped me feel so much better. Thank y'all! I know I'm gonna make it, and when I'm through I'll have so many experiences that I can look back on and just LAUGH.........

aimee

[Lab]

I was in my first clinical rotation at age 17 in a diploma school about maybe 25 yrs~I was observing in the OR~MY surprise was the patient was talking as they started the surgery! No one talked about anesthesia before this observation. I was torn between telling everyone in the room that the patient was still awake -vrs- keeping quiet. Thank goodness I kept quiet! But I still remember how foolish I felt!

[joannep]

I am looking at a group photo of my nursing class as I am writing this. Looking at each face brings back memories. Two of my group died when they were in their mid to late 20's and so there are bitter sweet memories.

However, the funiest thing was our A&P lecturer who split his trousers while he was teaching us, and we were too embarrassed to tell him. He was really mad at us the next time we saw him for not telling him, but we were all so embarrassed.

[Coytoy]

There was a big discussion in class about students missing clinicals and the instructors were not happy. Later that day I told my instructor that I would have to have been in a car wreck or dead for me to miss a clinical. NOTE TO SELF:DO NOT TEMPT FATE.

Anyways, I was on my way to a midterm conference about a month later when a big SUV crashed into my Escort at 65 miles an hour. My car was totaled and I escaped with a slight concussion.

Got home after the police report was made, the car towed, and a friend had picked me up and taken me home. The message light on the answering machine was blinking. I listen to the message and it is my instructor saying "Lisa you stood me up. You have probally been in a car accident or are now dead". She just about died when I called her back and told her that I had been in a serious car wreck. Told me to take it easy. The next class day I had the police report in my hand and offered it to her. She said "Oh no, I am so sorry I left that message. You do not need to show me that". But as she said that she had taken the report and proceeded to read it. She was very nice to me after that.

[rachel h, BSN, RN]

Oh god... this post just brought back many a memory...

We had this one girl in my class who was Miss Know-it-all (I'm sure every class has theirs). She would interrupt every lecture at least a dozen times to correct/ question the instructor who was giving lecture. It was incredibly irritating!

It got to the point that just her raising her hand caused half the class to roll their eyes in unison...

[rnparrot]

nursing school has a lot of very fond and funny memories for me. my most embarrassing moment was in clinical...i go into the pts room to change the iv bag, and not thinking, i pulled the spike out while the bag was still hanging! needless to say i got soaked and highly embarrassed. i think every nursing class has one or 2 memorable students that were so obnoxious it made if worth while to go to class to see what dumb stupid comments were going to come out of their mouth next. this one girl...NO MATTER what we were discussing...she ALWAYS knew someone that had it. it could be just an aunt...or her boyfriends, mothers cousin's sister....LOL........and she just couldn't wait to wear scrubs!!! she thought she would be so cool in them. i would like to think that she never passed her nclex, because she would be the nurse from hell if she walked in your room!

[karenG]

well, my memories are a bit different. we lived in the nurses home during our training..........which was fun! 18 and away from home! we had a home sister who sat and watched who came in and out and boys were not allowed in! at least not between 9-5! once went to a party being held at the local police station. we had no way of getting home and being worse for the wear, asked for a lift home. we were given a lift home in a police van, and as they approached the nurses home, they put the sirens and lights on! it was all round the hospital the next day that my group had been arrested for being drunk and disorderly!!! that sealed our reputation for the rest of our training!!!!!!

Karen

[Pamelita]

I had an awesome time when I was in nursing school. I took a picture after each clinical we had and I had them all in my album. I will never forget when I was in cardiac rotation and we were at post conference and my instructor told us that she had a serious announcement to say... everybody was worried... maybe something we did wrong.. she said. Guys, the staff and even family members have complained about one of you because you are WEARING A THONG!!!!! everybody started laughing nonstop! it was true, there was this girl a pretty girl that will wear her thongs and put her tuck her shirt inside so you could see it. It was so funny, all my male friends were like oh my God ! my secret came to light! making fun of the girl, but she was so embarrased because everybody new it was her. I have so many memories with patients, like when I was terrified of taking care of Vent patients, who would have known that I would be a respiratory nurse working with VENTS NOW!!!!! ha,ha