Feast or Famine

Thats how it is on Labor and Delivery. Last week I was running mad because we had too many patients and couldn't keep up. I go to work this morning, and helped deliver one lady, then moved her to the post partum unit, and got put on cal because we had NO patients. Oh well, I needed a day to get caught up in my classes.

My little puppy isn't so little anymore. It hit me the other day that he is losing his "puppy" look and is now looking more like a "dog." Daisy and dash are best buds. They play all day together, and have to be right next to each other while they sleep. They also cause a lot of trouble together. Daisy knows very well that she is not allowed on the furniture. For some reason she thinks the rule only applies when we are watching. I find her on our front room couch quite often and she jumps down as soon as she sees me..before I say a word. I was doing some laundry and walked in the front room, to find her there yet again. I scolded her and went back to what I was doing. Next time I walked into the room both daisy and dash were up on the couch. Now he things its a pretty comfy place to sleep and will climb up there on his own. Why can't she teach him the good things she knows, like shake, roll over, and stay?

Other News..

I guess its pretty close to official so I can share. Since Devry has been able to line up a job for after graduation here in rexburg, and because I love my job so much, we have decided to stay around.. for a while at least. We are currently in the process of buying Devry's parents house. It is the one we live in now, and have been renting from them, so it wont mean any big changes like moving or anything. I will be doing some remodeling to the house to make it "mine." I am trying to pick out carpet and paint colors that I like, and we will start on it as soon as the paperwork goes through. I am wanting to get it done before christmas. Devry's cousin Scott lives down the street and builds houses for a living, so we are very lucky that he is willing to help us out some. I will be posting before and after pictures as I get things done. I am really excited about it!

Work, Work, Work.

I finally have a day off! I have been working the past 7 days in a row, 12 hour shifts each day, and I am enjoying being able to sit and relax for the first time in a week. I started in labor and delivery last thursday. I absolutely love it...but I am VERY overwhelmed right now. There are so many things to learn, and since it has been very busy, I haven't had any real structure in learning. One day I will have one type of patient, then later that day 5 women will walk in in labor and I will switch patients 3 times before ever getting a grasp on what I was trying to do. Luckily I am always paired with another nurse who will follow up with me on everything I do, but time for teaching is limited. Hopefully it will slow down in a few weeks so I can have time to breath and take in the things I'm learning. The one thing I have learned for sure....I have absolutely NO desire to EVER try to have a baby without an epidural! I have heard way to many women screaming and crying in the last week to ever want to go through that. I admire those women who are tough enough to have natural labor...but I am definately not one of them.

Devry is into potato harvest now, so he has been working very long hours as well. He found an internship with a local car dealership and will start at the beginning of November. We really lucked out with it because Internships typically dont pay very much at all, but this dealership wants Devry to work for them through the rest of school and then after he graduates, so they will pay him pretty decent. Of course his wages will go up when he graduates, but it is a whole lot better then a $3 an hour internship that ends in 3 months. This month will be his last working on the farm. He has worked there for almost 8 years. I am sure he will still help them out some, but hopefully from this internship he can start his career.

I bought tickets to go see Natalie MacMaster this saturday. She is performing on campus! She is a Nova Scotian musician who plays celtic music. I saw that she was coming and had to get tickets. Her music reminds me so much of home, and I wanted Devry to hear it too.

L&D

My boss approached me on monday at work and told me she is going to change my schedule around a bit. I was scheduled to continue to orient on the Mother baby unit for another 2 weeks doing night shifts. Then the plan was for me to start working, filling in the extra shifts until the end of the year. I was then going to begin orienting to Labor and Delivery. She told me she needed me in L&D sooner then she thought, so she is going to skip putting me on nights, and begin orientation in L&D this week. My first day is tomorrow. I am very excited, but kind of nervous at the same time. L&D can be a very high stress area, and I have a ton to learn.

Hooked

Well, its official...I am completely hooked on the "Twighlight" series by Stephenie Meyer. I Had put off reading them because I had heard they were addictive and I simply did not want to put off school work and other important things to read. Being sick for 4 days has had one plus side... I finally could start reading this series without feeling guilty, cause really, what else would I do?

When I first heard about these books, I really wasn't sure what the hype was all about. I would ask what they were about, and people always would say something along the lines of "Its a love story about vampires." Not quite my type of reading. I really wondered if I would find them good. After starting the first one, I couldnt put it down, and once I finished it (in less than a day I might add), I couldn't wait to start the second. I am now starting the third. Although the first one remains my absolute favorite, I am enjoying the progression of the story. I do have to admit that because I was out of the loop, I didn't realize the author was LDS, which really suprised me when I found out. Not that the books are crude or explicit, but sometimes the context of the book suprises me with the lack of morality. (which seems to worsen with each book). I understand that being an LDS author doesn't mean she has to portray Our Church's standpoint on every subject, but I would like to think that being in such an influencial role on young girls minds would encourage Stephenie Meyer to send signals of morality.

The movie for the first one comes out November 21st. I am so excited to see it, although the actor they chose to play the heroic Edward is not near as perfect as I had played him up to be in my mind. I am sure it will still be good though. It actually comes out the day Devry's brother is getting married. His fiance Danizza is also very into the twighlight series, and wants to go to a midnight showing the night before. If there is one, I will definately be there, and if not, I may have to skip out early on their reception. Just kidding.

Sick of being sick

I got into the Doctor this morning, and he first looked at my throat and said "so you are on antibiotics already?" When I said yes he told me he was worried I have a viral infection......most likely Mono. So he ran some blood tests and it came back that it was actually bacterial.....just a type of bacteria that the antibiotics I was already taking didn't fight. Convenient. So the solution? Another series of a different antibiotic. Of course this antibiotic is a lot more expensive, and since they dont carry it at the hospital I dont get my employee discount, so I have to pay the whole amount. So I am absolutely thrilled that I am taking 32 pills a day for infections and pain. Hopefully this doesnt last long. So after waiting in the Dr.s office for a while because I was so lightheaded from being sick and then blood being drawn, I got my pills and headed home. Well of course I stopped for some movies and jello.

So while I was sitting in the waiting room at the Doctors office, I realized I had brought the book Twilight with me. I have been carrying it around with me for the last couple weeks, but havn't started it. I have wanted to, but everyone tells me once you start it you cant put it down....and there are 4 in the series. I knew school and work were more important so I put off reading it, until today. I am already 60 pages in...and hooked. The movies I rented may not make it into the DVD player until i finish my book. Oh well...isnt reading so much better anyway? So i will be lazy the rest of today...then the Dr. said i should be feeling better and not contagious by tomorrow so hopefully we will get to visit with family.

Stuck in a "Rut"

Well my simple dentist appointment to get my two fillings did not quite go as planned. On my left side, everything went fine, but he got to the right and within a few minutes says to me "Chelsey, I hate to tell you this but I either have to do a root canal or pull this tooth out." (Except because we are in Idaho, he pronounced it "rut canal" like everyone else around here). Well of course since my insurance doesnt cover dental my first thought was how much it was going to cost me. An extra $900!!! And that is if I dont need to get a crown, which would add another $700. Wow.....so since i really didnt want to loose my tooth, I went ahead with the "rut canal" :). He didnt put me on antibiotics because he didnt think it would get infected....I wish I had remembered my horrible infection experience with my wisdom teeth and requested I be put on it. He told me the numbness would wear off and the pain should be mild and only for a day or two, nothing that a couple Ibuprophen wouldn't cover. So I took a couple pills before the numbness wore off to prevent it from hurting. Well...the couple Ibuprophen didnt do too much. Within 6 hours of having it done, I had so much pain and pressure in my mouth It hurt to talk, swallow, and breath. Chewing was not even an option. I upped my dose of Ibuprophen to 600mg, which didnt even touch the pain. After a day, with the pain getting worse and worse, I started taking 800mg of ibuprophen every 8 hours, and 2 extrastrength tylenol every 4 hours. I had never taken that much pain medication for anything, and I still had a lot of pain and pressure, which was spreading up to my sinuses and giving me a bad headache. I worked my 12 hour shifts, and finally after 2 days of trying, my wonderful co workers convinced me this wasnt normal and I needed to call the dentist. I did and told the secretary what I was experiencing, and after talking to the Dentist for 10 seconds, she comes on the phone and says "he wants you to come in right away." Well, since i was at work i said i couldnt, and i work every business day until tuesday, which was when my follow up appointment was scheduled for anyways. She called a prescription for antibiotics into the pharmacy and told me to start them right away and call The dentist at home if it gets worse.

So shouldn't my adventure be over by now? I thought so to. Well...on my way home from work last night I felt my throat start to hurt. By the time I got home, it was bright red and pretty swollen, and kept getting worse throughout the evening. I had a fever and just felt absolutely rotten. Finally it got bad enough that I called work to let them know I wouldnt be in today. So, after not eating anything that I had to chew because of my tooth, I now am having a hard time swallowing anything at all. I really dont know if the tooth and sore throat are related, but I didnt want to risk having something contagious and being at work with all the newborns. And of course my dentist is out of town today..now that I can go to his office. So i have an appointment this morning at the student health center with my regular doctor. We will see how that goes.

I hope it is nothing contagious and I start feeling better because Devry's brother Ted and his wife Shayla are coming up for the weekend and I was really excited to see their little boy Kaden. Devry and I were gone to Vegas the last time they came, so we havn't seen him in 5 or 6 months. He was very premature and had to be in Primary Childrens NICU for quite a while. We were all worried about him, but he made it through and is now 2 years old and doing great! He didn't talk alot the last time we saw him, but everyone is telling us how much he has started talking and how big he has gotten. Hopefully I can still spend the weekend with everyone.

Officially an Adult

Although I turned 21 in February, I officially got the "i'm an adult feeling" when I got my first real paycheck, and almost a third was taken out in taxes. I knew because I would be making more, more would come out, but I didn't realize exactly how MUCH more. Its somewhat depressing really. 20 hours of work all gone before I ever saw the paycheck. The really new thing for me is health insurance. Because I'm from Canada, health insurance isn't something we ever had to go buy. It was just there. Of course I never saw the huge tax deductions from paychecks that my parents have, but it seems so silly to me to pay an insurance company tons of money when they hardly cover anything. I finally had to bite the bullet and go to the dentist today. My teeth have been hurting for a couple months, but since dental isn't covered at all on our health insurance, I put off going until I was making enough money to afford it. I went to the dentist every 6 months of my life until I got married, with only one cavity ever. Its been a long year and a half with no dental care. The outcome wasnt the rotting decaying teeth I had anticipated, only 2 cavities. One is very small and the other is a little bigger. But still....it will cost me almost $400 to get them fixed. Can I just go back to being 16,care free, having no taxes taken from my paychecks, and having my parents insurance cover anything I ever needed? This "adult" thing isn't all its cracked up to be.



On the other hand....

I love having a "real" job. I am really enjoying the mother baby unit. My boss asked me the other day if I will orient to do labor and delivery. I had to hold myself back from jumping up and screaming "YES!!" I have always wanted to do labor and delivery. It is the main reason I went into nursing. I thought I wouldnt have the opportunity to orient to L&D for several years, but my boss needed someone sooner, and so I get to do both! I calmly told her that I would absolutely love to. She walked off and I called Devry right away to tell him the great news! I start orientation in January for L&D. I can't wait!



Other exciting events....

Well, other then work and the few classes I am taking, not much is new. I was very excited to find out that I won an IPOD at work. I had entered a drawing for attending a meeting, and was one of the 3 that won! I was going to get one for Christmas from Devry, but now he can find something else to get me. :)



I am officially an Aunt of six now. Devry's Brother Joe and his wife Lisa had baby #3 today. A little boy they named Nolan. Devry's other brother Dan and his wife Rachelle are going to have their 3rd in February, which will be grandchild #7. Here is a picture that was taken in May. With new baby's coming all the time, family pictures will never be up to date.