Newborn Fix

Awesomeness

I just finished a meeting with my future boss. I was a little nervous cause according to the boss lady I spoke with thursday I had to discuss with him that I might not be licensed by the state by the start date.

I’m not going to go into details about the meeting because we all know writing about work is a bad idea… it was awesome though. I am seriously so excited I can hardly stand myself right now. The bottom line with the license stuff from the state is he’s not worried about it and wants me anyway and said “we’ll make it work”. I AM SO EXCITED. I wouldn’t even say this is my first choice of job, this is like better than I even hoped for. I had been a little nervous about meeting with him because I emailed back and forth with him a few times over the weekend and he told me he had interviewed 13 people already and hadn’t found anyone that fit his expectations so wanted to meet and go over things to be sure I wanted to sign on. I was like “geez what are these expectations” but the meeting wasn’t really like that and I clearly still had the job offer throughout and he’s not really one who readily broadcasts emotions but it seemed like he was really hoping I would accept the position. I did. It will be perfect. I would have taken a job at an urgent care place but I’m just SO much more excited about working in an ER. I thought to get in with this company I’d need to be willing to travel super far, or float to lots of places, or work at an urgent care – but I’ve been offered a spot at an ER that’s the closest to my house, no floating, and no nights. There’s 1 NP there daily and there’s another 1.5 people that are being hired and me and the other 1 person will be in charge of making our own schedules so one of us is there each day. I actually know the other person who has been offered a position and like her very much, he said she hadn’t accepted yet but hoped she would and I know half of the doctors who will be working there and like them all very much, so essentially – I think it’s going to be AWESOME. I am SO EXCITED.

The only bad part is it’s all fairly hush hush right now so I’ve told Hubbin, and my parents, and my MIL and that’s IT. I was DESPERATE to talk about it at work because there’s lots of gossip about who will be taking the positions and people are also very curious what I’ll be doing after I graduate and I’ve had to keep playing dumb when I actually want to be giddy with joy and jumping around screaming. My intention is to wait until it’s obvious my future boss has told someone that I’ve been hired, I don’t really want to be the one to break the news to anyone cause I don’t want to get in trouble or off to a bad start PR wise. It is SO HARD to keep my mouth shut because I’m (again) SO EXCITED!!!!!!!!!!

Excuses

I joined a little weight loss team through work in January. It’s not that I’ve gained toooons of weight, but I have gained about 10lbs. Should be easy enough. But it’s only the 2nd week in February and I’ve already fallen off the wagon. 

Maybe I’m just making excuses for myself but I just think I’m too A: stressed/anxious from school and B: too depressed from infertility. 

I have good days and bad days, surely, but… life itself is just too overwhelming these days. I know working out regularly would help with so many aspects of my life I mean, it’s good for stress, it’s good for lots of things, I just. I can’t. That in turn makes me feel guilty too. 

My excuse last spring was that school was just waaay too crazy, no really, working full time, 150 clinical hours and 9 credits. WTF was I thinking?! Then I started working out at the end of the semester and promptly injured my achilles. For which the only real treatment seems to be rest. It didn’t start feeling better until August for real — then — well I don’t have an excuse. I feel like the infertility thing has been depressing me all along, but August/September is when we finally went for testing & were diagnosed with unexplained infertility. I have a hard time telling if I was as depressed then as I am now, but I might have been. I think I cried each month before we finished testing, I can’t really remember, I know I’ve cried each month when we failed again since.

I think depression now is what’s really affecting my motivation when it comes to both exercise and school. Of course, it could just be that I am D-O-N-E with school. Emotionally anyway. School can just NOT be over fast enough right now. 

I think these are definitely reasons why I’m so irritable all the time. And just want to be alone. Always. I feel like I could be alone and do nothing for days and it might make me feel better.

I’d like to lose weight. I’d like to exercise regularly again so I can feel good about myself and the way I look. It’s hard to explain, but I’m just too overwhelmed by the basics of life right now to work towards goals or feel motivated in anyway. I feel like I just need to finish school, and then things will start getting better…. I hope that’s how it goes. 

Questioning my Judgement

Sometimes I question my own judgement and wonder how I ended up in the healthcare profession. My old job in the lab was really perfect for my temperament, I could arrive at work in the morning, nod a greeting to my coworkers, put on my headphones and not interact with a human the rest of the day if that was my so choosing… I don’t really like people. I don’t like talking to people I don’t know. I don’t like making small talk. I don’t like meeting new people. Lots of types of people irritate me for no particular reason. I sometimes wonder how I ended up going into a field where I constantly need to be interacting with people who I don’t know and may be irritating to me? I really like my job as an ER nurse, although I’m not sure I’d like nursing as much if I had to tolerate the same patient for days at a time rather than a few hours at a clip. I think this is what I don’t really like about my clinicals in primary care. You have to sit and talk with these people who have a whole list of issues that might just be occurring to them because you’re there, you need to pretend like you’re interested and concerned,  and then you have to try and fix their problems.

We all know my mother in law is very nice, but sometimes her mere presence is irritating to me. I sometimes wonder if this is a side effect of my job being against my inherent temperament. I don’t really like interacting with people, I spend all day at work doing it, then on my day off I just want to be alone and left alone.

I met my friend for spinning this morning, made a brief stop to get some groceries and then headed home. We have a driveway that fits 3 cars side by side, that’s on a very busy road. My MILs car, which is now dead is taking up 1 space. Then there’s two spaces in front of each garage space. I’m driving down the busy road to our house and there’s some huge buick SUV parked in the middle of the two spots so I can’t A: park in the driveway or B: pull my car into the garage. Our street isn’t really one that you can park on even temporarily, so I had to drive right on by the house and turn around to make another pass thinking I’ll park in our grass until I figure out what moron thinks they need to take up our WHOLE fucking driveway, and how long they intend to do it. So, already, I’m grouchy. I pull into the yard and put my car in park, just as my MIL and another older woman come out the front door. My MIL introduces me to her friend, who’s taking her out to lunch. Great. The woman says, “Oh. I guess I parked in the wrong spot” I didn’t say anything — but my FIRST thought was, “well it’s not that you parked in the wrong spot per say, you just parked in ALL OF THEM”… I didn’t say anything. But of course after the left and I set about relocating my vehicle I’m even more grouchy than I started out being.

I feel guilty that my MIL doesn’t even really need to DO anything to irritate me. She might just move a random thing, or do something else I perceive as stupid and it sets me off on an internal mental dialogue of cursing and bitching.

Sometimes I wonder if the fact that I need to interact with so many people at my job all the time contributes to how tired I am after a day of work. I mean, 12 hours is a long time to be doing anything, but I’m always dead on my feet by the time I go to bed. Good thing I’m contemplating this with 4 months left before I finish the NP program! HA!

But Wait!

But wait! I have good news that I completely forgot to address yesterday! (and two blog posts in two days, wow, I need to get ahold of myself!) 

My mother in law, who is slowly driving me crazy since she’s somewhat homebound due to lack of driving…. Discovered the Senior Citizens Center 1 community over! I mentioned to Hubbin that what she *really* needed was a senior citizens center like my grandma had. My grandma and her boyfriend were at the senior citizens center DAILY, they went, had lunch, played bingo, had parties. That’s what she needed, we were kind of getting to the point in our house where she was UBER cranky and bitchy and meddling with us because she was expecting us to provide 100% of her social entertainment. Hubbin went to see a movie by himself last weekend while I was at work and when I got home hours later she was still pissed. He was feeling kind of guilty and I said “no no no, we are providing her a warm place to live, we make sure she’s fed, we make sure she is as safe as we possibly can given her lack of regard for instructions or personal safety, it is not acceptable for us to feel like we need to be providing all of her social relief. She is not locked in the basement, we have volunteered to drop her off at her friends houses, or pick her up, or take her somewhere to meet them and she hasn’t arranged anything, you need to be able to have time away every once in a while”

Anyway, she took the old people taxi to the center two days ago, and had a good enough time that she’s going back today. Wooooooooooo!!!!!!!! Which means here on my day off I have at least a few hours by myself! 😀

The beginning of the end

Today is the first class of my last semester (god I hope) of graduate school. This has been an incredibly long journey and I feel so strange about it ending. I don’t mean that I want it to continue AT ALL & it certainly can’t end fast enough in my opinion, what I mean more is I just can totally NOT imagine what my life will be like this summer, this fall, and thereafter. Without things constantly hanging over my head and finally beginning my ‘career’ and being a real adult finally, maybe?

Yesterday our instructor posted the syllabus for the class. While it’s not 15 pages long like the 3 credit class that KILLED me last spring, I’m still highly irritated after reading it. We have a gigantic ‘quality improvement project’ that we need to develop, implement, write up and present. And this is yet another class that wants us to write a ‘journal article for professional publication’. Seriously? Do we really need to? These professional journals must get tired of all the BS articles students write and submit for no other reason than they’re forced to. What a pain in my ass. No seriously. I just want to do all my clinical hours, work my full time job, and graduate, couldn’t we just pretend we did all that other crap and can the bull shit for ONE SEMESTER? ONE!!! just one. No? fuuuuuck. This is probably more profanity than I’ve put in one post in, years.

I have a good job lead, someone I work with who already has the job I want and is fairly well respected in the company was asked by her superiors if she had any students with her over the last few semesters that she would recommend since they’re hiring. She was nice enough to mention me even though we’re coworkers and she’s never had me as a student. :D. So I fired off a resume and cover letter to one of the boss people as per directions on 1/2/12 and haven’t heard ANYTHING. Tear. I spoke with this friend of mine again and she was surprised I hadn’t heard anything, but thinks I still will as they called her to discuss me, and she said she has heard me mentioned a few times. Having a job before I graduate would be fabulous. Although it will probably put more of a rush on me taking/passing boards than I would prefer — but that will keep me from procrastinating I guess. Worst case scenario if that doesn’t work out I’m going to take my time and enjoy a leisurely summer at my steady-weekend position and enjoy having 5 days off a week. I don’t know about taking a real vacation this summer, I only get limited days with my current position and those will be entirely used up for taking a huge boards review class over my birthday -fun FUN!!! My fantasy would involve them holding a position for me as a nurse practitioner until august and quitting my current job sometime in July to take a big trip with Hubbin somewhere.

Hubbin has been threatening to up and visit his friends in Europe, even if I can’t come, so he can practice his foreign language and immerse himself for awhile. He did that last a few years ago for 3 weeks, I was sad, but it was okay. My only concern with it this summer is how it is going to interfere with more IUIs which are on hold now until I graduate.

So Much & So Little

I was actually toying with just waiting til a whole year had passed before updating again. I’d like to promise I’m going to update more regularly now but clearly I shouldn’t. The sad thing is so little has changed since my last post I haven’t really felt the need or desire to post much.

I’m going to try to post more often for sure, because I feel like I probably need an outlet for some things I have bouncing around in my head at all times… but we’ll see how it goes.

The hard thing is while it seems like so little has changed since my last update, I’m still killing myself at school, I’m still working at the same job, we’re still trying to get pregnant, so much has changed or evolved since then it’s hard to know where to begin when posting. My mother in law lives with us full time, but is in a rehab place right now after falling and breaking her arm. We’ve got our fertility specialist follow up appointment Monday after completing the full work up last cycle. I had to rearrange my school schedule a bit due to circumstances beyond my control but am hoping to double up in the spring to keep my May graduation date. I’m still working at the same job, in the same place but have managed to change my status to steady weekends so now I only work weekends to help with school. On one hand I feel like my organization skills and getting things accomplished are at a level that they never have been before, but I’ve gotten way worse at keeping in touch with anyone I don’t see regularly (my blog included).

I’ve got some not-yet-well-fleshed-out self improvement goals I’m trying to work on in between but self-reflection is definitely tied in there somewhere and why I’m going to try and resurrect my blog. Unfortunately one of my most very top stress inducing items right now and the one that occupies most of my mind at pretty much all times is infertility, so I feel like I need to warn you that that will probably be a main topic of discussion – especially as I try and work through my feelings about all of this.

Absolutely Nothing

I have absolutely nothing new or exciting to tell you about.

My MIL is currently residing in her own home which is currently for sale, as is our house. Given the economy there has been no movement on either. My MIL is scheduled to take her 6th driving test this week and she’s hoping she passes – I’m hoping if she passes she doesn’t severely maim anyone once she starts driving and her mental status deteriorates further.

Work has been nothing short of busy and exhausting – I come home completely spent every shift and am capable of nothing more than showering and passing out in bed.

School is a constant source of stress. I’ve got 9 credits and 150 clinical hours scheduled this spring… in addition to my full time job. Things are fanTASTIC. LOVE school. — I’m still slated to be done in spring of 2012 and that cannot come fast enough. I’ve been working full time and in school since Jan 2007 and I’m DONE. DONE. Although I’ve gotten grades that exceed my expectations each semester and two degrees in that time I’m exhausted. After this semester of 9 credits I will have 12 credits remaining in the program (broken down into 3 more semesters) So I am growing closer and closer each month.

No babies or pregnancies in this neck of the woods even though we’ve been trying since March… I know that would  just add stress before I’m done with school… and I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t help myself from wanting. I’ll be 30 this year, Hubbin will be 37, it’s time regardless of school… I intend to bring it up at my yearly gyne appointment this spring as it will have been about a whole year by then. I’ve been charting since spring of 2008 so I KNOW I’m ovulating each month and I know we’ve been decent to good with timing each month. Although we’ve agreed to not seek any actual “interventions” until 2012 when I’m done with school, we had a serious talk and Hubbin shocked me that he would be willing to seek “interventions” in the first place as he was always emphatically in the “you shouldn’t do anything EVER. PERIOD” camp.  Completely of the “Let nature take it’s course and if it’s not meant to be, it’s not meant to be” camp.

Nothing else to report.

Merry Christmas.

Happy New Year.

What other holidays have I missed? Hopefully I’ll post again before Valentines day but I just can’t make any promises in my life these days because I have difficulty remembering what I did yesterday let alone logging onto my computer after work to catch up on the internets. Thank god for my feed reader or I’d be totally out of the loop with all my bloging friends!

Lukewarm

I’m fairly lukewarm on blogging lately. First this seems to be a function of how much time I have exactly to putz around on the internet. At my lab job I had tons of time, I had perfected the art of slacking for several days in a row and putting in 1 or 2 hard days to make up for it productivity wise. When I worked there I was able to blog nearly daily. With my nursing job not only am I not online ever at work I am 110% totally exhausted by the time I get home and am good only to do two things. 1 is shower, 2 is collapse into bed in a heap. (Yes I’m great fun – but we do work 12.5 hour shifts and I work a good 45-50 minutes away from home).

Additionally standing in my way is that I don’t want to have a blog that is all whine all the time. Which is how I feel a lot of the time. I like my job mostly, but obviously can’t type about that in any real detail.  I am still in school which is absolutely no fun an the source of much of my whining. I’m not sure when I’ll be done but I think I’ve got a solid year to 4 semesters left. Regardless there’s not much point in talking about that either because I can barely stand school myself why would someone want to read about it in their leisure? “typing another paper today, and this class I’m taking has no real bearing on my future profession.” is about as much fun as reading “I had a classic cafe salad at panera for lunch today and it’s sunny and warm!”

I think I would blog more if I was able to do so from my iphone. I have the wordpress app but it seems to constantly eat my posts? Even if I save them they seem to never still be there when I go back to finish typing or post them, this has happened with enough frequency now that it sucks all the fun out of it. I get in the mood to type about a certain thing and then if my iphone eats it the mood is gone and I can’t bring myself to retype it to start from scratch. For instance I was about half to 2/3rds finished on a post about how finding out my exboyfriend got engaged was giving me weird feelings of nostalgia for college and ponderings about the end of our relationship. — but then I went to my wordpress app thinking I’d finish & post it and of course it was fucking gone. deleted. thanks wordpress app. you suck.

In other news I’d like to make the following announcement: I think everyone needs to just quit smoking already. I think we’ve all established now that it adversely effects your  health, does not make you look cool, doesn’t actually make you more relaxed, and is generally irritating to those around you. That is all.

Hubbin and I went to a party last night at someone’s house which I think was honestly the first time I’d been at a party in more than a few years where one of the attendants just started randomly smoking in the living room, newsflash: even if the host says it’s okay, if you’re the only person at the party smoking it is probably socially unacceptable to smoke in the living room and blow smoke at everyone. Have the decency to go outside or another room with an open window or door.

 

Appropriate Dressing

I had to log in today on the real computer instead of just on the iphone to change the wallpaper here to something more appropriate. I realize I’m quite lame for talking about nothing except the WEATHER for the past few weeks but srrriously! Yesterday we blew by the all time record for snowiest month ever. EVER. in these parts. Previous record was in the 70s. So we’re now officially over 40″ in this month (and I don’t even live in Aspen, or Buffalo…) and it’s been below freezing since the first snow fall so it’s all just hanging out. Dripping off the roof forming ice bodies. I knocked the ones on the porch down the other day (photographed in the previous photo) and they’re all back today, even bigger than before. Yesterday one of the aides from work put the fear of  god icicles into me and I put Hubbin on a mission to get the ones on of main roof off before the world came to an end. Or it pulled our gutters off, whichever came first. So Hubbin went to Lowes and got some long 2x4s to stick out our 2nd floor windows and bat the icicles down.  Seriously nuts. He had off work again yesterday for snow and gave me some lame line about how he’s ready to go back and teach because he ‘just wants to do his job’ to which I immediately replied “I’ll trade you. I’d be glad for a few 2 hour delays and cancellations”….