18

I remember being 18.  It has been, to date, the best age.  I Graduated high school, had a great summer,  threw myself a going away party before I started college.  Next… I started college.  I was so excited about life.  about the new adventures coming up.  about growing up and becoming a nurse.  about the new friends I would make at college.  I remember getting dropped off at college.  How dad helped my roommate and I get our room set up because her parents were still in Germany.  I remember saying goodbye, and being scared to death, until the next day when this crazy girl named chelsie said hi and started the best group of college friends I could have asked for.
Life was good at 18.  Really good.  And so full of promise... I was positive only good things were going to happen.  Looking back, from the advanced age of 23, I know life isn't as easy as I was hoping it would be. I know about different challenges.  I know how hard being  a grownup really is.  But at 18? I had the world and it was mine.

My 18 year old patient has tried to kill herself 3 times in the past 6 months.  I look at her, and I know she has no hope.  She doesn't look anyone in the eye, but willingly took a massive amount of medications trying to end her life permanently. at 18.  I don't know her life story.  I suspect it isn't pretty, seeing as how her step mom was the only parent anywhere around, but still.  How, at 18, can life look so bleak that you just want to end it?  Life is just beginning at 18.  The world should be full of hope. 

It makes me sad.

Favorite Time of Year!!!

I love autumn.  I love not wearing flip-flops and putting back on my favorite rocket dog shoes, putting back on the denim jacket. (and can we get a cheer for the return of hoodie weather?)

I love the colors. the way red leaves look on green grass.

I love the way they look on trees… especially the baby trees!

I love autumn flowers, both alive and dead.

and I love autumn skies through leave-less trees. 

I love this time of year.  After the heat has stopped and before the cold has begun… I love autumn. 

 

part of you capture!

:)

Last week walking around the local college campus, I saw a millipede.  does that count as an animal? I guess it is more like a bug, but still….

it is awfully cute. and it had this little guy pushing it to go.  I don’t know what he is, but once again, cute :)

(yes. the millipede is wearing high heels. )

on Monday I took pictures of my friend Katy and her husband for Christmas cards.  oh, and their two 6 month old puppies.  do you have any idea how hard it is to get 2 puppies to look at you? Add in a husband who didn’t want to be there and a wife who spent so much time making sure they were looking that she never was, and it was… interesting. Oh, and it had been raining all day so it was wet and muddy.  We had fun, but it was definitely a new challenge. that required lots of laughter.  which actually made holding the camera still quite difficult.

  

I also learned that sometimes with dogs, it matters less that they look at the camera and more that whatever they are looking at holds them still enough that their heads aren’t a pure blur. 

It was fun. 

You Capture

The faces of family

This weekend my grandpa threw himself an 80th birthday party.  pretty much all but 3 people came to it, and it was an awesome weekend. I wish I could show you pictures of the capture the flag game, but i was too busy helping the cousins beat the old people. 3 games in a row.  Life is good.

However, I have become known as the person who takes pictures, it is what I do at these things, so I did get lots of faces to share. I love these people…

I could post about 20 more, but until I figure out how to build storyboards (that is what they are called, yes?) I will leave you with these.  Not spectacular pictures, but they make me happy, because spending time with these people makes me happy.  Grandpa did a good job with his family.

  I think he enjoyed his party.

You Capture

The end of the driveway.

I am a Kansas girl. Who lives on a farm.  Want to know what Kansas girls who live on farms see lots of this time of year?

There is a reason we are called the Sunflower state.  There is huge pile of these growing at the end of our cattle road, and I drove down there after work on Tuesday to take some pictures.  The morning light was awesome.  My  photography class officially moved me into the realms of Manual, off of program where I have been quite comfortable for the last year, so there weren’t quite as many expecting good ones as I was expecting.  I blew out a lot of color, (so I guess I needed a faster shutter speed for less light? that is what I did with the picture above, but then turned it right back down…) but I love them just the same.

I love the contrast of the bright pretty flowers with the rusty barbed wire.

I haven’t played around with textures for a while, so I added some here.  I like it…

What I really want to do is go to the field a couple miles up from our place and sneak around in their pasture, it has all sorts of fall colors going, but I am leery of doing that.  Kansas girls who live on farms also see lots of steers, and I am not overly fond of being chased, so these will have to do.

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Part of You Capture

My Choice…

Favorite pictures of the week:

She loved the dress, the giant diamond ring, and all the attention every single one of her 31 older family members present gave her.(it was the first time we had all been together since before her time) She rocked the flower-girl job :)

My favorite picture from the photography class I started yesterday:

I have no clue what this is.  My teacher said it reminded him of a brain, and it does.  It was fuzzy, as well.  Weird.  Pretty, but weird.

My first week in review.

Lets talk day 1, shall we?

I am, obviously, new. I know where nothing is.  I am just getting to know my preceptor, just learning where clean holding IS, and haven’t even had time to browse it.

(I was at my last job for 2 years. for 300 nights I went to the same clean holding, grabbed the same things, and still couldn’t find everything on the first try. and then you have a new clean holding with supplies that look different. It is challenging)

They are getting ready to intubate a guy. He just came in with Resp distress, and bipap wasn’t cutting it.  I went in to watch, which is what you do on day 1, watch.  The med student starts to put in the tube, they give him a boatload of sedation, and starts to put down the tube.  He tries once, misses, pulls back and just as he puts it down his perfectly visualized cords, the guy starts... throwing up stool.

Have you ever seen someone throwing up stool? it smells, it is a weird consistency, and he was putting out A LOT! we had 2 suctions going, the dr stepped in to try to get the tube in and the guy goes into PEA and we start the nastiest code I have ever seen.  Every.Single.Chest.Compression (at a rate of 100/minute, mind you) was splattering this stuff out of his mouth while we tried to get a tube down him.  Once the tube went down him the stool started bubbling out of it (that is bad.)

I am standing there… holding up his gut so we can try to find a pulse with the doppler, and people keep asking me to get things, find things.  I know where nothing is, and fortunately other people were around to get it, but it made me want it to be 6 months in when I actually know how to find things.

We eventually got him back, and they started putting in central lines and arterial lines and dialysis ports (his magnesium was… like 9.  higher than I have ever seen it. normal is 2.5)  Eventually the doctor went in, told the wife what was going on and she said to stop.  pull the lines, pull the tube, let him go.  It took him less than 60 seconds after the vent was turned off to die.

They asked me if I had ever been in a code, to which I just laughed.  Yes, I think I have.   Leave it to me (known at pcu as the Code Queen) to have a code on day one.

Once I got home I took off my scrubs and found little splatters on my clothes, which is a perfect example of why work clothes only get worn at work.  nastiness.

Day 2 I had a patient with a bowel evisceration (she had parts of her small bowel sticking out of her incision).  I  thought it was kind of cool, my preceptor was freaked out, and the doctor didn’t much care, but still. Day 2.

Day 3 was boring.  Which was good after days 1 and 2.

I start nights next week.  I am kind of scared what is going to happen to my patients.

the words I am not writing

I have these words I want to write.  About my first day and my second day and how I have this weird love/hate relationship with days.  It is amazing how much you can get done when your body thinks 9 am is sleeping in.  It is amazing how much getting up at 5am every morning sucks.  I would write about how frustrated I am with my preceptor and how I am so ready to be my style of nurse again, not hers.  about the nasty code and the cute residents who are all married and how I really really miss the people I used to work with.  How I want a house but I like living at home because there is sometimes food when I get off. 

But I am tired.   my brain is fried because I just worked my first day after 18 off and 5 was extra early today and 12 hours was extra long and then I had to drop off my car so that someone can turn off of the check engine light, hopefully by checking the engine, and I don’t feel good so I am going find a book I have read a million times and fill the tub with hot water and probably fall asleep and drown.

the end.

Loving life, morning edition.

So… I didn’t do the last 2 You Capture challenges, but for a good reason. I spent the last 12 days on vacation in Costa Rica.  I was outside playing pretty much every day. I took walks on the beach, I rode a zip line through the rain forest, I walked on hanging bridges 300 feet in the air, and I stayed at a hotel at the bottom of an active volcano: (Arenal first thing in the morning… that is steam coming off.  We didn’t get to see any lava, which was a bummer)

I took early morning walks, which I never do, and was amazed at what I saw:

( Hummingbirds all over the place)

( Beautiful flowers glistening after the morning rain)

( Iguana’s loving the morning sun)

We stayed 2 night at the JW Marriott resort on the pacific and the beach in the morning was gorgeous…. As it also was at night.

(I know, not the challenge, but still…)

This is beautiful lake formed by a crater from another (non-active) volcano, Poas, we walked up one morning. 

The mysterious reflecting rivers of the Tortuguerro reserve on our morning boat rides.

And a beautiful Butterfly park

I could keep going, literally all day.  I took over 1500 pictures, and have spent the last 2 days going through and deleting the bad ones and duplicates.  Someday I might edit some of these, but I have enjoyed just going back and looking at the beauty.  I needed a week away to relax and unwind, and I got it.

Life is good.

everyday

Everyday this week there has been the most amazing sunsets… and everyday this week I have been driving while seeing them. The one day I had my camera with me, I stopped. I love Kansas fields and sunsets.  I think I have this mental picture of God saying… Okay I know your days are crazy hot, but here is a gorgeous evening sky to make up for it. 

part of You Capture.

Summer is…

Summer is….

My teacher-sister coming home for a visit:

And everyone being really glad to see her:

Summer is…  Cousins hanging around telling stories of growing up together:

(apparently the debate was about whether the hamster was killed by being dropped or if it committed suicide by jumping…)

Summer is… being too busy having fun at the barbeque to take pictures of dad grilling like I planned.

Summer is… being reminded that life isn’t fair because my siblings tan and I don’t:

Summer is… cute kids plopping in the grass after running  a race:

Summer is… waking up the next morning to find dad playing farmer in his garden.  

Summer is… fresh cucumbers and tomatoes and corn and green beans:

Summer is… being told to put down the camera and start helping. and then getting covered with bug bites cause I was smart and gardened in flip flops and shorts. 

Summer is… awesome

 

Part of You Capture

black/white

I love playing with my pictures, and I was excited about this challenge because last Friday I did a photo shoot with my friend and her girls.  It was my first time photographing more than 2 people, and I was wondering how I would do.  Conclusion: I love my single-people shots but have no clue how to group more than 2 people.  Guess I need to work on that…

Anyway, I would have played with them some more but I have spent the last 4 days on orientation for my new job and pretty much what I have learned is that I did a smart thing by not picking an 8-4:30 job because OH MY WORD I don’t know how people do it.  When do you get things accomplished? I am so tired by the of the day that I collapse on the couch.  So ready for my 3 12s to come back… and even more ready to be on nights again.  Mornings are not my friend.

 

So… the few I have played with in black and white~

Mom:

Oldest:

Youngest:

Family:

I love black and white pics so I can’t wait to see what everyone else did on You Capture this week!

Healing Hands

My patients have an awful lot to say about me, I guess because I don't say much of anything so the silence has to be filled somehow, right? Nearly every single shift and sometimes a few times a shift, I get compliments on my hair. All the old people think it's natural and I can't lie so I have to confess it's bottled. But they love it anyway. All the little old ladies think I am so beautiful and I smile sweetly and say "Thank you, now don't move while I put this IV in!".

Last week I took care of an 82 year-old man who introduced me to his wife like this: "This is RaDonna my nurse, she takes really good care of me and she also has a really nice butt!". I was mortified! My face turned a brighter shade than my hair and I ran out there as fast as I could! The funny thing is I got a text the next day from a paramedic friend of mine saying that he was transferring my little old man to the next hospital over and he wouldn't stop going on about my nice butt. So now my derrière is apparently the talk of the county!

My favorite thing that my patients say about me isn't my hair or my tush, but that I have a very gentle touch. It made me so happy when I finished putting in an IV today, and my patient says "Thank you for being so gentle with me." So many times I see nurses or aids roughly turning patients or grabbing their arms to put the blood pressure cuff on them and it makes me so sad. One of the ICU nurses I followed around the last month of nursing school told me that patients can tell you care by the way you touch them. That has stuck with me throughout my year-long nursing career and I hope I never forget it.

I tell you what though, I didn't feel very gentle last Tuesday when I was holding a tiny little 7 week-old baby for a lumbar puncture. Poor little baby had a fever that wouldn't break so we had to give him the full workup: labs, IV fluids, cath urine, lumbar puncture, and antibiotics. I was terrified taking care of such a tiny baby and the worst thing was he never stopped crying the entire 6 hours I took care of him. Every time I walked into the room I brought some other method of torture with me. I looked for a vein on him but had to bring reinforcements because he had nothing that I could see. I catheterized him for the urine sample and that was hard because I had never cath'ed anyone under thirty before! When it was time for the lumbar puncture, we laid him on his side at the edge of the bed and bent him into a fetal position and held on as tight as we could without hurting him. He wailed the entire time but Dr. C was good and nailed it.

We ended up transferring that poor little boy to a hospital with a PICU to rule out sepsis. One thing I hate about emergency nursing is that I rarely get to find out the end result of my patients, and the few times I do find out, I usually don't like what I hear. The little old man who like my butt was transferred because he had a massive aortic aneurysm and he only had a 50% chance of surviving the surgery to repair it. A sweet man I took care of last week for gallstones ended up coding the following day. This morning I cared for a man with a 106.9 F rectal temp and after I finally got him cooled down enough that he wasn't delirious from the fever, all he wanted to do was hold my hand because it was warm.

I don't know if any of these patients lived or died but they touched my heart, each in their own way. I am so glad I can make a difference to them by the gentleness of my touch and hopefully bring God's comfort through my hands.

I found the following blessing for nurse's hands on the internet and I wanted to share it with you.

Blessed be these hands that have touched life.
Blessed be these hands that have felt pain.
Blessed be these hands that have embraced with compassion.
Blessed be these hands that have been clinched with anger or withdrawn in fear.
Blessed be these hands that have drawn blood and administered medicine.
Blessed be these hands that have cleaned beds and disposed of wastes.
Blessed be these hands that have anointed the sick and offered blessings.
Blessed be these hands that grow stiff with age.
Blessed be these hands that have comforted the dying and held the dead.
Blessed be these hands, we hold the future in these hands.
Blessed be our hands for they are the work of Your hands, O Holy One

My Country

I love the 4th of July.  It and Thanksgiving are my favorite holidays. (except St. Patrick's day, but that is a given.)

3 years ago when I spent the summer in South Africa I did okay with the homesickness.  S.A is nothing like USA, but I loved it all.  Until I realized that on the 4th of July, the holiday celebrating my home, there would be no watermelon, no barbeque, no family sitting on the lake watching the fireworks.  Oh… fireworks. I love them .  So we were running VBS at this little Indian church in Durban, I was beyond homesick, my teammates all thought I was crazy for being so sad about missing this one little holiday (WE ARE IN AFRICA,CORRIE!) and I walk into church late and see these beautiful children

and hear them yell “Happy independence day, Corrie!”

Pretty sure none of them had any clue what they are talking about but it made me smile, and slightly less longing for home.  That is one of my favorite memories of this holiday, the one I spent far from home…

Now… this 4th of July was so~much~fun.  It is my friend Tiffany’s birthday, and we celebrated big. I would show pictures, but I was too busy going down water slides and getting into splashing fights to take any. And then as we headed for fireworks, the skies opened up and that plan went out the window.  But as far as AMERICA goes, here are my captures:

Joe has spent the last 6 months in Army training, and got to come for a couple of weeks before he goes to his new assignment. He spent the time helping plan their wedding, which we are hoping isn’t delayed by a deployment.

America would not be the awesome country it is without the people who volunteer to protect it.

And the place I love:

People hate on Kansas all the time, but seriously? We have the best skies around. Fireworks or no fireworks.

The weekend ended with me hiding in an empty room to watch the fireworks at work when they set them off on Monday.

I love my country.

Part of You Capture