Those of you who may be in the hospital, let me fill you in on a few things.

1. you are in a hospital, not a 5 star hotel.

2. your nurse aide is there to assist you with things you CANT do for yourself. We are not your personal servant, maid, or secretary.

3.you are in the hospital for a reason (presumably medical) this is not a place to hold a party.

4.its 2 visitors per patient. you can not fill up your room with friends and family until we can not get to your room mate that is in respitory distress and turning blue.

5.if you come in here weighing over 300 pounds, its probably not a good idea to have your family bring you Mickey D's and a bag reese cups.

6.this is not a vacation resort, please dont ask me to go to the gift shop and get you post cards.

7.this isnt a hook up bar. Dont ask me to get the phone number of the girl in the room across the hall.

8. If I have to give you an enema, please realize that Im  not doing this because I enjoy it, Im doing it because the doctor does!

9.when I come to take your vitals, dont ask me "why?" Your in a hospital, thats what we do here.

10. under no circumstances are you to smoke in your room, especially when your room mate is on oxygen!! Trust me on this one.

Im not making any of this stuff, this has all been observed by me while working in the hospital.

Well, I was back on rehab last night. It was a pretty quiet night. I have some new patients and they are very nice. One poor lady has so many family members coming to see her and staying until 10:00 she cant get any rest. We have tried to explain to them that she really needs some time to rest, but they all pile in anyways. And there are two other patients in the room with her and they cant get any rest because of all the noise. I think the nurse is going to restrict the amount of people and make sure they leave by 8:00pm.

We are supposed to assist these people with their showers. Just stay in there so they dont fall. But, Ill tell you, some of these old people just wont shower. They can be there for 3 weeks and will just wash up at the sink. I would never be rude enough to tell them "you really stink, you have to take a shower", but with some of them, Id really like to.

I have one really sweat lady. She was in about 4 months ago after having a stroke, now she is back because she fell at home and broke her hip. I feel so bad for her. She is depressed about the whole thing, but she is recovering really well. I keep going in her room and talking with her and encouraging her. I tell her all the time how well she is doing. She always says "do you think so?" She is very worried that she wont get better. She smiles when I tell her she is doing better than I had thought she would.

ooo craft show coming on, got to go

Today was actually a pretty fun day at work. I got pulled downt to my old home, the med/surg wing. We end up with a lot of mental health patients there and they can be quite the handful. One of them got off the floor and started a fire on the first floor. Our security people found him and brought him back up. When the fire alarm went off we had to do the usual closing of all the doors and removing things from the halls. It really breaks up the monotany of the night.

On a sad note. My hockey has been canceled. Im really upset about this. Me and Commadore had a lot of fun watching the Red Wings. Now we only have Nascar and thank God that is starting this Sunday.

I have to talk about my babies, my ferrets. Toby and Zoe. They are the coolest little things. Toby is 4 years old. She is sooooo sweat and playful. She follows me around begging for Cheerios, which she has developed a huge addiction to. Zoe is a year old and she is still in the bitting stage. She will leap through the air to attack you. They have such sharp teeth and Zoe really hurts when she bites. Toby will play bite, you can barely feel it, she just does it to let you know she wants to play.

They are such weird animals. They do the strangest things. Some times I wonder if they are having convulsions, they way they shake and wiggle when they are excited. They are a riot to just sit and watch. I dont understand their fascination with stealing things. They have made a hole underneath my couch and they steal stuff and put it in the couch. I have to empty the thing out once a week. I find pens, tooth brushes, bra's, socks, my clay molds and various other items. If anything is missing, we look in the couch and were sure to find it. Very cool pets, but not for homes with small kids, because of the biting.

Ive been going to college for my RN but Im so frustrated with the whole thing. Every time I think I have my pre reqs done, they add 2 more. I have the feeling that I will never get into the program. I have to work full time and Im in my 40's so trying to the pre reqs and go into the program would be very difficult for me. I have been watching the nurses for awhile now. They dont get to spend much time with the patients. It seems that most of their time is spent charting, noting, calling docs, talking to families, placing orders and so on. They all have told me that they dont do the kind of nursing that they would like, which is to spend time with the patients. The fact is, it is the NA who notices when a patient is going bad. Its the NA that is there (if there is no family) when the patient dies. Its the NA that the patient depends on to change their wound dressings, fix the beeping IV's, monitor their vitals and so on. My nurses are frustrated that all they really get to do for the patient is to give them their medication. I really enjoy my job and I could put up the bad pay if we just got a bit more credit for what we do. It isnt the nurse that gets their butt kicked by the mental health patient, or gets spit on by the HIV patient, its the NA. Ok, I know the nurses go through that too, but they usually end up tell me to deal with that person.

Oh sorry, I got off track, the nursing school, yes, well, the more pre reqs I have to take, and the more I talk to my nurses, the more I think that being an RN isnt for me. I mean, the pay is great for them, but they dont get to give much patient care. alright, enough moaning. Im done