I'm feeling a little nervous about stepping on the scale at my meeting tomorrow. I really hope I have lost. I've been tracking fairly well. The only thing I haven't tracked was last nights meal out at Rudy's. I had 10 points left to use and I ordered a quarte pound of turkey and a baked potato. Well within my 10 points. For a bedtime snack last night I had a can of drained and rinsed mandarin oranges, 0 points and super yummy.
I've been weighing myself throughout the week and have seen about a half pound loss on my scale at home. I went to weigh myself this morning and forgot to do it before I took my morning pills with a huge glass of water. Doh! I won't weigh again until my meeting at noon.
I feel I've done a pretty good job with tracking everything I put into my mouth, no matter how healthy or unhealthy it is. I've also reminded myself to have a treat every now and then.
My "big" meal out this week was at Dion's. I ordered a turkey sub on wheat. I wasn't super hungry going in so it was really easy to only eat half of it (I ordered the 6") and about half of the chips that came with it. I'm very proud of myself for that. It would have been really easy to eat the whole thing and then some.
That's been the biggest challenge for me so far. Not letting myself get too hungry. Last week I was terrible at it. This week has been much much better. Every once in a while I will feel those "overhungry pangs" but I've really been trying to keep on top of it. It makes it easier to make healthier choices and if I know I shouldn't eat all of something, it makes it easier to stick to that plan.
I called the orthodontist this morning to make my second appointment to get braces put on. I thought they were going to put them on at the appointment but it doesn't sound like it. At least I have the ball rolling on it. They called this a records appointment. I know they are going to take molds of my mouth.
As nervous as I am about it, I really hope that they put the braces on that same day as well. I can't believe I'm this nervous! I really wonder how it's going to change the way I look with them on and how it's going to feel. I'm not worried about the pain at all. Nothing a little Tylenol can't help. That and some cold food or ice water to numb it (probably ice water for me).
Our new furniture should be here today. It will be nice to be rid of our old furniture. Especially since the couch is broken.
TKD is going alright. We've been doing a lot of sparring lately. A lot. I'm ready for a break. Just one week off would be nice and then we can get back to it. Last Wednesday I had a terrible day. I just couldn't think straight and wasn't throwing and landing things like I have been doing. I'm pretty sure it's a mental thing.
Sparring, for me, is mentally taxing because it's comparable to a game of chess. It's a game of strategy so you are constantly watching cues from your opponent and looking for the right time to attack. When it's right, you just know it and go for it. I got some good rushes in but I wasn't happy with what I did otherwise. I really hope tonight goes better. I have some frustration I need to get out.
I'm pretty excited! I had my weekly weigh in yesterday with WW. I was surprised at how nervous I was about going! I'm used to weighing myself 2-3 times a week but when the weigh-in counts, it felt different. It shouldn't have. But it did.
It was really awesome to see the face of the person who weighed me in. She smiled at me real big and was very happy and proud. I had lost 3.6 pounds in one week!
I knew I had lost because of tracking my weight at home. I wasn't expecting it to be that much though. I was expecting around 2 pounds so needless to say I was super super happy.
I need to take some before and after pics. I plan on doing that today.
The thing need to be careful of now is to not expect this every week. Weeks like this, in real life, are the exception, not the rule.
I would be thrilled with a 1.5 or 2 pound loss next week. That would give my my 5 pound sticker in two weeks. If that's realistic or not, we shall see.
That's the other key to success in weight loss. One needs to realize that there will be ups and downs and we have to take the highs with the lows.
I made a goal this week of having fresh fruit with my breakfast. So far I haven't done that. I am planning on having an apple with peanut butter for my snack today. Our group leader challenged us this week to make 10 meals of just power foods. I'd like to do that as well. I know two goals can be quite lofty. I'm going to try my best. If I don't reach one, then it will be my one and only goal for next week.
Last week I used all of my activity points (I have it set up to use those first) and had 35 "bonus" points left over. I hope to do the same thing this week.
I saw this on a message board that I like to hang out on and it just stuck.
This is how I feel as a new nurse. I've had to fake my confidence. It's still not all there because there is so much I don't know about but it's getting there. I'm able to speak to parents with more knowledge in my arsenal which also makes me more confident in what I'm telling them and hopefully that will help them have confidence in me as I take care of their tiny one.
I've been taking care of more chronic kids lately and am ready to go back to higher acuity.
That's what I like about working where I do. Yes it is a critical care environment but we really see different spectrums of care from the super critically ill 1:1 patient to our more chronic kids who still need our care because things can go wrong very quickly, of course, but are pretty stable on the grand scheme of things.
I think I would get burnt out if we had all super critical kids all the time or if we had more of the chronic type all the time. The variety keeps me thinking in different ways and I really appreciate that.
Over the past two weeks I've had two orthodontic consulatations for braces. I'm super exctied to be able to get them. I'm amazed at the cost difference between the two different docs I visited. They both offered the same treatment in the same amount of time. There was about a 1500-2000 dollar difference though.
It seems the only difference between the two was the office. Both of their before and after pictures looked absolutely fantastic. Nice neat and precise work. Dr #1 has a brand new office which is a 5 minute drive from my house. It is very nice but to the point. Not a lot of extras which is just fine for me.
Dr #2's office was amazing. It was very modern and inviting. There was pretty awesome music being played in the reception area. They had a tray of cookies out for patients, two different sinks you could use to brush your teeth. The sinks were really neat looking, something like you would see in a nice custom built home. There was a pretty big tropical fish tank in the office built into the wall. Outside the consultation room, there were actually video games like you would see in an arcade! In a dentists office!!!!!!
Can you guess which dentist/orthodontist charged more???? Yeah, nuff said.
I did like Dr #2 but I cannot justify spending that much more. If it were only a $500 difference, I could totally justify going to Dr #2 if I had wanted too.
As an adult it was kind of rediculous to me to see arcade games in his office. The whole thing seemed so over the top that I wonder if he's trying to make up for something or if he's really that popular and successful. It was very "showy" to me.
I go for my second weigh in with Weight Watchers tomorrow. Will be interesting to see if I've lost anything. I think I have.
I weigh myself at home pretty regularly and the past several times I've weighed myself, the scale has been reading 2-2.5 pounds lighter. I hope the WW scales pick up the same thing. I'm not tracking my weight at home on anything because it's the weigh in at WW that counts toward my goal.
I admit I have a hard time sticking to my daily points allowance. The good news is that I'm tracking everything that has been going into my mouth. That has made a difference in my food choices. I also earn a lot of activity points from working out so I only used 15 of my weekly allowance points on top of using all my activity points. I'm very happy about that.
I also wear a pedometer at work that calcualtes points as well so I'm getting activity points every day I'm at work. I really like that a lot.
I've been wanting to lose these last 20 pounds for way too long now and finally decided it is time to do it. I joined Weight Watchers.
I've only been tracking for a few days and had my first weigh in/meeting last night. I like the environmen! The meeting leader's name is Keri (or however she spells it) and she seems to be very realistic and fun.
I thought walking in there that I would be the only younger person in there. I was wrong! Granted, it IS mostly older women in there but it's nicely sprinkled with those of us without grey hair as well.
Last night someone recieved their lifetime membership. She lost 70 pounds and some change in 10 months! She looked so good. It was inspiring seeing that.
They also hand out little "rewards" as you lose. For every 5 pounds you lose, they give you a sticker that you can put wherever you like. I plan on putting mine in my weight tracker as a reminder of my hard work. Then you get rewards for losing 5% of your body weight (my first goal), 10% (my second goal), and then you get a reward for reaching your goal. If I remember right, once you stay at your goal for 6 weeks, then you can become a lifetime member.
What I like about this program (not having done the old one ever...I lost my first 70lbs on my own) is that they point out what they call power foods, I call them clean foods. They tell us it's "the most bang for our buck." I love that they are trying to get people to eat more healthy food like that.
Fruits and most veggies are also zero points!!! I've always liked eating those but now that I'm tracking points, it's that little extra incentive to eat even more. Last night, for example, I had eaten at Chick-fil-a for dinner. I ordered a grilled chicken and fries, yes I tracked it. That took up the last of my points for the day plus a few extra. I was hungry last night before bed but didn't want to add any more extra points than I already did so instead of snacking on triscuits, I opened up a can of fruit and then went to bed. It was nice that I got to eat and didn't have to add any more points to my daily total.
Let's be real about this though. Weight Watchers is nothing special or any different than eating good and reducing calories. What is different from say, sparkpeople.com is the support and extra stuff that you get.
I was searching for quick meal ideas for breakfast and lunch for when I work because that is really hard for me. I found a place on the online tools that has quick meal ideas and it's right up my ally! They're quick, easy, and something that I can put together before I go to work.
It seems that everything I was lacking on sparkpeople.com has been included in WW (so far).
I also like the idea of weekly meetings. It gives me a little extra edge to know that someone is going to be holdin me accountable for what I put into my mouth for a week. I can't wait until I get to put my first 5lb's lost sticker on my weight tracker.
I also like the fact that I know I will have support to help me lose weight after I have a baby. They don't want you on the program while pregnant, understandably so. What they do is put your membership on hold and you go back when you get clearance from your Dr. One of my fears has been weight gain with pregnancy and it really eases a lot of that anxiety knowing that I will have something to look forward to to help me with that when it's over.
Wish me luck. I think I've made a good decision.
So I passed my testing although it could have gone much better.
I made silly mistakes that I don't normally make in my patterns. I messed up on the second and fourth patterns. Little mistakes but still. They're not mistakes that I make. It's amazing at how being sick messes with your concentration.
I went in with that foggy head feeling which is never good. My saving grace is that at that point, I thought I was starting to clear up. I wasn't coughing and my nose had stopped running for a bit.
We started with patterns. They weren't my best, as stated above. I feel alirght about them though. As we were starting our patterns Mike started to give me a hard time about something and then Mr T (Michael) jumped in on it. It was a good time. It gave me an idea for a new comeback. haha!
Next up were our kicks. This is where I was really starting to know that I wasn't at my best. I was giving it all I had to make them look good. Afterward I was talking to my husband and he said it looked like I was just hopping instead of jumping. While I was doing the kicks it felt to me like I should be jumping. I had a couple of good 180 back kicks in there. The rest were just meh. They didn't feel as good and smooth as they typically did for me. I know I'm capable of much better.
After this we broke out into several different areas. First up was splits for me. I ended up being right where I thought I would be. I had made a goal at my last testing to get to 180 degrees on the machine. I made it to 170 which is actually not as far as I had gone on my last test. Needless to say, I'm still working on that goal. Last testing I was at 172.5-ish.
Required knowledge was next. No worries here.
Last up out of this part of testing was breaking. I really enjoy breaking. A lot. My breaks were a jump turn kick and an outward knife hand. This was the only area I felt confident in yesterday. I was able to perform both breaks on the first try. My jumping turn kick was either high or low. I'm not sure because I didn't look to see how the boards landed when I broke them. I'm wondering if I went a little high from where I measured. The outward knife hand went really well. That one I broke straight down the middle and across the knot in the board.
We all regrouped one last time to do our pushups, situps, and squats. I was nervous about this one because of the pushups. I wasn't worried about getting them all in, what I was worried about was going down far enough. I feel like I'm getting better and stronger at them but still have some room to improve. One thing I can say is that I'm thankful for all of the pushups I've been doing while at work. They felt easier this time around. I had to do 35 of each in 2 minutes. It was close on the pushups because I was trying my hardest to go down as far as I could. I heard the 30 second buzzer go off and just did 5 real quick to make sure I got them in. They were 5 really crappy ones but I got it done.
I surprised myself on situps. At the last testing I was required to do 30 and I remember just barely making it over that in 2 minutes. This time I did 44!! My goal for next testing will be to do 50+ in two minutes.
Squats went OK. Apparently I had a real odd form going on them. Not surprising since I wasn't feeling well. I don't even know what I was doing but I remember people around me telling me to not bend my back. I'm wondering if I was arching it or something.
All in all I did pass. I could have done better if I weren't sick so I'm not fully satisfied with this round of testing. The good part of it is that I gave myself a lot of room to improve for when I go for my blue belt so I will have to excuse to show progress.
Now this cold can go away any time.
I was not the creative one who came up with these. I found this in a post on http://www.allnurses.com/.
ENJOY!!!
A couple of us felt the need to change the lyrics to some Christmas Song Favorites---hope you enjoy!
(To the tune of Oh Christmas Tree)
Oh CBI, Oh CBI, how rapidly you're running!
Oh CBI, Oh CBI, how rapidly you're running!
The foley still is cherry red...
The patient thinks he's nearly dead...
Oh CBI, Oh CBI, When will you stop your clotting!
(To the Tune of Deck the Halls)
Wreck the halls with urine & stool!
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Clean the patient like a fool
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Get the rectal tubes a-flowing...
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Seems like everybody's going!
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!
(To the tune of Winter Wonderland)
Call light ring
No one's listening
Someone screams
"Stop his *******!"
It's normal at night
To cry out "All RIGHT!"
Working in a midnight wonderland.
Patients Yell
Gimme Pain Meds
What's that smell?
It's the same bed!
You're running the halls
Cuz everyone calls
Working in midnight wonderland.
In the middle there will be a Code Blue
Then we found out that he's a DNR
We'll have fun explaining all of this to
The Person who's in charge of all of us!
Later on, he'll expire
Then we'll call the house doctor
Who sleeps in his room
Don't call him TOO soon!
Working in a midnight wonderland!!
(To the tune of I'll Be Home for Christmas)
I'll be home on Christmas
Don't you dare call me!
I don't care
If no one's there
It's my day to be free
Christmas Eve I'm working
'Til the sun comes up!
And I'll be home on Christmas
So sooorrry---touch luck!!!!
And finally...
(To the tune of Silver Bells)
Poopy Bedpans
Smelly Trash Cans
Dressed in bright yellow gowns
In the air it's a feeling of C-diff....
Patients crapping
Nurses Laughing
Clean up bile after bile
And in all nurses' stations you'll hear.....
Saggy B*alls
Saggy B*alls
It's time for scrotal support!!
Ringaling
Hold up that thing
Soon they will be on the floor!!!!
(To the tune of The Dreidel Song)
We have a vial of Haldol
We use it every day
And if our patients go crazy
You'll surely hear us say
OHHHH Haldol Haldol Haldol
We give to you for sleep!
Haldol Haldol Haldol
You will not make a peep!!
Hope you got a kick outta this....we had so much fun writing these!!!
Merry Christmas Everybody!!!
I was told this morning by the PA I went to see that I am resilient (sp?). I guess I should take that as a compliment but quite honestly, I can't imagine living my life any other way than that which I have chosen. It's just me. Who I am. What I do.
I'd like to take a moment to say how thankful I am for where I am in life right now. Life isn't perfect but I'm pretty happy with where I am at. I feel very thankful for my wonderful job and everything else I have worked so hard for. I'm thankful that I am going back to school in January with my end goal being my MSN. I'm thankful that we are where we are financially, it hasn't always been this way. I'm really happy that my body is holding up through all the stuff I put it through with my different exercise endeavors.
That being said, none of this happened by chance. I've had to be strong to stick to my goals. I wouldn't have been able to do this if it weren't for the support I've had from my husband, friends, and God (in no particular order).
Yesterday at work I got my butt kicked. I wouldn't say it was a bad day, just busy for me. I had a pretty alright assignment and was also 2nd admit. The assignment I had was totally appropriate as an admission assignment. What threw me is that we got our first admit yesterday at about 9:30 or so and about 15 minutes after that baby arrived on the unit, the team was called over to another delivery. It was a term c-section so I wasn't expecting to get anything. Then I realized they were over there for quite some time for a term secion so I got to thinking I was going to be getting this baby. Term babies that come to us scare me because we don't typically get term babies unless there is something wrong with them such as congenital diaphramatic hernia (we've has a run on these lately) or if they have severe respiratory distress from things such as meconium aspiration.
This kiddo had niether of these. Let me clarify that a litte bit more. The baby did have respiratory distress but not from meconium aspiration. My guess is either from having a low H/H or TTN (transient tachypnea of the newborn--common with sections becuase the secretions are not being squeezed out of the lungs) or a combination of both.
It was amazing how white this baby was when it came to us. The parents are of the darker skinned variety and this baby was more white than the whitest white person I know.
This admit ended up being more sick than the first admit which we expected would be super sick and wasn't.
So we did the typical lab draws and all that stuff. Had to give a bolus right off the bat and then another bolus after that. Then they ordered blood to be given.
This was a new experience for me. I never had the opportunity to give blood on orientation and since I've been off, the opportunity just has not come up for me. It wasn't that bad. We had to double verify the blood, double check the orders (again 2 RN's involved) and then prime the tubing. We use special tubing for the blood but it's different that giving it to adults. There is no normal sailine carrier that goes with it. It's just the blood which was different for me. The only time normal sailine went in was when the line was flushed. There was still the usual charting. I charted every 15 minutes for the first hour and then every half hour after that until the blood was done (it goes in over 4 hours).
I am feeling more comfortable at work but I still have so much to learn! I've been there for 7 months now but I feel like I'm still trying to find my feet.
What I'd really like to make as a goal for next year is to start doing flex and going to deliveries. I'm going to talk to my charge nurse about that and see what she has to say.
I'm so excited about going back to school in January. I got an email from my director saying that I can sign up for my CAP III. CAP is basically an increase in pay grade for things like education and certifications.
I'm a little confused because I was asking about this earlier and was told I wouldn't be eligible until I start the actual BSN courses. Right now I'm taking the last of the prereq's required for the BSN. I need to go talk to her about it. Not that I'm complaining that they want to give me more money, I just want to clarify everything so that I don't get in trouble for anything.
Tae Kwon Do testing is on Saturday. The husband is able to come and I'm so excited for him to be able to see what we do. I can't wait! I feel very ready for this!
In class on Monday we were doing test review and another green belt and myself were working on our patterns. Mike came over and was watching me do the last half of my pattern. It made me so nervous that he was watching!!!! I lost my concentration for a bit but got it back. He told me my pattern is looking good, I just need to work on my sine wave on the move in the pattern right before the side kick. I will be working on that tonight.
