Long time no see.

Hello. I know it's been a while. 

Unfortunately, I have a habit of starting something and not pushing through. 

So where do I begin? 

Let's talk about my nursing career. I am still working as a labour & delivery nurse. I've seen a lot of good things and a few not so good ones too. I've worked as a nurse during a pandemic (now that deserves a blog on its own.) I've injured myself a few times at work through the years but now it's really hit me good.  I always thought pain is a sign that there are needs I'm not taking care of, so I had to step back and take time off work. 

I've been off the floor for almost 6 weeks now, and God, I miss being in those deliveries! Right now, I'm doing a lot of behind the scenes- creating education boards for the nurses, making presentations for the new hires, doing audits for the upcoming accreditation, assisting staff with the new computer system we're using, and helping out everywhere but where the action is! 

So I'm seeing my family doctor every other week, trying to see if he could clear me so I could return to work without modifications, but failed. I mean, he did say from the beginning I will likely need 6 weeks to heal and I was just being stubborn coming back every 2 weeks to be reassessed. I'm hoping next week he could finally give me the green light to be back on the floor again. I just really miss the adrenaline rush and my night crew!  But I also get his point, I don't want to re-injure myself and be off work for much much longer. 

I did contemplate on finding another job- a more laid back job- to try out for a few months. I was getting frustrated that my feet/ankles would just not get better, that I thought maybe I need an office job where I don't walk and stand for prolonged periods of time. I couldn't though. I couldn't find something I see myself doing permanently, let alone for months. 

One good thing I'm getting from this temporary work load is that I now work the same days as Jay, so we both have weekends off, and we're having such fun weekends this summer so far!

Well, I got 3 take aways from this experience:

1) Listen to your body.

2) Be patient. Healing is a process (I should know this, I tell my patients this all the time *eye roll*) and I can't fast forward anymore than my body would allow it. 

3) I can find something good about any situation, even though some days I have to really look hard for it. 

That's all for now! Til next time (could be tomorrow, could be 5 years from now!) 

Believe in Yourself!

A year ago, I was doing my acute care rotation. I was super excited to learn nursing from an internal medicine perspective. Unfortunately, I was matched with a very strict instructor. Not the good kind of strict who made you want to challenge yourself; but the intimidating kind of strict, who made me feel stupid to be in nursing school. Of course there are always two sides to every story and she probably meant well. But she was the type who took pride in making her students cry. I was on the verge of quitting, but my gut told me to stay strong. "You're almost there! You just need to get through this one and your final preceptorship is right around the corner!" I finally got on her good side when I did something that impressed the nurses on the unit. She finally stopped picking on me and I survived the rest of the rotation.


If there's one thing I learned from the situation it's that I don't want to be like her. As a preceptor myself, I always like to make learning fun. Challenging, but not scary.I always strive to be the approachable instructor and mentor so that my students do not fear coming to me to ask questions. I want my students to feel motivated to come to learn every single day.


I also learned one other thing: Always believe in yourself. Nursing school requires a lot of hard work and dedication. And I believe, more importantly, passion. There's always gonna be critics along the way; take their feedback and move on. Do not dwell on the bad. Do not let one person change the way you think about yourself or your capacity.

I'm now a Registered Nurse!

A little backstory: I finished my LPN diploma in 2009 and worked almost to full-time for the next year and a half before I decided to register for the Bachelor of Nursing program. I've been extremely lucky to have found a job that I loved, co-workers that I look up to and aspire to become one day. This was what encouraged me to pursue my degree. I continued to work full-time between two jobs and squeezed in some school work during my days off. Took me five years to complete but I think it was all worth the wait.


I finally finished the Bachelor of Nursing program in December of 2016 and landed a full time job right after school. Technically, I didn't start working as a graduate nurse immediately after because I went on a 3-week vacation abroad (I thought I very much deserved it! LOL) but during this time, I was getting all the appropriate documents sorted out so I can start working at this new job when I got back. Because of the super hectic orientation schedule, I couldn't study for my NCLEX! I wanted to play it safe and give myself ample time for studying. I didn't want to risk taking the test without studying properly (it's an expensive test after all!) So I waited til my 3-month orientation was done and then I began studying. Meanwhile, I continued to do my research on the "best" NCLEX reviewer. Quite frankly, I wanted to wait til June. I got my authorization to write the test late March but I postponed booking my exam til April. At the same time, a part of me just wanted to get the exam over with.


May 9th was when I had scheduled myself to write the exam. Weeks of preparation became days. Next thing I know, the day I've been dreading has come! It was hard I'm not gonna lie. For those who aren't familiar with NCLEX, some questions would require for you to "select all that apply" - the kind of question I hoped I wouldn't get as much. You miss one option, you're wrong. So I thought the chances of me getting a point for those questions? Slim to none. I felt awful after the exam, nauseous, shaky, and discouraged. I prayed long and hard the next 7 nights for a miracle.


May 16th: my miracle came! I passed my NCLEX! I was with my mom when I got the email and when I told her the good news, she broke into tears! Apparently my reasoning behind answering most of those questions were right. I was so excited so I submitted my registration that same night. I got my new Registered Nurse license within two days.


I still can't believe this is happening. Those years of hard work trying to balance time between work, school, and leisure is now behind me (til I decided to return to school for something else, who knows!). Now I can just enjoy working, saving up for my future, and enjoy what I love to do the most!