The Strength of My Pelvic Floor

And I’m back.

The first of four semesters of Nursing School officially came to a close ten days ago.  I sat for my 75 question final, worked my way through the exam, and left with a smile on my face and a spring in my step.  Having shaved my head early that morning, I was feeling good about life yet generally terrified about the next eighteen months ahead of me.

Sweet cheese’n’rice the semester F L E W by.  To quote Sondheim and Lapine from “Into The Woods”:

And I know things now, many valuable things, that I hadn't known before.
Do not put your faith in a cape and a hood, they will not protect you the way that they should.
And take extra care with strangers, even flowers have their dangers.
And though scary is exciting, nice is different than good.

C'mon Summer of 2013.  NCLEX, I'mma getchu!

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Registration for the next semester of classes came and went.  This semester my classroom work was Mon/Wed day with a 7a-1p Tue clinical. Next go ‘round I’m in class Mon/Wed day with a 7a-1p Thu clinical.  Which means I spend six hours at one hospital, shower, nap, eat, and head to my hospital, Big Hospital for Kids, to work the first of three overnights.  I’m still working 7p-7a Thu/Fri/Sat. 

The weekly shift-flip remains, but I’ll gain a full Tuesday off.  Definitely a luxury I’m looking forward to.

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So what did I learn in semester one of four?  Assess, assess, assess, and if you fail to spell ‘assess’ correctly in a nursing note, you’ve just written the word ‘asses’ in a patient chart.  Twice in my case.  As you cannot scribble out mistakes, somewhere there is a medical record with something close to the following entry:

“…with the assistance of Petit Filipina, R.N. (obviously not her real name…) and four other team members, rolled patient to the left side to asses asses ASSESS skin breakdown on the back, sacral and perineal area…” -Nosokomaniac S.N.

Joking aside, the goal of our program was to learn assessment and safety skills when caring for patients.  That covers a surprisingly large area of nursing, but overall I feel pretty confident about the things I’ve learned.  My psychomotor skills (to use their parlance) are absolutely lacking, but practice and repetition will hone them over time.

My CNA coursework and clinicals in early 2010 taught me good stuff.  There were ten students in my clinical section, three of us CNAs.  The contrast between us and the other students was remarkable.  I can’t fault my cohorts for their lack of experience, but you can guess who I asked for help when I needed it.

My Nursing School does not require incoming students to have their CNA, but I cannot recommend it enough for anyone considering nursing school.  We were miles ahead of everyone in both the clinical and classroom setting.  The language, the familiarity with equipment, body positioning, ADL care, isolation precautions, you name it, we surveyed in CNA class and it made a huge difference in Nursing 101.

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It could be the case that in every vocational training there are people who bemoan the educational staff constantly, I’m not entirely sure.  What I do know is that there are some folks in my program who are so inconceivably rude and ignorant, I find myself doing kegels every time they speak. 

Let me sidetrack for a moment.

Back in my former life in Investment Banking, I had the good fortune to attend many classes on communication and management.  One of the teachers was lecturing us on how to deal with difficult people in several different scenarios.  He taught the text to the letter for a bit, then closed the book, sat on the table at the front of the class, and proceeded to blow our minds.

“Unless your life depends on it, whenever you encounter a difficult person, instead of spitting negativity back at them, do ten kegel exercises.  I guarantee when you consider what to say to them, it’ll come out a lot more effective that if you were simply reactionary.”

Trust me when I say it works.  In the face of negativity, tensing and relaxing the muscles in your pelvic floor will diffuse any snap judgements you might make.  Of course there are situations where it’s inappropriate.  Say for instance a person is threatening you with a knife with the intent to slice you to shreds.  I would NOT recommend pausing to tense your pubococcygeus muscle ten times.  However, when one of your cohorts is shit-talking like there is no tomorrow, ten quick squeezes down there isn’t gonna hurt the situation.  In fact, it’ll help keep you from perpetuating the negativity.

So.  Back on topic.  The naysayers who feel it necessary to belittle staff and many of their other cohorts are few in number, but they seem to be spreading misinformation like rot through the program.  I’m definitely not gullible enough to drink their poison koolaid, but a few people are.  And it’s worrying.

In the interim, my pelvic floor is getting stronger.