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 :)

So far I've only spent 350$ on my books. Which is great compared to my school's 700$ for if you buy through the book store. I use bigwords.com and they compile a list of textbook sites that sell used books and lists them in order of price. I also saved a bundle buying my major nursing fundamentals book in international edition. It's 1500+ pages but because it's international edition, it's soft cover so it's MUCH lighter than my hard cover books. ....now time to spend the money I saved on uniforms and such

I want my own place and a stable jobbbbbbb! That's all I want right now. After those two then I'll think about other things I want.

Yes we should! I'm a little sad to see that not any recent Weight Loss threads are that active. Maybe we should start one On another note I purchased a cute lunchbag to take with me to class, but I'm on the lookout for small containers to separate my lunch and my snacks (or else i'd eat them all in one sitting! ) Does anyone have any recommendations? Also does anyone have recs for running shoes? I currently own a pair of asics but because I have a low arch and wide feet the sort of cut off circulation to my toes after running/jogging for so long.

I have the same dilemma as you. I start NS in the fall also but I feel that if you pack your own lunch, monitor the amount of calories to intake and try to work out a few times a week you'll be fine. My friends in NS who have gained weight, from what I can see, are always unprepared. They never plan their meals ahead so whenever they have breaks they dash over to the 7-11 across the street to grab some junk food. And when they're not studying they don't bother to go to the gym because they'd rather go online or go party because they haven't in a while. Me, I'm planning on packing my own lunch and going to the gym daily before class. It'll be hard but if I manage my time I think I'll be fine. I think you'll be fine too :)

woah staples sells stethoscopes!? I need to check out my local staples besides the point, online medisave seems to be the cheapest including shipping so I'm most likely going to get mine there! :)

thanks so much! I just signed up and placed an order yesterday and it's already shipped out today!

Another great place to buy your books online if you have the ISBN numbers handy is BIGWORDS.COM That site pretty much takes all of the online bookstores and compiles a list of which site has your books and for what price in order of cheapest to highest. They even have the rental stores like Chegg and stores like amazon, ebay and such. I've found it super helpful because I've paid a total of $200 for all of my textbooks for my first semester of NS this fall and our school book store bundles all of the books for $500+. Eeepp! Another tip that I have is to try to get the international editions of your book. Some books have international editions which are EXACTLY the same as the edition that you have EXCEPT it's in soft cover and it's more than 50% cheaper than the standard edition. Soft cover = less heavy&cheaper so it's a win-win situation :) It's a little more work to find international editions because they have a different ISBN, but it's well worth it! My Nursing Fundamentals book even as an international edition/soft-cover weighs 20lbs! Imagine if it were hard-cover

thanks so much for the helpful information oi812! And congrats on finishing your first semester of NS! On a different note, what kind of stethoscopes do all of the students have? I'm planning on getting a littman classic SE but my friend said the cheapo ones that come in the kit works decent too. I'm just worried about losing an expensive one amongst students.

i believe at the orientation they said that uniforms should only be worn during clinicals and the lab coat in lab. Don't go to lecture in your uniform.

I have the same question as Ladybug15 too. How easy are these to clean? I know they're not like crocs where you can just wipe them down. Do you throw them in the washer?