It's Over!!

A few days ago I finally finished my consolidation period. I’ve had a week to readjust to non-nursing life, which involved not waking up and sleeping and random hours of the day and constantly thinking about when I could nap next for the longest amount of time. It was especially difficult to get out of night shift schedule and fight the temptation to stay up until 0400 doing nothing and then not waking up utterly confused and disoriented at 1500-ish. Instead, I’ve been trying to get out of nursing jet lag and catching up with friends and family. I vowed to myself that I would not think too much about hospital life and nursing, but I failed. Instead, I delighted my non-nursing friends with great anecdotes like describing the appearance and odour of C. diff stool (green, mucusy and smells like rotten death) and how fast blood can ooze out of places that were previously held PICC lines. Seeing their green faces and frantic attempts to avert their gaze towards anything and anyone but myself reminded me that in the normal world, graphic descriptions of bodily fluids and odours are not tolerated well.

Even mundane chores like cleaning are reminding me of my nurse-self – so far I’ve found enough alcohol swabs to open my own store, medical tape, a few pieces of sterile gauze, endless amount of post-its with vital signs and room numbers, a few stolen pens (I’ve told my colleagues repeatedly – if you leave a pen near me, it will be mine), two 3 ml syringes, and a butterfly. I had no intention of taking these things home with me (except for maybe the pens) but since I’m too lazy to go back to my unit to return them, I’ll keep them as a souvenir of my time in consolidation.

On the other hand, it is getting much easier to indulge a few other loves of mine – namely reading magazines (give Bitch a chance) and baking. In fact, I’ve made an amazing carrot cake and banana bread so far. This leads to yet another point – ironically, I ate much healthier when I was working but now that I’m at home (and baking), I need to sample my creations (for umm… quality control purposes). My treadmill in the dungeon (the basement) will be paid a reluctant visit soon.

But while I’m glad that consolidation is over (working full time for free is not conducive to having a life that needs occasional bursts of consumerism), I’m scared of joining the ‘real’ world of nursing. For the past few months I’ve practiced under my teacher’s license which provided me with a palpable sense of security. Now that that security is gone, I’m shaking in my boots about having to be solely responsible for the consequences of my decisions. But the increased pay (from $0/hr to $more/hr) should help alleviate some of those anxieties!