Merry Christmas To All

Merry Christmas one and all! Or at least Happy Holidays! I hope everyone got what they really wanted for Christmas.
Don't work too hard, if you are.
Don't eat too much , if you aren't working!
Love
From
WardBunny, Snoopy and Woodstock

Twas The Week Before Christmas

Twas the week before Christmas,
When all through the college,
Not a lecturer was there,
Not even Sim Man,

The tree had been decorated,
While no one could see it,
With eight feet of green pine,
And so many lights,

The students had gone this way and that,
Results sprinkled with care,
Over the internet were passed,
Both good, bad and indifferent,

For some Christmas would be merry,
While others would face trauma,
The endless rewrites of essays,
Of corrections and mistakes,

Their fingers all calloused,
Worn down to the bone,
Suffering the stress,
And avoiding dry turkey,

The greatest present of all,
Santa could leave under the tree,
Would be an essay of quality,
Earning an A from all teachers,

So Christmas came to pass,
They were heard to proclaim,
“Merry Christmas? Bah Humbug!”
From all nursing students.

Stupid WardBunny

Remember the confidence I displayed over the three essays I handed in? The one I handed in first has come back as an E (which is a narrow fail folks). It criticised my writing style, which isn't good since I'm dyslexic. I don't think they are allowed to do that. Ah well it has to be resubmitted on the 14th of January, so I won't be having a quiet Christmas after all.

When The System Crashes

When my Windows laptop crashes I use ctrl, alt, del and reboot the whole thing. It stalls like that, nearly always, because I'm trying to do too much at once. So what happens when the health care system crashes?

People slip through the cracks. That's what happens.
Those incapable of looking after themselves and thrown back into the community without so much as a backwards glance. Christmas is a time of year when people should be with their families, however with rumored hospital discharges at around 90 per day for the week before Christmas, how are social work, social care and district nursing services expected to continue? They just are and with less staff because they all want to be at home for the holidays too.

So while I sit at home with my college prescribed two weeks off, I'll be thinking about the people who are unable to care for themselves in homes not equipped to care for them with families, who either don't care and won't be there for them or who simply cannot cope with the level of care they require.

I know the world is far from perfect but we could all make it suck a little less.

Post Nap

I'll get on with some of my fiction writing over the Christmas break, however in the meantime I'll fill out these memes (I wasn't tagged for the second one but I've done it anyway).

8 Things From Mousie (for being a lurker)

8 Passions in my life:

• Chocolate
• Art and writing
• Museums
• Houseplants
• House and CSI
• My family and friends
• Nursing
• Computers and technology

8 Things to do before I die:

• Write my novel
• Write my autobiography
• Immigrate to America or maybe Canada
• Climb a Munro (maybe more than one if I actually manage to climb one next year)
• Find the love of my life
• Travel across America and Asia
• Adopt a child (or have a child, in some way)
• Get married, hopefully to the love of my life

8 Things I often say:

• What's the word count?
• I've lost my keys/ wallet/ phone/ notes/ diary/ pen/ etc.
• I like Star Trek.
• What's your problem?
• You OK?
• I need chocolate.
• I'm skint.
• *sigh*

8 Books I've read recently: (I grouped some books together so there are way more than 8)

• The Bone Collector by Jeffery Deaver (I love the move and the book is better)
• A Gathering Light by Jennifer Donnelly
• The Tenth Circle by Jodi Picoult
• The Intimate Adventures of a London Call Girl by Belle De Jour
• The Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich
• The Harry Potter series by JK Rowling
• The Old Kingdom series - Sabriel, Lirael, Abhorsen and Over the Wall by Garth Nix
• The trinity of nursing textbooks - Nurses' Dictionary, A Nurses' Survival Guide to the Ward and Essential Nursing Skills - There are more textbooks that I use but those are 3 of the best in my nursing for dummies set.

8 Songs that mean something to me: (There could be so many more)

• Someone Saved My Life Tonight - Elton John
• I Don't Feel Like Dancing - Scissor Sisters
• Somewhere Only We Know - Keane
• Up On The Roof - The Drifters
• Nature's Law - Babyshambles
• Reflection - from Mulan
• Everybody Needs Somebody - from The Blues Brothers
• How To Save A Life - The Fray

8 Qualities I look for in a friend:

• Honesty
• Acceptance
• Intelligence
• Humour
• Warm heart
• Loyalty
• Happiness
• Love

My Christmas Schedule (Taken from my friend list on the other blog.)

17th - Finish essay, hand essay in, sleep, placement
18th - Placement
19th - Placement
20th - Placement, lecturer visit, Holby City's on!
21st - Last day in placement for 2 weeks! Pack up halls room, head home to parents
22nd - Last shopping day, ? see friends for present exchange, Casuality's on!
23rd - Hide, sleep, write
24th - Nothing planned, watch TV, write
25th - Christmas day, lunch at restaurant, open presents
26th - Boxing Day, again nothing planned
27th - Nothing planned, Holby City's on!
28th - Find something to do!
29th - Nothing doing, Casuality's on!
30th - Go Shopping with Christmas money and gift vouchers (if I get any)
31st - Hogmannay! Watch bells on TV as usual.
1st - New Year's Day!
2nd- Nothing happening.
3rd -Ditto, Holby City's on!
4th - My Birthday!!!!!
5th- Nothing going on, Casuality's on!
6th - Return to halls
7th - Placement
8th - Placement
9th - Placement
10th - Placement, Holby City's on!
11th - Placement

Wow, need to get some plans. Mind you I plan on sleeping, writing, watching TV, drawing and I might do some college work. Or maybe not.

Pre-nap Update

I finished the essay at 6am this morning before catching an hours sleep before heading to placement. My mentor told me I shouldn't have come in but allowed me off early to hand in the essay at the college.
So that's it, all three essays are in and the first results are due this week with the rest in January. I'm feeling good about the essays handed in. Although it takes me so long to write a first draft they are usually good enough to get a C without any intervention. The only essay I handed in without this good feeling was the first nursing one and unsuprisingly it failed (not by much it managed an E), I've been better since then, making sure I know the question and layout, so I can give them what they expect.
I promise to post something way more interesting after a nap.
WardBunny

1,400 Words and Counting

I will get this finished
I will get this finished
I will get this finished

Friday Feeling

I really don't have that Friday Feeling right now. No, I'm not in placement this weekend but I do have an essay due in on Monday. So I'm going to have to strap myself to my computer and conjure two and a half thousand words on something sensible on nursing.
Better shove off and get something done. Like write an essay, maybe.

Don't Slag Off The NHS!

It's true. We've been told to not slag off the NHS anymore because that's now people get the bad impression.

Well sorry folks but it's not the words we say that give that impression. It's a little thing called body language. We heard about it in the first six months of my course and it comes up every so often ever since. Clients, patients, service users (whatever we happen to be calling the people who use our service this week), they notice that we do not have the time to spend with them because we have so much yet to do between notes, drug rounds and inter-disciplinary working. Even if we try to hide it, knowing what it seems to do to the professional relationship, we all know fine well that the sly glance at the watch will incite a response of.... "Aw, look I'm keeping you. You don't need to be hearing about my bowels." When, in fact, we do need to be hearing about Mrs Smith's bowels and Mr Brown's skin problem and how sometimes there is this little stabbing pain just to the right of the shoulder blade.

Accept it. Until there is enough staff (or less patients, for the management who think we already have enough staff) we will never be able to give our full concentration to the patient in front of us. We will constantly be thinking about the next patient, the next task or the list of stupid nonsense that has been handed down from the ivory tower this week.

Home And Dry

Sorry for the random poetry that has been filling this blog of mine. This is only one of two, however I am unable to be as out on the blog all my friends read as I am here. SO on with a little introduction...

Things I Like: Cartooning, writing, reading, TV, computers and NURSING. That's a short list and the stuff you'll find here will be based on one or more of those subjects.

Things I Hate: Essays (I should be writing one right now), narrow-minded people and hiding who I really am.

Why Nursing? Honestly when I was a child I wanted to be Duffy from Casualty (Not that you'll find me wearing a dress or hat on placement!). While I've chased other dreams I have finally come back to this one and I'm loving it.

Am I Different From The Other Nursing Student Blogs? No not really. I stress and struggle like everyone else and I work hard and love placements. One thing makes me a little different though. I'm gay. I've stopped making excuses and I've given up on hiding it, however it is not yet common knowledge amongst those I work with so I keep my head down still. None of this changes my practice or patient care.

I better get back to that esssay now, they don't write themselves, which is a bit of a shame.

Love WardBunny

Trapped Inside / Nightshift

Trapped Inside
Help me escape from the never ending pain,
Take me away to a world without care,
Let me leave this caged existance,
Free me to be who I once was.

Nightshift
She hurries onwards through the night,
Never stopping, always moving,
Her list of tasks never shortening,
The endless night, the endless work.

Hold Me

Hold me in your arms and tell me you love me,
Hold me in your arms and tell me that you care,
Hold me in your arms and tell me the truth,
Hold me in your arms and lie to me if the truth will hurt,
Hold me in your arms and whisper worthless nothings,
Hold me in your arms and shield me from this pain,
Hold me in your arms and share your strength with me,
Hold me.