This photo illustrates how I was ready to start my first day back… then after 8 hours at school, several hours of homework… this is how things started to look….
It’s going to be a rough semester. Classes consist of: Pharmacology/Pathology, Community Health, Maternity/Peds, and Professional Nursing. It sounds great, until you really learn that Maternity is like 4 regular classes in 6 weeks. At non-accelerated programs, you can have Labor & Birth, Postpartum, Mother & Baby, Newborn all be individual classes instead of 6 weeks. After today’s 3 hour lecture, I left feeling like… how is this even possible? We have our first exam, next Wed, which is class #2. I have the weekend and Mon/Tues to memorize 88 maternity terms and 24 medications (side effects, usual dosage, actions, etc.) and refresh on female anatomy.
Tomorrow we have class from 8-1 pm, then special lab, which my professor is calling maternity bootcamp from 1-8 pm. Friday, I have my first maternity clinical from 7-7, and Sat. training at the hospital from 1-5.
Extracurricular activities… the Duke Navigator’s Program, the end of life workshop series that I was involved with in the fall, continues this spring. I have been paired with a GI cancer patient. Starting in two weeks, I will meet them during their chemo treatments and begin having end of life discussions with them. My goal is to normalize these conversations with patients in serious conditions. The goal for the patient is to discuss their thoughts and ideas, and hopefully, I can be part of their support team.
Other activities, I took it upon myself to create more opportunities for nursing students of color to support one another. I am hoping to start an informal peer mentorship group and create opportunities for social mixers to meet one another. By doing so, I accidentally elected myself President of a student club. Hopefully it won’t be too much work, but help support other students’ needs by providing avenues to share experiences.
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