annie.z

Week 5 so far! My preceptor is awesome and super knowledgeable. I'm so thankful because I'm more of a hands on learner and 1:1 explanations work so much better for me than class lectures. I've been doing a lot of things by myself so far. We've only had 1 or 2 REALLY critical patients, those times she just had be do 1:1 with them. But so far, despite the unit being a little "slower" than the upcoming months, it's a great opportunity to get my time management and documentation skills down pat before as she says it "shiiieeeetttt hits the fan!" I love it! I am sooo grateful to be where I am now, but anyone else feel like their brain is about to explode with all of the information that's being packed into our brains?? I don't feel like I've every stopped studying for something this whole time haha. I'm having issues incorporating/processing the hemodynamic information too! Does anyone have any tips on how to make things easier to understand?? I haven't had a change to read the Hemodynamic document on ICUFaqs to see if it would make more sense to me there.

Almost done with my first week of orientation! Not on the unit yet though, that will start on tuesday. Everyone in my cohort is a little nervous about the BKAT that we have to take next week. I don't care if my manager said it's just an "assessment" and not a test, I still consider it a test. Makes me want to study all weekend on everything in life, even though they told us specifically not to. Otherwise I'm excited! We are going to be oriented to the classroom part of orientation on monday and learn how to use ECCO. Besides the test I'm looking forward to being able to move around the floor. My cohort is all experienced nurses (2 with step down experience and 1 with med/surg experience) I'm the only new grad between the two critical care units! Eeekk. Hope everyone's orientation is going well! Any recommendations on study material? I know there is a lot of info in the forums, based on that I rented the ICU book and have the Critical Care made Incredibly easy books :)

Everything is posted online but 2 weeks after all my online stuff went up (2 days post NCLEX) I got a paper license in the mail! I was pleasantly surprised since I didn't expect to get a paper copy.

Just got the official call today that I got the job in the ICU at an awesome local hospital. I'm so siked! This is my dream job and the hospital is great! Everything and everyone has been nothing short of spectacular so far. I start the end of the month (just in time for 2 weeks notice!). Congrats to all of my fellow new graduate ICU nurses! :)

I start august 30th! I'm kind of excited but more nervous than excited. Gotta get crackalackin on all of my homework nowww

EXACTLY the same. Just different cover (soft cover vs hard cover) but all of the material, page numbers etc., EXACTLY the same :) I always try to get international edition. Mine have always turned out to be soft cover so it's SO MUCH more lighter than the original textbook. Easier to transport to class

Thanks for the tips! I'll definetly look into NBs I actually just bought a small lunch tupperware set off of amazon (yay free shipping via prime!) that fits my vertical lunchbox. Can't wait until it comes in! Just wondering, how is everyone losing weight? I've been a low carb-er/keto-er for a little over half a year now and I find that it works for me. Just curious about everyone else. Maybe swap quick recipes :)

Congrats! I got my acceptance letter the first friday of May. It was during finals week so I was already stressed like none other and anxiously waiting for my letter didn't help. (I sprouted white hairs like weeds, my friend called them forests -___-) But yeah every day that week, when I came home from work the first thing I would do would be open the mail box. That friday I happened to get off work early and when I arrived, so did my mailwoman. I greeted her and she held out a huge stack of envelopes for me, none of which were from the college. I started to turn away but she told me to wait and sign for a large letter so I turned back around. I started to sweat (it didn't help that it was insanely hot that day either) when I saw it was from my college. I ripped it open then and there and then when I saw the first line telling me that I was accepted I skipped/ran down the driveway and called my mom to tell her the good news. ....now that I think about it. My mailwoman probably thought I was crazy. lol oh wells.

I just purchased mine in Peach! I was tied between Ocean blue and Peach but I figured, might as well be unique since it seems like a lot of people in my program got some type of blue or teal :)

congrats on your weight loss so far! only 14 more lbs to go!

Why are scrubs from Dove so expensive?? It the quality superior or something?? Our uniform, top(17$) and bottom(19$), only cost 36$. That's still way less than your top!

Hi Samantha! I actually go to an ADN program in Maryland :)

I think if you think those classes will help you become a better nurse go for it! As for gpa boosting, I guess it would depend on your current GPA. If it's not as high as you would like then put an easy A course in there. If not so much then stick to the classes you have and do your best :) I'm currently doing the same but I'm opting for the easy A course because it relaxes me (ceramics 2) in the midst of all of the nursing school stress. :)

eep! this thread is so inspiring. It gets me super excited about my first day! I start on August 30th! I have yet to get started on my reading but after reading this thread, I'm going to hop on that! Thanks for posting everyone! I'll get to post my own First Day story soon :)

I'm buying 2 pairs because I have clinicals 2x a week. So one for each day. My school's uniforms are surprisingly inexpensive (I think at least) since the local scrub store has a contract with them where students get a 25%+ discount on the school uniforms and an extra 20% off on everything else in the store. Not too shabby of a deal :)