The First Week of Classes

Well, that was fun.  I’m now starting to get a sense of the work load I should be expecting over the next several months.  While I will be busy, I don’t think it’ll be as intimidating as some people make it out to be.  So what fun and exciting things did I do this week?  Well, I had class Mon – Fri, so don’t expect any tales of my wonderful adventures exploring this great vast city of Toronto.  Instead, you’ll get an internal monologue of the cool and not so cool things I’ve learned.  

I’ve technically only got 3 classes this semester, but their 3 fairly busy classes.  One of them is an introduction to the basic skills nurses must have (i.e basic hygiene, assessing vital signs, wound care, respiratory care and all those basic but fundamental skills).  We had our first lab for that class where we got to practice properly washing our hands, where I am proud to say, I did a thorough job (yay me).  We then learned a few aseptic techniques, like donning sterile gloves, and preparing an aseptic field.  And the good news there, I only dropped my tweezers on the floor once.  And I’m sure the thought has popped into someone’s mind, so I’m going to address it here:  No, the 5 second rule does NOT apply when dealing with sterile fields, or anything that’s supposed to be sterile, for that matter.  Oh, and in my defense, though I might have been the first person to drop my tweezers, I wasn’t the last.  

My other class addresses all that fluffy emotional interpersonal skills stuff that nurses must have.  It looks like it’ll deal with all the ethical stuff centered around nursing.  Sadly, I’ve already taken two different health care philosophy courses, one specifically was for nurses.  While the obvious reaction would be “hurrah, I should ace this course with very little work,” I’m still going to have to do all the readings and all the essays.  How annoying.  I should have taken something more fun in my undergrad.  Oh well…

My final class is on child bearing, then later on will switch to geriatrics.  And guess what, I get to start my clinical in the maternity ward in less than 2 weeks!  Fingers crossed, I’m really hoping to see a vaginal birth.  If I have to, I’ll settle for a caesarian section.  As long as I get to see one or the other, I’ll be happy.  But more on that when and if it actually happens.  A lot of people seem most excited about being on the maternity ward; I must admit, I’m equally excited to work in geriatrics.  The down side of clinical: I’m commuting to North York General, about a 45 min public transit excursion away.  I guess this means I’ll be getting up early for my 7 AM clinicals… thank God there’s a Starbucks on the way.  Anyway, I can’t complain about a class that let us watch Monty Python and used it as a valid argument on what the labor and delivery process used to be like (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcHdF1eHhgc). 

Okay, so I suppose it wasn’t an overall intense first week.  We seemed to be very gently eased into the content we need to learn.  But I will say that the multitude of readings I’ve had to do for all 3 courses was intense.  Some of the articles were interesting and seemed useful, others had me considering jabbing a needle in my eye to try to stay awake.    What could possibly be so painful you might ask?  Well, imagine a 20 page article on the what constitutes “private time” and “public time.”  And the lesson from that article: Don’t call people at 3 AM, unless it’s an emergency…  I guess the good news about having to read that article is that I hated it so much, I seem to remember it well.  Go figure.  But I wont dwell on that particular article, because there really were a couple interesting articles I had to read.

All in all, things are going well.  I’m still terribly annoyed by my internet situation though.  I suppose I should elaborate that I did finally get internet in my dorm, however it’s through the UofT, which only allows you to download/upload 2G per week.  2G!!!!  WTF!!  That’s barely enough for me to get my school work done :-S  Let alone the fact that, half of the reason I bought a laptop was so that I could continue to have a life by staying current on my favorite TV shows and using Skype, Facebook, Twitter, and all of that to stay in touch with people.  One might just say I should go and get my own internet, but as it turns out, as far as internet is concerned, Ontario is like living in a 3rd world country.  They have tiered internet, so if you want unlimited high speed internet, you pay an arm and a leg.  Most people have to settle with the slower version.  They might as well just go back to dial up :-(  I’m ranting because I used up my 2G for this week while I was in the middle of Skyping with my sister when my internet cut out.  Plus because it’s crappy quality, the image keeps cutting in and out.  If ever there was any doubt about whether I should return to BC after getting my RN, thanks to the internet here, that doubt is gone.