Leap Year

Just a few days until we depart for some sunshine in San Diego. B is stalking the forecast out there, but I keep telling him those weather experts won't know next week's weather until next week. In the meantime, school has kept me running around like crazy:

• Tuesday I stood-in on a surgery for my adult health clinical! I saw a hip arthroscopy! It's a pretty easy, fast out-patient procedure, but still very amazing to see firsthand. I got to pass tape to the resident, see a camera inside a joint, andhold down the patient's arm when he woke up from anesthesia. What a strange, amazing thing! I really enjoyed it, but I don't see myself as an OR nurse. It was still a cool adventure and I brought home one of the special pens for marking surgical sites. (I'm totally plotting what to do with it now...) My patient was up and moving quickly after surgery -- they don't mess around about early ambulation.
• Wednesday B heroically got me to school in time for a 7:20 a.m. quiz when I woke up at about 6:50 thanks to a dysfunctional alarm and my wacky schedule of late. We zoomed safely to school on time for my quiz and ready for the rest of my class day. Phew!
• I got a 100 on my Community Health Exam. While I can be incredibly intimidated by tests I can also rock out at them. Community Health is stuff I know -- school nursing details, what government does for health and how worker's comp works. Hooray for a good grade and the esteem boost!
• Tomorrow I go see my little one with asthma for Community Health. I got her mom a notebook for jotting down questions for the doctor, details from appointments and any concerns she has -- hopefully this helps. I've found that carrying a pad of paper to help a lot. It shows that you are paying attention and think about your health besides the 20 minutes at the clinic. And, if you go to my doctor you can write a grocery list or doodle instead of reading a Newsweek from 2008.

Happy Leap Year!

Shopping at home

My school schedule is all re-arranged, giving me Fridays off for studying, leisure, more studying, dentist appointments, etc...

This Friday I planned to head to Staples for some school supplies. I needed notecards, a notecard notebook (for my disease flashcards), a way to hold all my drug cards together and maybe some cool Post-It notes. Alas, my own home did the shopping for me.

I dug through a box where I toss receipts and other "maybe I'll need this sometime soon"-type items and found everything on my list. Everything! Ridiculous.

Now I will settle for some pre-vacation shopping later this week. The weather forecast for San Diego is warm, but not hot, and we are super-psyched to leave this not-quite-wintery city.

This is just a quick check-in -- back to studying for my Community Health exam tomorrow. At least I've got a perfect attendance record -- professor says "If you've been coming to lecture and paying attention you should be happy with the test." Hooray!

This is Dizzy and Meowgi's new condominium. B's brother made it and it's terrific. It is where the cats go for scratching, resting, climbing, cat-nip-rolling-around-in and when they're bothersome.

How are you?

I went to a baby shower this weekend, and I survived.

I wanted to go. And about 30 people told me that I didn't have to, but I wanted to go. It was hard.

My friends who are about to become parents are expecting about three weeks after our baby was due. Their baby girl was supposed to be friends with our baby. But celebrating another person's joy doesn't make my sadness worse. Maybe it makes it better.

I thought about skipping the shower, and considered it pretty seriously. I even made plans with my sister-in-law. But she got sick and our spa day is rescheduled, so it seemed like I was meant to go.

Our friends are having a girl, which made things easier for me. Pink ruffly stuff -- even though it's tiny and sweet -- doesn't make me think of our baby the way baby boy stuff does. Just the same, seeing our friend's round belly and new-mama glow was rough.

Friends ask, "How are you?" and I still don't know what to say.

I'm completely heartbroken. I'm sad every day.

But I'm in nursing school and very motivated to be an awesome nurse one day soon. I have an absolutely amazing husband who I love more than I knew possible, especially after all we've been through.

My family and my friends are outstanding. BFF Julie rearranged her holidays (both Christmas and Thanksgiving) to be with us. I got a care package from Cindy in DC, cards aplenty, dozens of kind emails and one girl in my program gushed "I think you are just amazing" to me at a happy hour. Besides the pre-eclampsia that ended my pregnancy, my health is outstanding.

And, we will try for another baby (eventually, we were told to wait about a year). We will be scared to pieces. We'll get through whatever challenges there are. And then we'll have a baby. I think then, when people ask me how I'm doing, I'll have a perfect answer

Just thinking on the Brown Line. There's a doofy-looking dude behind me, but that's just how things are on the El, right? I love the train.

Help The DI

The Daily Illini could stop publishing. And that's terrible.

The DI is where I met my best friend Julie, my best friend Cindy, MDS who performed our wedding, everyone I've ever shared an apartment with, dozens of amazing friends who continue to do amazing things, and where I met my husband, B (he's pretty awesome too).

The DI gave me the best summers of my life. The DI gave me the courage to call people out of the blue and ask for their opinion, for information about their friends, to let me come to their homes, to tell me about their lives, to let me drive around campus in a garbage truck, whatever. The DI taught me how to teach. The DI taught me how to listen. The DI taught me how to do a beer bong, how to plan a bar crawl and how to make hot chocolate with peppermint schnapps.

When I worked at the DI it was at 57 E. Green St., an address I couldn't forget if I tried. I started as a reporter during the first week of my freshman year. The best move a freshman could make. My dad was excited because he loved the DI as a student at the University of Illinois and now I was writing for it.

I learned to write. I learned to ask questions. I worked hard. I won the Raymond Clamage Award, which is for a non-senior staff member who contributes to the newsroom twice. (Roger Ebert only won it once, but that's cool.)

I was promoted to development editor and trained new reporters. It took me a little while, but that experience showed me how much I love teaching and helping people. Then I became managing editor, which was one of the best jobs I'll ever have. Ever.

At the DI, I met Gov. George Ryan, author Dave Eggers who stole my "tear the book in half" compromise idea for his book You Shall Know Our Velocity, almost every shady guy who owns a bar in Champaign, quite a few University of Illinois administrators, several political candidates and the terrific people who turned the power back on after an outage at the University power plant.

Now I'm in nursing school. Working on career No. 3 of my 31 years. But I still carry the DI with me. I'm still fearless about talking to people -- doctors, patients, professors, whoever. I'm still a good listener. I can still detect press-release-bullshit from a fair distance. I still love to write.

I still love to help people, even if just a little bit, but hearing their stories and doing what I can -- whether that's telling their story, teaching them something or helping them to heal.

I doubt anyone who worked at the DI could find words to describe what the DI did for them. But I can find some money to help them out. The idea that some freshman will find the DI booth next year on Quad Day and start an adventure like mine is too precious to lose.

Thanks, DI. Xoxo.

A totally dull image, right? Well, it's a DI logo. I wanted to find a good photo of me and DI friends, but then I realized nearly all of my photos are of DI friends and me. And I guess that's what the DI means to me.

Here we come!

To San Diego! B and I are hitting the road for my spring break -- to the sunny California coast.

We've got three nights scheduled at a motel on the beach within a quick walk of several bars (including a favorite of my parents') and a Trader Joes, a visit from BFF Julie, and plans to do nothing. It's pretty exciting.

My semester has slowly revved up to a busy one -- I'm loving clinicals but there's a ton going on besides the fun patient time. A big community assessment, online tests, teaching projects, documentation, a drug book to make, etc... Whew!

B and I have been properly holed up in our apartment. It's been terrific, really. I didn't realize how nice it is to be a homebody. But by the time our trip comes around -- I'll be ready to put my toes in the sand and be out of the house.

Delicious!

I love food. I love talking about food, reading about food, watching food shows, planning food for parties and eating food.

B and I have food traditions aplenty. And there are unwritten rules about who makes what -- B always makes chili, rolls out pizza dough and makes peanut butter cookies. I always make B's favorite pasta dish, juevos rancheros (tacos with eggs, sort of), salads, and pies. Lots of times we help each other out, other times we try to replicate what the other one has done with our own tweaks.

Our kitchen is a fun place. I love food traditions -- like niece Nora's pancake Thursdays. We don't have anything so scheduled yet, but we do have some favorite routines:

• Saturday Afternoon Soup -- a hodgepodge mix of beans, leftover meat, a can of tomatoes, veggies, chicken stock and chips. Usually this ends up as a tortilla soup, but it varies.
• Brunch -- a total B specialty. B will whip up eggs, french toast, cheese grits or whatever strikes him on a weekend morning. He also makes himself oatmeal pretty frequently during the week. What a way to start the day!
• Lunch-packing -- I've been awesome at carrying a meal along with me everywhere I go this semester. I always have some raw carrots, along with some cheese, crackers/pita/bread, and a random other item (clementines, yogurt, cookies, craisens, whatever). It's no tradition, I guess, but it's a nice thing regardless.
• Pizza nights -- B makes dough with half-whole wheat flour, then we top the pie with pizza sauce, cheese and prosciutto (thin-sliced Italian ham-bacon-goodness). Often we eat our pizza with salad greens on top, like they serve at a restaurant we like called Frasca.
  
• Criner traditions -- When we visit my parents we eat well. My mom will put together a terrific dinner with an entree (chicken cordon bleu casserole, Hawaiian chicken, pork chops, etc...), veggies, fruit, rolls, etc... There's something special about mom-cooked food -- especially my mom's! Last weekend we had a breakfast of dad-made scrambled eggs, toast, grape juice, coffee, sausage and orange slices. Divine!

Thankful (again)

I spent my fourth Tuesday with patients and I come away feeling more and more thankful that being a nurse is something that makes my heart sing -- rather than making my heart crumble.

I can't say much about my patients at all. But I can say, safely, that I've seen people with all sorts of maladies -- the type that creep up as a surprise, the sort that people wait for, the kind that have a clear answer and the ones that perplex everyone. I've seen patients who are hopeful, patients who are depressed and patients who shrug their shoulders about the facts of their lives.

Being with people during their tough times is amazing. I'm proud that I'm the sort of person who can make them smile, or listen to their worries, or explain things well, or just clean them up so they feel a little better. I've done some mildly medical stuff as a student nurse, but I'm absolutely positive that the diaper-changing, smiling and conversations matter more.

I could definitely the hospital feeling defeated. It's rough. Lots of people are hospitalized for a mess of ailments that don't have a good outcome. At rounds everyone talks about helping patients heal, but there are people who don't heal no matter what happens.

I come home (today after donating blood -- seriously long day) feeling like nursing is right for me. Feeling like my communication skills, strong stomach, understanding of science and smile can do a lot for people.

That, and a hot shower, sound pretty good right now.

Lesson #1

In nursing school we talk a lot about what to expect from patients and how to handle what we see. There are risk factors for everything. And there are plenty of problems that come upon people without any reason whatsoever. But, from spending time in the colorful world of clinicals -- with real people experiencing real disease right before my (or my classmate's) eyes it's crystal clear that the decisions we make determine a great deal about our health.

We talk about 89-year-olds who don't want to use canes because a cane would make them "look old." We talk about patients in their 60s with laundry lists of problems -- obesity, diabetes, immobility, infections of many sorts. My own grandfather is still working going on age 92.

What's the secret? I certainly don't know how it all works, but I do know that there are a few things we can do to make our lives long and terrific...

• Do not smoke. Anyone who has taken A&P can tell you it degrades almost everything in your body. Smoking doesn't correlate to anything good.
  
• Exercise, move, whatever. Keep all those parts working. I can't count the number of times people have said things to me about how they can't exercise, but I still don't buy it. Swim, stretch, jump, walk, dance, touch your toes or just walk really slowly. The more you keep your body working, the better it will work.
  
• Go to the doctor. Ask the doctor questions. All the questions you have -- ask them. Don't ignore symptoms. I'm a big fan of having a healthcare notebook -- I've got one place where I write my questions, jot down my lab values and keep a log of what goes on with my doctor. It impresses my doctor (who brags to her med students about me) and it's pretty great when I want to look back at how I'm doing.
  

Is that innovative? Nope! It's pretty standard advice, but it's not common practice. I probably won't shut up anytime soon about how much behavior and lifestyle choices mean to what life turns out like. There's lots more to it, of course, and not everyone who gets sick behaved badly and not everyone who behaves badly gets sick.

But seeing patients firsthand makes me want to take walk.