Jaybird310

I don't sleep a lot anyway, I've always been a victim of insomnia. But my sleep patterns were completely jacked in nursing school. I'd come home from class or clinicals and sleep for an hour or two, the get up study, do care plans, etc, for about 6 hours or so then sleep another couple of hours and get up and start my day all over again.

A basic tear like that you're looking at probably 6-8 weeks. And when I went back I didn't go back to the ER for 2 months after that, I did med surg so minimize the stress on my knee. Depends on your personal recovery really. I suffered a knee injury far worse than yours and was out of work for 6 almost 7 months. My injury as I said though was far worse what then what you had I suffered a completely torn MCL (which retracted up), a partially torn PCL and a partially torn ACL and a blown Meniscus sack. On top of a broken leg. It required 2 surgeries and they had to pin my knee back together. I was bed ridden for the 1st month and on crutches for 2 months after that before I could even start physically therapy. 3 years later I still deal with knee pain. The best advice I can give you is even after you're healed and done with the physical therapy keep your knee healthy and strong. I do a lot of the stuff I used to do in PT at home on my own.

Ultram's not a placebo for pain relief. And there have been cases of people becoming addicted to Ultram. It's less likely to be abused than narcs but shouldn't be used as a placebo. And for me personally I prefer Ultram over narcs because narcs make me extremely ill most of the time.

If this is a true statement then my fiancee would have to do some serious convincing if she really wanted this man delivering our baby. The idea of a misogynistic OB delivering my child and handling my pregnant fiancee just makes me uncomfortable.

My first question is why didn't he discuss this with you on your first visit? Most of this type of thing was discussed with my fiancee and me when we had our first appointment with the OB that would be delivering our baby (she was living in another state when we first found out she was pregnant and after telling her doctor she planned to move 4 months into the pregnancy, he didn't feel like discussing birthing issues and proceedure was nesscary). Now my second question is why was the paper handed to your husband and not you? I know personally that I feel like all of that information should be presented to my fiancee. While some of the things we might need to discuss, she is the one who will actually be going through labor, not me. It almost seems like a sexist move. That action actually makes me more uncomfortable than the whole issue with the birth plan. If you're not comfortable with it find a new doctor. That's the best advice anyone could give you. I know after something like this my fiancee and I would have to have a long discussion about if this was the right doctor for us.

It sounds like the program you're talking about requires that you're in school to aquire an RN or an advanced nursing degree. I'm not sure but being that it has requirements on testing and getting recomendations from nursing instructors. I'd stop transferring balances from card to card, my parents played the balance tranfer trap for years and it never did them any good. You could also look into 'cash out' refinancing to pay down your bills. But like you said refinancing has it's downfalls and your equity is almost used up so I'm not sure if that would even be an option for you. Keep your head up though.

The mentality of your ex husband is very different from what the OP is dealing with in her husbands worries. I was very much exposed to the kind of mentality your ex husband has through various male family members and actually had a touch of it myself. It was part of the reason I went into nursing. That mentality and my abandonment complex lead me to want to grow up very fast. And when I started college all I wanted to do was marry my then girlfriend and have a family. When I started college she was still in high school and I didn't encourage her to go to college at all. I didn't want my wife to have to work and I wanted her to stay at home and raise babies. It was partially that mentality that cost me that relationship. The next serious relationship I got into was with a very independent single mother who was 4 years old than I was and she changed a lot of things about my mentality. She actually kicked my ass in line and I was actually in love with her enough to change. That relationship didn't work out either but I'm grateful I dated her and don't have a negative thing to say about her. Infact we still speak occasionally and without her changing my mentality I wouldn't be where I am now. My fiancee is also a very independent woman, she's also educated and insists on working. And I'm absolutely, completely head over heels in love with her and know without a doubt that she's who I want for the rest of my life. And you want to talk about the tables turning in fact when she has our baby, the plan is for her to become the main provider and for me to cut back to part time and focus more on school while being a somewhat stay at home dad. Now that I've rambled on about that I have a twist on the OPs unsupportive spouse question. How about other guys have any of you experience wives with the jealousy issues because you work in a mainly female workplace? Or do any of you ladies happen to have given your old man grief over being a nurse?

I'm with the majority in saying I wouldn't give it. I actually had a patient who was a drug seeker hit me because he thought I was giving him a placebo pill. And to whoever had the orders to narcan the pt until family makes them a DNR that doctor shouldn't be practicing in my opinion.

Scrubs is about the closest scripted show you'll get actually hospital life, even though I'm not a huge Scrubs fan. I personally LOVE House, and it can be accurate at times as well. I also love Grey's Anatomy but most of the scandalous behavior seen there just doesn't happen. I'll be the first to tell you that I've flirted with female co workers before, it was always when I had first started or they had first started but it never went anything past harmless flirting. The closest I've ever come to scandalous behavior at work was spending two months flirting with an X-Rays Tech only to find out she was engaged. But I did make the mistake of telling the girl I was kinda of seeing at the time and she wasn't happy at all. Though I told her to make her jealous in all honesty. Most men, myself included, are jealous by nature. So maybe his comparisons come from the possibility that he might be slightly jealous because he sees you working with guys who look like Patrick Dempsey, Eric Dane etc...

I actually have liked my co workers at every hospital I've worked. A few months back I did have an issue with one, as some of you might remember, but that was due to her behavior and she ended up getting fired. But other than that I've never really had problems with my co workers. I work nights and always have for the most part and at the hospital I'm at now I came into not only a new job but had just moved to a town where I literally knew no one at all within a 4hr radius. So some of my co workers here are both co workers and really good friends. A few of them have already put in for time off to go to my wedding in New Orleans in August and we haven't even sent out invitations yets lol. Liking your co workers makes work more enjoyable and while I'm not going to tell you there aren't those few that occasionally get on my nerves, all in all I like them. Now it's a different story with some of the nurses on the day shifts that I work with from time to time...

Tell your husband he watches too much television lol. Hospital work is very rarely anything like what it's protrayed on television and he's stereotyping based on fiction. My fiancee jokes with me about it because up until I met her a lot of the older nurses I worked with wanted me to date their daughters. Apparently being nice looking, stable and taking care of people for a living made me some kind of rare catch I don't know. But I've never really dealt with this. The worst I had to deal with was my dad freaking out when I told him I was going into nursing instead of staying pre med. He was convinced everyone was going to think I was gay. And I told him he watched too much television much as you should tell you husband.

I'm very much on the younger end of nurses at 25 (though I've been a working nurse for almost 5 years) but at 45 you're really not that old for a nurse. I've seen new grads that were in your age bracket. Did you have any issues with co workers or your new manager? Outside of the handwashing thing, which sounds BS to me, you made some mistakes but as nurses we all make mistakes. Can these mistake make your firing legit, sure, but I've seen nurses make far worse mistakes and keep their jobs. You mentioned making 'unprofessional comments' most people make unprofessional comments from time to time but had you ever made them in the ear shot of someone who might have been offended? It doesn't seem to me like your age has a lot to do with it. And as for trying to replace for that so they could bring in a younger crew of new hires or new grads, most managers know that new grad especially don't always have that long of a shelf life, and a new hire regardless of experience or age is always a risk as opposed to a proven stable employee. The best advice, take your experience and move on, even with this firing you should be able to find another job.

Are you doing a BSN or an AND program? I know a buddy of is on the last of his pre reqs for his AND and he hasn't had it take chemistry. So if it's an AND maybe you could look at other programs in your area and see if your credits would transfer to one that didn't require chemistry. If it's a BSN and you have to have chemistry (which I did in mine) have you tried getting a chemistry tutor? I don't reccomend an LVN to RN program all that's going to do is make it take 2 twice as long to get your RN.

I don't know exactly how much credit card debt you have but have you tried calling the credit card company and seeing about getting your interest rate reduced? This could lower your payments and help you out. I personally don't carry much credit card debt after watching my parent aquired mountains of it I swore I'd never do that to myself. But I know of several people who have called and worked things out with the credit card companies, and all it took was just a phone call. The only company I know of that has been unwilling to work with anyone I know is Bank of America. I do recommend going back to school for your RN that will benefit you both financially and with job security. You can look into grants and programs that pay for your schooling. A lot of hospitals also offer tuition reimbursment for RN. Some will even pay for your schooling if you work for them while in school and agree to work for them when finished. I don't recommend that though unless you are absolutely certain things in your life will not be changing. I'm doing that to pay for my grad school. A decision I made when the only person I had to think about was myself, now I'm engaged with a baby on the way. Now as much as we'd like to move back home once I'm done with school, I'm tied to where I am for the next five years unless I want to pay back the hospital and pay them back quickly.

I started going back to school for my pediatric nurse practitioner this past fall. I worked as a nurse for about 4 years before going back to school, mostly in the ER. I made the switch to a pediatric ED about a year before going back to school. My decision to go back to school was made based on several things. When I orginally started my undergrad I wanted to be a doctor, so about the same time I changed jobs I also started taking bridge courses and preparing for the MCATs. However shortly into my semester of bridge courses I suffered the loss of my cousin who was only 16 and incredibly close to me. This made me completely reevaluate every aspect of my life. I came to the decision that not only did I need to make some changes and find somewhat of a fresh start, but that I was happy as a nurse and felt as if I would make more of an impact advancing in nursing than I would as a doctor. So I dropped out of my bridge courses and began focusing on applying to NP programs. Months later I uprooted my life, packed all my stuff and headed back to school ten hours away from the place I'd called home for most of my life. It was been both one of the best and most trying decisions of my life. And much like the poster above me the support of my loved ones has played a big role in what's kept me going at time. Ironically the uprooting of my life, lead to the uprooting of my fiancee's life as well. We met about two months before I moved and played the long distance game for a time (which added stress). Now she's moved her with me and we're expecting a baby boy in June. Sometimes it feels like I've bitten off more than I can chew but I'll be damned if I'm going to spit any of it out.

I work in ER and have for most of my nursing career. I'm an insomniac and not someone who's naturally needs a lot of sleep. Long shifts are never fun and personally anything after 15 hrs (which I pull or come close to pulling at least once a week) I wouldn't consider a good idea. Fatigue, and just a general lack of focus comes into play for me around the 15hr mark. I've pulled quite a few 15-16 hour shifts due to under staffing and call ins. I've also been subjected to emergency situation hospital lock downs where you're 12hr on shift and then 12 hr on call while sleeping at the hospital. My longest single shift ever was 17.65 hrs (per time clock and it wasn't under 'normal' curcumstances). A 12hr shift is long enough but it's rare my shifts are only 12 hrs.

I didn't read all the other posts. But I totally feel the OP sometimes. I had to stay for a meeting this morning after a 12hr night shift, despite the fact that my fiancee and I were leaving to pick up friends in Knoxville and then back home to New Orleans for the Mardi Gras weekend. Thank God I don't mid her driving my truck :) Sometimes the meeting times suck but you just have to suck it up and deal.

I laughed a little at this title because I can totally understand. My fiancee gets 'jealous' of a lot of my habits (if it were just allnurses that'd be the least of the evils haha) and she's currently trying to break me of my 'bachelor and loner' ways. It's cute. We're still getting the hang of living together, it's very awkward.

1) Pay attention and STUDY first and foremost. Learn that until you are finished with nursing school your head will stay in a book and everything else will have to be dealt with once you're finished studying. 2) If you don't have thick skin, grow it and grow it quickly. I have very thick skin and there were times I had instructors make me want to cry. On several occasions I ended up the shoulder to someone who was crying 3) Be organized or at least as organized as you can possible be. This will help you in several areas of school and work 4) Learn to get along with your fellow students, you will have to work with them often and they're going to be great for support. 5) I don't know if this is helpful to you but in nursing school we had a mantra that "77 = RN" I.E. You cannot ace nursing school. Just do the best you can.

I've been a smoker since I was 15, I managed to quit for a about a year but then I moved here to Kentucky and in the stress of moving and not knowing anyone I picked the habit back up. I like a couple of other posters actually enjoy smoking. Plus with the anti smoking laws around here, it gives me an excuse to go outside and get away from groups sometimes. Now I'm at a point in my life where I want to quit and have to quit. My lifelong non smoker fiancee has just moved in with me and she's pregnant so I'm quitting for my family. Now does anyone here have advice on how to stay quit? Because through the year that I was quit the awful craving never went away.

Yea I've been assured by all my friends up here this isn't normal. I'm not worried about myself, I'm gonna be a nervous wreck next week when my girl starts working up here, she's got to commute over Louisville from Lexington. That's when getting to work in the weather will bother me. But the storms and cold sure don't sit well with my Louisiana blood either. Luckily driving in mud kinda helps you prepare for ice.

I didn't read through all the posts, but I know getting to work in my area has been hell this week. I'm from Louisiana and this is my first winter in Kentucky, so I had the learn to adapt quickly. It usually takes me about 25 mins to get to work and with the ice on the roads it's taken me anywhere from 45mins to an hour to get there. They excused people being late the 1st day but after that we were all expected to adapt. My poor pregnant fiancee moved up here from Louisiana Monday and she hasn't even attempted to leave the house. She told me today if I were anyone else she'd have hightailed it back to Louisiana already.

My heart goes out to you. I've had an HIV scared due to a needle stick before and that was horrifying. Lucky for me the patients test turned out to be a false positive. Keep your head, it's not the end of the world. With modern medicine plenty of HIV+ patients are living perfectly normal lives.

I work either 3-12s or 2-12s and 2-8s. This usually includes at least one weekend shift a month. Trust me in ER you'll never want to work 6 straight 12s. Rarely are my 12s actually 12s they usually end up being more like 13-15s, unless I have class and have to get out of there on time then I'm lucky enough to have coworkers that'll pick up the slack.

LOL I know exactly how you feel. I've been in ER (minus a brief stint in med surg after being out of work with an injury for a while) since I got my license 4 years ago (almost 5). It's certainly very rewarding and if you're that excited about it go for it. ER needs more good nurses who are this excited about their job! 4 years later and it's still a passion for me, though I've found that I enjoy peds ER just as much. You think you love it now wait until you handle your first trama as a nurse! Good luck!