March Madness

This month was mediocre until the last few days.

My clinical for school right now is OB- which is pregnant moms and their babies for the first few days.  I have clinical 2 days a week.  My first day this past week, I was in and out of a bunch of different rooms doing peri care (cleaning 'down there') and refilling pitchers and such.  Well, I met this woman that was about my age.  She had just had a baby the day before.  The baby was incredibly early- almost not viable (unable to live outside mom).  The baby was under surveillance.

He was so tiny.  The family was making a ton of plans for when the baby could go home.  The next day, I was assigned specifically to this mom, instead of having a bunch of different moms.  After getting report from my professor, I tracked down the nurse and got report from her.  She told me that the baby was struggling and it was looking more and more like the baby wasn't going to make it.  I went to go and check on my mom and her family showed up with balloons and toys.  I kept an eye on her.  She took family members one by one to go see the baby.  I went in and saw the baby, he was so tiny.  He was the size of my hand and wrist.

I assisted with other moms, but kept an eye on mine.  As time went on, I got a page to go to the front.  I went to the front and found out that the baby had crashed.  The nurse, the mom, and the baby were in a different room.  The nurse and my professor told me to stand outside the door.  I stood outside for the better part of two hours.  I stared through the tiny window.  I could see the box and the mom sitting next to the box in a chair.  I saw many nurses buzzing around.  Almost every alarm on the machines was going off.  My brain flew a million different directions.  I knew what was happening, but I truly didn't want to believe it.  Finally, my nurse came out and gave me the low-down.  I won't give details, many people wouldn't really understand it anyway.  She essentially said that the baby wasn't going to make it, so they were making the baby and mom as comfortable as possible.

My nurse disappeared back in, I continued staring through the little window.  Everyone is crying.  As family heard the news and started trickling in, I was able to finally go inside and see him.  I listened to the Dr and the head nurses.  I stood there for close to 3 hours more.  The pastor came in and said prayers with all of us.  I couldn't shed a tear, I couldn't.  I saw different reactions from everyone in the room.  I got to see him move, grasp fingers, open his eyes.  Even with his grim diagnoses, he was still moving.  I had a hard time accepting his grim fate.  I knew he was in pain from all the machines.  It literally broke my heart into tiny little pieces.  I heard the prayers of the mom and the family members.  I listened to the mom apologize since she delivered him so early.  My heart was breaking into dust.

To top off the evening, my professor asked me to share my experiences with my classmates immediately after it happened.  It was one of the hardest things to do.  My eyes were raw and tearstained.  I felt like as I was explaining it, I was blathering on like a bumbling idiot.  I was crying through the majority of it, I don't know if anyone even understood anything of what I said.  My teacher gave me a hug and asked about 10 million times if I was ok.  Ok?  How did she expect me to be ok?  I was traumatized!  Sadly, it was an experience that would have happened at some point, I'm sure.

Today, my week just got that much better.  I met with my guidance counselor for school.  My counselor basically asked me to sit out of school for a semester and have me graduate in 2012.  Mind you, my graduation has changed slowly from 2008 - 2012.  I've been in college full time since 2006.  I want out and it's absolutely absurd that it would take me 6 years for a bachelor's degree.  If I don't go, it's time to pay back on the loan.  If I do go, I won't even find out until a week before classes start.  I am 7 classes away from graduation.  Why will it seriously take me 2 1/2 years to get a degree.  I'm sorry I don't understand this.  Is there anyone that can explain this logic to me?  Only 2 of these classes next to be taken in a specific order- that's what?  One year, maybe?  Ridiculous.  So right now, I'm a babbling mess.

So let's share some good news!

Steven got a promotion!  He is now the Production Manager of the Chronicle!  Yay!  He also got a great pay raise.

That's been our life so far.  Otherwise, life is good.