I am a REGISTERED NURSE!!

That explains why I've been on a mini hiatus :)

I took my NCLEX on Monday morning and I'm not going to lie, I thought the test was AWFUL. I studied SO MUCH from the time I finished my NCLEX course until the time I took the test, and to me the NCLEX was a mind game! I left the testing center certain that I failed. I wanted to cry.

There is a thing you can do called a Pearson Vue Trick, or PVT. After you take the exam, go home and log into Pearson Vue and try to register for the NCLEX again. There is a "good" pop up and a "bad" pop up. The "good" pop up says something like "Our records state you have recently scheduled this exam. Please contact your board of nursing for further details. Another registration cannot be made at this time." That supposedly means you passed. The "bad" pop up takes you straight to the credit card page, which supposedly means you did not pass. The page has to say "delivery successful" before you can try the trick.

Waiting for it to say "delivery successful" was maybe only about 30min, but it was an agonizing wait. When the status changed, I went into sympathetic nervous system overdrive!!! But I got the good pop-up!! The PVT is said to be 99% accurate, but I still wasn't convinced.

Pearson Vue also gives you your "unofficial" quick results, which are still accurate, 48 hours after you test. The only reason why it is "unofficial" is because Pearson Vue doesn't actually issue the license - the BON does, and sometimes the BON is slow with updating their records. Not all states participate in quick results. Thankfully Texas does. I just got my unofficial results and I passed!!!! I am an RN, FINALLY!!! Those dog days are over ;)

Aside from studying my butt off the NCLEX, I was also busy with some other things as well:

1. I met with some friends from the sorority I used to belong to - they are my "family" (my big, my grandbig, and my twin) and we ate at Rocknes. It was really nice to be able to catch up with them :)

2. Saturday I met with the church pastor to discuss ceremony stuff. I also told him that E and I already got legally married in December, but we decided to keep it quiet from pretty much everyone except for our parents and some friends. I was afraid that would change something, but he said that's fine - he usually has at least one couple/year who does this and they are military :) So that made me feel better! He said they will just make some subtle changes in the actual ceremony, but nothing really noticeable. The vows will sort of be like a renewal (saying that we will CONTINUE to promise, etc etc etc).

3. Mama bear and myself spent Monday addressing, stuffing and stamping all of those invitations. That took FOREVERRR. I never want to do that again. If I have a daughter, I'm telling her she's on her own with her invitations lol (probably not). We mailed them out on Tuesday :)

This Friday I am meeting with my florist at the church to discuss options on decorating, as well as for the bouquets and boutonnieres. I just hope she does not go into anaphylactic shock on me!!

She has a problem, and docs can't figure it out. Between January and now, she has gone into anaphylactic shock at least 11 times and has been in and out of the hospital. They can't isolate the cause. It's so bad that she'll be driving and then she'll stop breathing. My big from my sorority and this girl are best friends which is how I know her. My big was explaining to me that doctors are trying to rule some stuff out...and she couldn't remember what they were trying to rule out, but if it is what the doctors think it is, then this girl probably won't live past 30. She's like my age. We're hoping it isn't that, but regardless, it doesn't seem good. The doctors suspect it is some sort of autoimmune reaction that is causing her to go into anaphylactic shock so many times...it is just so strange.

Some big things I can cross off on my list of shit to do. now I can focus more on wedding planning, as well as working on my resume! And so the job hunt begins!

:)

Military Monday Bloghop! and Miscellaneous Monday

1. I finally caved in and took the Texas Nursing Jurisprudence Exam. It's a requirement for licensure in Texas. I could have taken it any time but I will not receive my license until I do. It seemed very intimidating because there was a "study guide" page with lotsssss of information. You have 2 hours to take it, there are 50 questions, and you're allowed to have other windows open and use the BON to look up answers. If you fail, you can take it again but have to wait 7 days.

It was all about nursing law, the NPA, board rules, etc.

Some of it was blatantly obvious. Like for example:

As a nurse, which of the following should you NOT do?

A. feed your patient lunch

B. dispense medications

C. kill your patient.

...okay not QUITE but you get the idea. Others were tricky. It took me nearly 2 hours, but I passed! One more thing I can cross off the list. Now I just need to take and pass that damn NCLEX! :)

2. We had some crazy thunderstorms last night. I love storms, but not when they rob me of my sleep. I'm working 12 hours today, which I haven't done in awhile (11a-11p)...either it won't be too bad or it's going to suck. Either way, I'm really tired.

The past 2 times I worked wasn't bad at all. I got floated to the overflow med-surg unit (which is located on the ICU stepdown but of course the overflow and stepdown don't "mix" with each other...unless you walk by and see a patient climbing out of bed or something lol). The overflow has 8 beds and usually 2 licenses (at least one RN, obviously) and usually a support. A majority of the patients were ambulatory. By the end of the evening, we had 5 patients. There was only one patient who was kind of a problem (he was climbing out of bed *AND* at the very end of the hall...I suggested moving him closer to the makeshift "nurses station" that way they could keep a closer watch on him instead of making him a sitter. It was such a long walk down to that room lol). Overall, I did some vitals...helped someone to the bathroom...pulled out some heplocks...ran some 24hr pee to the lab...and that's it. Most of it was sitting and BS'ing with the nurses lol.

Saturday I only worked 4 hours and got floated to sit with a patient, who fell, broke her hip, had it repaired, and is confused. She was a handful. Her family was very nice. The last hour was the worst, though. Very confused. Kept saying she had to go home and tend to her kids and dogs and if I called her neighbors, they can bring her keys so that she could go home and drive, etc etc. Kept trying to get out of that chair to leave. I kept advising her not to bend over because of her hip (and she was very well approaching that over 90-degree mark!) but like that did anything. She is also borderline. I kept reorienting her and trying to empathize with her her frustration for wanting to go home but can't and at one point she said to me, "you can either do one of two things. you can either SHUT UP or help me get out of here." She then apologized, but still asked me to help her get home.

Finally she decided she wanted to go on the "couch" (her bed) so I had the RN and the aide who was replacing me help her back. It took us about 20 minutes (all she had to do was take a few steps) but we finally did it, and then she started to settle down...except for screaming at the other aide telling her to "stop making so much damn noise and turn those damn lights off because I'M TRYING TO SLEEP!" and then telling her she had a pretty outfit. lol. Never worked with a borderline patient before. They can be quite a challenge.

3. I'm almost hoping I can sit again with a patient (I don't care if I'm sitting for 12 hours!) so I can get some studying done. It's crunch time! I need to pass my NCLEX on the 1st try! Everyone else I talked to passed. And I keep reading about people on allnurses.com failing 2, 3, 4, 5 and even *6* times. That makes me nervous.

4. My enhancer for my engagement ring still hasn't come in yet. Jared's told me early February. I'm getting nervous that it won't be here on time for the formal wedding!

5. I finally decided to change my earrings yesterday. I bought some cute black/silver/grey dangly ones for $4.99 at Target lol...so I went home and wanted to try them on. The earrings I had on were very comfortable, but the back isn't like your standard earring back (with that funny looking stopper to go on the post). I was able to get the right one off pretty easily but the left one was jammed in there - I thought I was going to tear my ear lobe! I definitely hurt my ear a bit trying to get that one off. I decided to not put those back in for fear of having a hard time getting them back off so I just stick in some princess cut cubic zirconia posts instead :)

ATT...and cake!

I got my ATT today! Finally!! Apparently the finger prints went through this time! I checked on the TX BON the other day and saw that they received my background check so I was thinking I was going to get my ATT soon...and lo and behold, I was sitting in my class this morning and got the lovely e-mail!

I also scheduled my test. I'm not telling anyone when I'm taking it, because I don't need any false reassurance and if I end up failing, I really don't want anyone to know about it. All of my other friends have passed so far so we'll see! I scheduled my day and even though it's not for awhile, I'm already stressing out and feeling very sick to my stomach. This test will determine if I'm competent enough to be an RN. Although it won't be the end of the world if I fail, I'd rather not pay another $200 to Pearson Vue just to take the damn test again!

But now that I have a date, I feel like I can focus more. It's crunch time now!

I also sampled cake today! We went to The West Side Bakery, which apparently is the place to go in my area! They allowed us up to 4 flavors to sample. I loved them all except for the hazelnut torte with chocolate ganache (too dry, but I realize that style of cake is different than the other three)...but the almond cake with raspberry preserve filling blew me away. The two went so well together and the cake itself had a lovely almond flavor. I decided on the design:

it'll be up to a 4 tier cake (depending on how many people come) with buttercream frosting...basically what is shown above but with dark/light purple calla lily flower accents. I gave them a fabric swatch of my bridesmaid dress colors to try and match up with the flowers on the cake. The flowers in that picture are buttercream but I'm trying to see if they can do marzipan flowers instead. They said they can, I just don't know how much extra it will be. Calla lilies are less intricate than other flowers (like roses or mums) so to make them out of marizpan (which is similar to fondant) shouldn't be that much more expensive, and I'm keeping the flower accents similar to the those in the picture - so it's not like there will be a ton of flowers. I haven't decided if I want to keep the top with just flowers or some flower accents and a cake topper. we'll see. but needless to say, I am very excited about this cake!

Another thing to cross off my list :)

Military Monday Bloghop!

It's Military Monday!

I started my NCLEX class today :) I decided to go to the Starbucks on the corner before heading in but daaaaamn were they busy! The drive-thru had a long wait and they were packed inside. Instead of opting for my usual grande soy 1 pump vanilla latte (for the sake of time, because I only had 10minutes before the class started) I opted for a grande Pikes Place instead, because I could that instantly lol. Unfortunately that didn't do the job, because I'm still ridiculously tired.

I enjoy this class, though. The main instructor is hilariously vulgar, and that makes it even more fun. As tired as I am, I'm even more motivated now :)

♫ I'm coming home, coming home... ♫

Today I drove nearly 12 hours from Fort Leonard Wood back to my home in OH-IO. I left by 0840-ish (definitely took my time...when I was leaving to go to FLW, I was up and ready by 0500 lol) and got home around 2030.

The past 4 days went by soooo fast. It also didn't help that I came on a week when Eddie was busy with BOLC stuff. I pretty much saw him in the morning when he got up for PT (at like 0500 lol), went back to sleep, then got up around 0700 when he came back. He would hang around until around 0740 and then went off to his classes. I saw him for lunch, and then I had my evening time with him. Between then I would just kind of hang around lol...I made several trips to the PX and commissary and then ventured off-post to the huge super Walmart (there is *SO* much to do in Fort Leonard Wood!) and just patiently wait for him to come back home. Yesterday was our only "whole day" together but regardless I'm just so happy I got to see him and spend time with him. I can't wait to go back there again and this time I'll stay longer. Thank goodness February is a short month :)

I'm also starting my NCLEX review class tomorrow. Is it sad to admit that I'm actually kind of excited for this? haha. I have been trying to motivate myself to study on my own and although I've been doing a good job, I don't think I'm doing as well as I should. I'm hoping this review class will help motivate me more and put me on the right track as far as studying goes. There's soooooo much information that we're required to know and it can be really overwhelming. This will also make me one step closer to becoming an RN, which I should hopefully have my March :D I'm still waiting on my ATT, though.

On the flipside, once I get my RN, I'm pretty sure my job won't let me work as a tech anymore, which sucks because I'll be unemployed and who knows how long it will take for me to find an RN job! I still have wedding shiz I need to pay for too, plus rent and other bills. I'm hoping they'll let me slide since I'm getting licensed in Texas and not Ohio, but we'll see. Maybe I'll just keep my mouth shut about it!