and hell begins again.
Jan. 12th, 2006 09:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
verushka70Okay, school hasn't even started yet, and I'm already freaking out. I went to school yesterday to login to the WebCT "class" for one of my nursing classes. They are no longer providing pre-printed copies of all the course handouts and materials in the bookstore for purchase. Now we have to download and print them ourselves. (Fortunately we're not paying for the printing... yet... they haven't implemented that yet but they will be soon.)
I basically downloaded a tome of info. Ok, that's an exaggeration... but it was probably about 60 pages or so.
For a class that will last less than a month. (Med/Surg Nursing I) (In week 2 of February, Med/Surg II starts...)
We have a paper due Feb. 1. We haven't yet received the assignment or particulars of what is required for this paper... but the deadline was on the calendar. And class doesn't even start until Tuesday Jan. 17.
So I'm freaking. I have to read the 1st chapter of my Med/Surg textbook by Tuesday. I have to read a small optional text on fluids and electrolytes. I am starting research on my paper, even though I don't know what exactly is required for the paper, only that is has to be about a particular cancer (of our choice).
And I'm going, shit, some of the instructors (and ALL of the 2nd year nursing students) told us that the 2nd semester of our 1st year would be harder than the 1st semester of the 1st year. And I can see why, since I'm starting my studying and homework BEFORE I have even started classes.
And the other real bitch of this situation is, I just turned 38. I'm sort of used to having a life. It isn't a life which includes a husband and kids, which makes me abnormal in my nursing classes (8 of the 10 of us in my clinical group are married; only 1 other woman is single besides me, but she's living with her boyfriend). So, although I'm woefully lacking in the relationship department, I used to have the TIME to date and have fun -- as well as just hang out with my friends, go to movies, read a lot.
I can't do that anymore. Maybe that's why I saw Brokeback Mountain 5 times between 12/16/05 and now. (As well as Corpse Bride, Wedding Crashers, 40 Year Old Virgin, In Her Shoes, Chronicles of Narnia, and Jarhead). I am trying to cram as much fun and entertainment into life as possible during the break because my 38 year old ass just can't do all that stuff and go to school even though I'm not working right now.
It isn't the difficulty of the material (although IT IS FUCKING HARD). I don't have trouble reading; I've always loved reading, even the difficult and dense prose of scientific journals and books. I was reading about the psychopharmacology of depression back in 1990 when I was 23, just because a psychiatrist told me, "Look, you're bright. And your school has a good medical library. Why don't you take some books out about the psychopharmacology of depression, and read them. Then if you have any questions for me, before I prescribe you antidepressants, just ask." (Which, in retrospect, was him pushing his job off onto me, but in his defense, I will say he was the director of an underfunded community mental health outreach clinic and extremely overworked, and probably underpaid.)
So it's not the difficulty of the material. IT'S THE SHEER VOLUME. I can read, and I can even read fast, but the sheer volume of the reading last semester had me wondering when exactly we were supposed to get all the reading done -- in our sleep? Because I wasn't even working, and I couldn't complete the readings! By the end of the semester, I was so overwhelmed with studying for tests and final and writing the second care plan, that I just stopped reading and tried to wing it on the lecture notes and class handouts/materials. (Which, I found, worked: I got 2 As and 2 Bs, so I'm not complaining).
But I worry about my fellow students. Sure, I'm a slacker, but I was working for those grades. And I wasn't working a "real" job, just the occasional side job (cash only or barter, nothing to declare to the IRS, although I always declare SOMETHING.) I have classmates who are trying to go to nursing school full time, raising a couple/few children, and trying to work at the same time! I fear for them, I really do; if this semester is harder than the last one, those who must work are going to be especially behind the 8 ball. And those who are single mothers... (shudder)
I don't know how they do it. They can be excused for only doing averagely, as far as I'm concerned. I've never seen such exhausted women in my life, except maybe my own mother who went back to get her BA when she was like 36 and already had five kids, the last two being me and my little sister, and we were already 11 and 8 & 1/2. We were a bit independent, and we had a grandmother and father to look after us when our mom wasn't home.
I am really glad I didn't have any kids yet, because I'd no doubt be in the same boat as these gals. I vowed to myself years ago that I wasn't going to have any kids until and unless there was a man in my life that I could actually see being a good husband and father. (Whether that means I have simply made a lot of big mistakes in choosing men, or not, is open to debate, I guess...). And by that I meant, someone who was REALLY going to be up for both. And I guess I haven't met any who were. Or I guess I haven't been in any relationships where I truly believed we were "meant to be" and it was all going to turn out right. (Given that I'm a depressive, I suppose that isn't so surprising; but then, a major research journal did find out that depressives are better in touch with reality than non-depressives, which makes a lot of sense -- it's probably why we're depressed!)
At any rate, the men have come and gone, but they didn't leave me with babies. Which sadly has given me a huge edge over my classmates, although I don't view it competitively at all -- in all of them I see my mother, trying her damnedest to finish papers on an electric typewriter while loading the Crock-Pot with food so that when we got home from school and she was at work (my parents were divorced by this time), we'd have a hot meal anyway, and my grandmother just had to watch us, she didn't always have to cook for us, because she was getting up there, too. I mean, SHIT. I just want to help these gals... they are all younger than me, with kids and sometimes with husbands (or not), trying to get through nursing school. I have it so easy by comparison.
Which is NOT to say it is easy... IT ISN'T. But it's a helluva lot easier for my old ass than for these younguns, for the simple reason that I am unencumbered and only responsible for myself. Well, and my cats, but they're pretty low maintenance...
Then again, at least the younger students are... younger. Sometimes I feel like an old woman (but that's other health issues as well).
Oh well. So the hell begins anew on Tuesday, January 17, 2006: semester two of nursing school, starting with Med/Surg I and Pharmacology I.
I basically downloaded a tome of info. Ok, that's an exaggeration... but it was probably about 60 pages or so.
For a class that will last less than a month. (Med/Surg Nursing I) (In week 2 of February, Med/Surg II starts...)
We have a paper due Feb. 1. We haven't yet received the assignment or particulars of what is required for this paper... but the deadline was on the calendar. And class doesn't even start until Tuesday Jan. 17.
So I'm freaking. I have to read the 1st chapter of my Med/Surg textbook by Tuesday. I have to read a small optional text on fluids and electrolytes. I am starting research on my paper, even though I don't know what exactly is required for the paper, only that is has to be about a particular cancer (of our choice).
And I'm going, shit, some of the instructors (and ALL of the 2nd year nursing students) told us that the 2nd semester of our 1st year would be harder than the 1st semester of the 1st year. And I can see why, since I'm starting my studying and homework BEFORE I have even started classes.
And the other real bitch of this situation is, I just turned 38. I'm sort of used to having a life. It isn't a life which includes a husband and kids, which makes me abnormal in my nursing classes (8 of the 10 of us in my clinical group are married; only 1 other woman is single besides me, but she's living with her boyfriend). So, although I'm woefully lacking in the relationship department, I used to have the TIME to date and have fun -- as well as just hang out with my friends, go to movies, read a lot.
I can't do that anymore. Maybe that's why I saw Brokeback Mountain 5 times between 12/16/05 and now. (As well as Corpse Bride, Wedding Crashers, 40 Year Old Virgin, In Her Shoes, Chronicles of Narnia, and Jarhead). I am trying to cram as much fun and entertainment into life as possible during the break because my 38 year old ass just can't do all that stuff and go to school even though I'm not working right now.
It isn't the difficulty of the material (although IT IS FUCKING HARD). I don't have trouble reading; I've always loved reading, even the difficult and dense prose of scientific journals and books. I was reading about the psychopharmacology of depression back in 1990 when I was 23, just because a psychiatrist told me, "Look, you're bright. And your school has a good medical library. Why don't you take some books out about the psychopharmacology of depression, and read them. Then if you have any questions for me, before I prescribe you antidepressants, just ask." (Which, in retrospect, was him pushing his job off onto me, but in his defense, I will say he was the director of an underfunded community mental health outreach clinic and extremely overworked, and probably underpaid.)
So it's not the difficulty of the material. IT'S THE SHEER VOLUME. I can read, and I can even read fast, but the sheer volume of the reading last semester had me wondering when exactly we were supposed to get all the reading done -- in our sleep? Because I wasn't even working, and I couldn't complete the readings! By the end of the semester, I was so overwhelmed with studying for tests and final and writing the second care plan, that I just stopped reading and tried to wing it on the lecture notes and class handouts/materials. (Which, I found, worked: I got 2 As and 2 Bs, so I'm not complaining).
But I worry about my fellow students. Sure, I'm a slacker, but I was working for those grades. And I wasn't working a "real" job, just the occasional side job (cash only or barter, nothing to declare to the IRS, although I always declare SOMETHING.) I have classmates who are trying to go to nursing school full time, raising a couple/few children, and trying to work at the same time! I fear for them, I really do; if this semester is harder than the last one, those who must work are going to be especially behind the 8 ball. And those who are single mothers... (shudder)
I don't know how they do it. They can be excused for only doing averagely, as far as I'm concerned. I've never seen such exhausted women in my life, except maybe my own mother who went back to get her BA when she was like 36 and already had five kids, the last two being me and my little sister, and we were already 11 and 8 & 1/2. We were a bit independent, and we had a grandmother and father to look after us when our mom wasn't home.
I am really glad I didn't have any kids yet, because I'd no doubt be in the same boat as these gals. I vowed to myself years ago that I wasn't going to have any kids until and unless there was a man in my life that I could actually see being a good husband and father. (Whether that means I have simply made a lot of big mistakes in choosing men, or not, is open to debate, I guess...). And by that I meant, someone who was REALLY going to be up for both. And I guess I haven't met any who were. Or I guess I haven't been in any relationships where I truly believed we were "meant to be" and it was all going to turn out right. (Given that I'm a depressive, I suppose that isn't so surprising; but then, a major research journal did find out that depressives are better in touch with reality than non-depressives, which makes a lot of sense -- it's probably why we're depressed!)
At any rate, the men have come and gone, but they didn't leave me with babies. Which sadly has given me a huge edge over my classmates, although I don't view it competitively at all -- in all of them I see my mother, trying her damnedest to finish papers on an electric typewriter while loading the Crock-Pot with food so that when we got home from school and she was at work (my parents were divorced by this time), we'd have a hot meal anyway, and my grandmother just had to watch us, she didn't always have to cook for us, because she was getting up there, too. I mean, SHIT. I just want to help these gals... they are all younger than me, with kids and sometimes with husbands (or not), trying to get through nursing school. I have it so easy by comparison.
Which is NOT to say it is easy... IT ISN'T. But it's a helluva lot easier for my old ass than for these younguns, for the simple reason that I am unencumbered and only responsible for myself. Well, and my cats, but they're pretty low maintenance...
Then again, at least the younger students are... younger. Sometimes I feel like an old woman (but that's other health issues as well).
Oh well. So the hell begins anew on Tuesday, January 17, 2006: semester two of nursing school, starting with Med/Surg I and Pharmacology I.
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Date: 2006-01-13 08:46 am (UTC)Egad!
Date: 2006-01-13 10:19 pm (UTC)My mom has helped me a lot, too. When I lost my job, she reduced my rent, and then while I've been in school full-time, she didn't charge me rent at all (although I plan to pay all that back after I get hired as an RN) -- which means I don't have to work. I was fortunate that I had paid off all my credit card debt and had no car payment or anything when I got laid off. But that meant I didn't have much money saved up, either. But then after my father died last year, I inherited some money -- so even my dad helped me posthumously.
Still, the prospect of owing my mom $16,000 in back rent is daunting, but she deserves it for helping me out, and by the time I'm done, she'll be retired and she'll probably need the money! Despite my worries, I am looking forward to Med/Surg. I am so glad I'm making this career change... I couldn't go another year in a mind-numbingly boring tech support job, even if I hadn't gotten laid off or developed wrist problems!