Holy Cannoli Batman!!!

I am so behind on reading blogs it's ridiculous...and I don't have an excuse, I've been out of school for nearly a week!!! I don't know what the deal is although Blogger is being kind of weird, my blog keeps showing up on my blogroll. I don't follow myself, that would be redundant!!! I'm gonna get caught up though...eventually.

In other news, the hubs had to dump my computer because I'm a dummy and downloaded a virus. Obviously it wasn't intentional, I was trying to get museum dollars for my Treasure Madness game on Facebook but I got a virus along with whatever I downloaded. So, no more downloading stupid game toolbars for me!!! The upside to this was that I finally got to update my iPhone to OS 4.0!!! It's pretty cool but the sad thing is, I have three game folders. Yeah, three...I put my iPhone to good use!!! I gotta have something to do other than read blogs all day, right? :)

I am missing this music post that someone used to do. I have been listening to "You Can Call Me Al" by Paul Simon nonstop for the last two days. I've also been watching the video on youtube. Chevy Chase is in the video and it is hilarious...I laughed so hard I cried! I remember watching the video, back in the day, on MTV when they actually showed videos and played music. Heck, I remember when MTV started...and now it's all shows. Even VH1 is all shows practically, it's so weird. Hello, MTV stands for MUSIC television, but perhaps they forgot!!! I don't know, things are so different these days as far as tv and music go. Anyway, Paul Simon took me back to that, the good 'ole days. One of my other favorite videos from that time is "Take On Me" by Aha because it starts out real, goes to cartoon format and then ends up real, if I remember correctly. That's always been one of my favorite videos.

The other song that I am obsessed with lately is "Mad" by Ne-Yo. I have been alternating between him and Paul Simon...strange, I know but that's how my taste in music is!!! I like it all from Mozart to Metallica. What I listen to usually depends on my mood...I guess. The hubs and I haven't been fighting so I don't know why "Mad" is a fave but it is. I'm gonna have to put it on my phone so I can listen to it. I love to sing it at the top of my lungs when I'm in the car. People driving by me must think I'm crazy! I don't care though. I love to sing and I have a fairly decent voice, or so I've been told. Besides, my dogs don't howl when I sing so it can't be that bad! ;)

I'm going to have to stop this post...Blogger or my computer is being weird and it's getting on my nerves. I should get back to my blogroll anyway, there's a ton more to read!!! Have a good rest of the night everyone! :)

Pour Your Heart Out Wednesday

I sometimes worry about the field that I have chosen for my career. I am going into the medical field. My ultimate goal is to be a family nurse practitioner. Right now I am in school getting a two year registered nurse (RN) degree. I love it. I am where I am supposed to be, but I still worry. The whole universal health care conundrum scares me to death. It's not that I am totally opposed to everyone having access to good, affordable health care by any means, I just don't know what it means for me. I am worried that it will have a huge effect on my salary. That sounds very selfish but I don't mean it that way. I just want to have a successful career where I make good money. I don't think that I need to be a multimillionaire or anything like that, I just want to be comfortable. I want to be able to pay my bills without thinking twice. I want to be able to shop, within reason, whenever I want and things like that. I am afraid that this whole universal health care bill will cause me to not be able to make that kind of money. So I guess it is selfish but is it wrong for me to want to be successful? I don't want to be successful at the expense of other people but the medical field is a business just like any other business, it needs to make money. Granted, there should be more nonprofits in the medical field but there aren't. I think that everyone deserves to have quality, affordable health care when they need it. I would be willing to work with people if I had my own practice, but I won't because I don't want that hassle. I want to be in a group where I don't have to be on call all the time and have some time off. It's just something that I think about.

Another issue that I have with the universal health care bill is the cuts that are being made to the Medicare hospice benefits. That just flat out makes me angry. I worked for hospice for about a year and a half and it is one of the best programs out there as far as medicine is concerned. I think that the whole of medicine could learn a lesson from hospice. Hospice is a place where people are dying, it is very sad but yet, it is a time of joy. It's very hard to explain unless you've been a part of a hospice experience but, for the most part, people who have been would recommend it. Of course you have your naysayers, ones who have had bad experiences but I would imagine that the majority would say it's a good thing. I think that people have a right to die with dignity. I think that quality of life is just as important at the end of life as it is at any other time in a person's life. Of course, quality of life is a huge issue in hospice, at least a good hospice. The goal is to give the patient the best quality of life as their life comes to an end. It involves every facet of a person's life. It involves the family as well. It's just an amazing thing that is being cut because it's "unnecessary". Well, I disagree. It's not perfect but the blessing that it allows families to have shouldn't be cut. I don't know what the answer is but cutting the already minimal benefits isn't the answer!!!

I don't know what the answer to the universal health care plan is. I believe that it can be a great benefit but just like our welfare system, there will be people who "work the system" and I think that there should be enormous consequences for them. I think my biggest fear is how it will be legislated because there's a lot of moral issues involved with health care and that is always very personal to people. It's personal to me. I don't know, it seems like there's not an easy answer. If you had asked me before I took my mental health class this summer then I would have said I was all for it except for people who don't have a job, or refuse to get one but, there's a portion of those people who are unable to keep a job due to mental illness. I think that those people deserve to have good health care too. It's an issue where there are no easy answers. I believe that if you are truly unable to work then you should be able to have quality, affordable health care. However, if you choose not to work then the hell with you. The key word here is CHOOSE. There are people out there who think that our government should support them, I disagree. Granted, at the moment, I am "living" off the government, sort of but I still work some and make money. I am just getting student loans so that I have help paying my bills. I am also going to look for at least a part-time job so that I have some steady income coming in. I can't be someone who doesn't contribute to society in any way, I just don't believe in that. See, it's just a tough issue. The problem is weeding out the people who are just trying to take advantage...it's imperfect, as is the screening or weeding out process for the welfare system. Again, I don't have all the answers I just think that we should be very careful when doling out our money for health care. I just wish there was an easy answer....

Post-It-Note-Tuesday

*sigh*

Well, the summer semester is officially over as of Friday!!! Woohoo!!! I ended up with a "B" in my class which I am pretty proud of. I think a "B" in nursing school is acceptable. I could probably get "As" but I am not willing to put in that much time and effort. That may sound bad, but it's true. I don't think that grades necessarily reflect my ability as a nurse, they're just grades. I do think that you have to have a background or a base knowledge of health and disease to be a good and/or effective nurse. However, I know that you can never fully understand the human body and/or disease. I took "Mental Health" this summer and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I learned more about myself than I thought possible. Some of it was good, some of it was not but all of it was helpful. I learned about things that really made me sad, diseases that have no cure and can't be controlled, even with medications. I am not necessarily just a proponent of drugs, I think that there are other ways to treat conditions but I also understand that some conditions just require medication. This is the way I think about it: I don't take a pill every time that my head hurts but if I need a pill, then I will take it. If I have had a headache all day, tried everything else, then I'll take ibuprofen usually. I don't like to take medication but I do take heartburn pills on a regular basis. I wish I didn't have to but they're the only pills that control my heartburn. I do not want to ever have to take something such as cholesterol medication or antidepressants. I don't want to have the side effects of these medications, however, if I needed them, then I would take them. I am totally on board for trying other methods than medications prior to taking medications. If taking fish oil controls your cholesterol along with diet and exercise, then by all means, take it. If your cholesterol remains uncontrolled though, why not try cholesterol medication? Is that really any more dangerous than getting in your car and driving to work? I don't think so. Everyone takes risks in their daily lives and yet, medication and the medical profession in general, when they reveal a treatment that is ineffective or side effects of medication, they are essentially blackballed. It really frustrates me. Medical professionals are people too, they make mistakes, unfortunately, those mistakes can cost people their lives but why are they more culpable than someone else? Engineers have peoples lives in their hands every day too as they build bridges and buildings and yet, they are not mistrusted and looked at as people who are just trying to make money and people be damned. I am not saying that there are not sorry people in the medical profession, there are but are they any worse than people in any other profession? What makes the medical profession so much worse than all the others? Most people don't go into the medical profession because they want to make money, this is an extremely tough profession that is very physically, socially and emotionally demanding. Most of us that go into this profession want to help people, all people. Yes, we have biases, prejudices and judgments about certain people and situations but we're people too. Why are we not afforded the same rights as every other person when it comes to that? I admit, I am judgmental about certain things but if I were treating a patient who had made a decision that I disagreed with, I would treat them the same way that I would treat my mother. I don't have to agree with what they have done but at the heart of the matter, they are people and deserve to be treated as people. I would even extend this courtesy to prisoners. I don't agree with the prisoners choices or with people who choose to do drugs but I have never been in their shoes. I don't know for sure that I might not have made the same decisions that they made had I been walking at their shoes when they made their decision. I would like to think that I wouldn't kill someone or harm someone or steal something or do drugs but the reality is, I've never been in a situation that would call for that. I have never been forced to choose between my life and someone else's and I can assure you that in a situation where it's my life or someone else's, I choose me. Tell me that you wouldn't do the same. I know that you would, instinctively, we choose ourselves over others, especially when it's our life. Now, if I had a child and I had to choose between myself and my child, I would choose my child, most likely...but it's all circumstantial so I can't say with 100% certainty that I would choose me or the child. Situations force us to make decisions under duress and sometimes we make the wrong choice but there are chemicals in our bodies that cause us to make choices that we might not normally make. I don't say all of that to say that I am not responsible for the choices I make, I am definitely responsible for my choices. If I choose to take someone's life, then I have to take responsibility for that action, period. Now, if they are trying to kill me or my family and I choose to kill them instead, then it's self-defense but I still took that person's life. I still have to live with my decision to take their life and pay the consequences for it. I don't know that prison is the right punishment but then again, I did take a life so that will probably be up to a jury. I feel like medicine is the same way. First of all, it is not an exact science. I wish that it was, I wish that I could just wave a magic wand and cure disease but I can't, I don't have that capability. I can help restore people to their health but if I give you a medication that has unpleasant side effects then that makes me a bad person. Why? I don't understand. I am trying to help you, I am trying to restore your health or keep you alive but I'm the bad guy for trying to help you. I hate that stigma, I do, I feel that it's unwarranted. My underlying motive is to help so why does that make me a bad person?

Pour Your Heart Out

So, I have been doing a lot of thinking lately. I have been thinking about lots of things. Mostly about finances but other things too. School, babies, life...it's such a jumble. I am really tired right now so this might be a little discombobulated...especially since it took about five minutes for me to come up with the word discombobulated!!! LOL!!! I didn't get a lot of sleep last night due to working. I am taking care of two hospice patients, a husband and wife and the husband is total care. It is a very sad case. He requires medication every two hours along with other care. This is why I didn't get but maybe an hour of sleep last night.

I also had to take a test at school this morning. I did well regardless of no sleep!!! I made an 85. The upside is that I will get four points on my next test, I think it's four, it might be two, again, lack of sleep is dictating a lot of this so sorry I'm so disorganized. Anyway, I came home and took about a two hour nap. Now I have to study for a test and write two papers. This whole writing papers bit is getting old. I enjoy "writing" but not for school. The research part isn't so bad but the actual writing of the paper sucks. We have to use APA format which I HATE!!! The thing that I find strange is that we, as nursing students, are using the American Psychology Association format. I don't like it, it's very complicated and annoying. Plus, I'm not getting a degree in English, I'm getting my RN. I'm not saying that it's not important to be able to communicate through the written word but I don't have a problem there. I may not be the most articulate person on the planet but I can communicate effectively. I have taken English 1301 and 1302 as per the graduate plan. I had to write papers for those classes...I think I've done my school writing. I found out that I have to write another paper next semester...ugh!!! I'll get them done but I don't have to like it...and I won't. I'll just complain about it to my faithful readers.


Anyway, I digress. I have been thinking a lot about my/our current financial situation...and I don't like it. We do not make good choices when it comes to our money. We act like teenagers with no responsibilities. It's beyond ridiculous and I am tired of it. Right now, we don't make tons of money because I don't work full time. I do work some but it's only 22 hours a week and I'm not always timely turning in my paperwork to my actual job. That generally works to my benefit though because my checks are bigger...but still, I need to be more responsible about turning in my paperwork on time. My husband makes decent money but we have a lot of bills. Some of them are by choice, like our cell phones and internet and some, obviously, are not. You have to pay water, electricity and gas whether you like it or not. We also have two car payments and a loan payment which are all three optional. I will probably have a car payment forever, by choice. However, I can have that if I can gain financial control, I mean WHEN I/we gain financial control.


We have to take control of our finances before I start making good money or we will be in debt up to our eyeballs quickly. I don't want that. I don't want to owe my life to someone else. I want to be able to buy what I need without having to figure out what to give up or what bill to put off. Granted, some of this is poor spending habits which is another thing that we have to gain control of. The impulse spending has got to stop. I will have a pretty good amount of debt when I graduate from student loans. I wish that I didn't have those but unfortunately, that was my best option. I will start paying on them as soon as I get a job after graduation because obviously, I can't make payments if I don't make money.


The other issue is we have to get on a budget and stick to it. This will be difficult because we like to spend money. We are very immature when it comes to our money, something that is a little puzzling to me. I'll admit, I didn't have great role modeling when it came to money issues but it seems as though that should be something that is logical and easily controlled. I mean, it should be as simple as, "I don't need that"...but that doesn't seem to be enough for us. I don't think there is anything wrong with spending money on things that you like to do, if you like to go to the movies, go to the movies. You don't have to go every night, but once or twice a month should be satisfactory. If not, perhaps a dollar movie or a discount theater. There's always the option of staying home and watching Netflix. I think maybe what our problem is has more to do with impulsiveness and laziness. The laziness part has to do with us going out to eat instead of eating at home. There's just the two of us and it's extremely hard for either of us to cook for two. Granted, he does more cooking than I do because I'm not a great cook and it's overwhelming to me. This is something that I am going to have to work on because obviously, once we have kids, we can't be going out to eat every night...even to McDonald's. I'm talking about the money issue and the health issue. I don't even want my kids to EVER eat McDonald's but realistically, it will probably happen. It just doesn't have to happen often. That's a whole other issue though. We're concentrating on finances here.


So, I've said all of this to say that big financial changes are on the horizon. We are going to have to figure things out. Obviously, we will have to sit down and discuss all of this, and we have, to an extent. We just have to commit to it. Sometimes it's about making up your mind and then you become successful. The more you tell yourself something, you will start to believe it. My first statement of affirmation is, "I will gain financial control BEFORE I graduate from nursing school"! :) Have a great Wednesday everyone!

Post-It-Note Tuesday!!!

Pour Your Heart Out

Please grab the button for your post and link up!

Be sure to check out some of the links- you will find some amazing stories out there.

Again, just a brief reminder that everyone linking is pouring their hearts out and we should all be respectful in our comments. ;)

I'm on a roll today...three posts in one day. Ok, technically it will be tomorrow in eight minutes but still. So, this post is where I am going to pour my heart out, thanks to Shell who started this lovely idea! 

Marriage seems to be the topic of the day so I will follow along. I have lots to say about marriage and relationships, always have. I am very opinionated yet I try not to judge. I am not in your relationship so I can't claim to be an expert on it. I try not to judge people regardless, it's just not a good way to be. I am learning to be less judgmental even though I sometimes have to make a very conscious decision about it. 

Anyway, back to marriage. I have a great marriage, it's far from perfect of course but it is still incredible. I have a man who, for the most part, gets me. I get him too, for the most part. However, we have struggled a little since I started nursing school. That's not to say that divorce is or was on the horizon but it has been mentioned and that was extremely scary to me. The funny part is, I was telling my sister about it and she said that she was relieved because she always thought we had the perfect relationship! HA!!! We are both the oldest child and it shows. He is a red head and I have a red head temper. You will not find two people who are more stubborn than he and I, and yet, it works. We met on AOL, back in the day, before match.com and eHarmony were around. I think at the time AOL was the only internet provider but I'm not sure. This was 1997 and I was just learning the internet and all that it could provide. 

I was going to school at Texas Tech University, majoring in political science. I thought I wanted to be a lawyer...I was wrong! LOL!!! I had been reading a lot of John Grisham and had taken a government class, that I loved so I decided to go from the medical field to law. I think that previous to that my major was cell and molecular biology and I was planning to be a genetic counselor...but I digress. Anyway, I bought a computer and my roommate helped me get set up on the internet. She was a management information systems major, which is something with computers so she knew a lot. Anyway, I got set up on AOL and decided to put an ad on there, sort of as a joke. I honestly thought that I probably wouldn't get many, if any, emails. I was wrong...I got TONS!!! I got emails from males from ages 15 to 56!!! Mind you, I was 20 at the time so 15 was way too young and 56 was older than my parents!!! Besides, my limit was 30...I mean, that's ten years and I thought that was a stretch. I got emails from all over the country too...it was nuts! I got one from Lubbock and one from Amarillo. I got a few from Dallas and one from Houston. The guy that I was talking to from Houston even proposed to me. He told me to pick out a ring and meet him in Abilene one weekend. I told him that he was crazy because we had never seen each other, just talked on the phone and im so there was no way that he could be in love with me. I did visit him in Houston and let's just say that he was less than interested. Again, I digress...so, I talked to txbjr1 a few times on im and sent several emails to him. I was headed home for a Jars of Clay concert so we decided to meet.

I had also decided to move out of the dorms because I was dropping out for the semester. I think I only went to class for two weeks or something like that. I spent the rest of the time on AOL trying to get my MRS...and it worked! Anyway, I had gotten most of my clothes out of the dorm and I was on my way to Amarillo when I realized that I left the concert tickets in my underwear drawer, which I had forgotten to empty! I had to turn around and go back, about an hour, to get the tickets...which I was afraid was going to make me late for the meeting with txbjr1!!! I was freaking out!!! I made it though, and we ended up talking until 0700 the next morning. I was very impressed, I mean, he actually talked to me for 15 hours!!! This was the first night that we met!!! To make a long story short, we were engaged three days later and got married four months later!!! We've been married for twelve and a half years. We'll celebrate our thirteenth anniversary on Valentine's Day 2011. I am so blessed and amazed!!!


I think the thing that makes our relationship, well, actually, I know that the key to our relationship is our communication! We talk about EVERYTHING!!! Sometimes we scream and yell but we still communicate and I am certain that is the key. We have been through some rough patches but we have weathered the storms. My sisters tell me that they are amazed that we made it through what we have without even separating. That was never an option though. I remember telling him before we got married that he'd better be sure that I was the one because we weren't getting divorced. I meant that. It's not that I look down on people who get divorced and I understand that things happen, I just don't think that there's anything that you can't work through. That's just my opinion though. I think that we could even work through infidelity, it would be hard and it would suck but I think that we could. I don't worry about that though, it's just not something that either of us would do. We made a commitment to each other and we both intend to honor it. Now, that's not to say that there has never been temptation because obviously, we are both human but we chose to overcome it. 


Anyway, back to communication. We are pretty good at relaying information to each other. Sometimes, we get frustrated because it seems as though no matter how we say something, the other one doesn't get it but most of the time, we figure it out. We have certain issues that took years to work out. It all boils down to talking about it. I truly feel as though there is nothing that I can't say to my hubby. He may not like what I have to say but he will listen, with an open mind and I will do the same for him. There are things that we will probably never get completely worked out, but we continue to work on them. I know that we have survived some of the things we have because we are determined to make this work and we talk about it. 


I think that nursing school has been the most challenging phase yet. I have a year left before I will have my RN. It's been rough at times and yet, we have managed to work through it. There are fears and doubts on both sides but we just talk it through. We might not be able to talk about an issue right when it surfaces but eventually we will and we figure out how to work through it together. It's like Shell said, sometimes you just have to make up your mind to make your marriage work. However, if your marriage doesn't or didn't work, that doesn't mean that you're a failure. Things happen, people change, sometimes it's just too much for a relationship to take. I can't say that I fully understand it but that doesn't mean that I don't sympathize with those that experience it. I don't judge them either because I don't know for sure what I would do in their situation having never experienced it myself. Plus, I'm not in their shoes so even if I do have the same experience, it's not exactly the same so I don't know that the choice they make isn't the right one for them.


Another thing that I realized is that in order to be happy in a relationship, you have to be happy by yourself and with yourself. If you are unhappy alone, you won't be happy with someone else. You have to be complete by yourself so that you can compliment another. Relationships take two people to work properly. I have a friend who is not happy alone...she was married for some time but has since divorced. Her relationship really had no basis. The guy, I won't say man because I don't think he qualifies, was just not right for her. I say this because he never would step up to the plate and be a man. The worst part is, he refuses to change so she had to let him go. They have three beautiful children that he does nothing for. She supports them on her own. She is amazing and yet, she doesn't see it. It blows my mind. I say that and yet I have been there, I felt like I couldn't be complete without a man. Luckily for me, I figured out that I was a pretty ok person by myself and then I met this wonderful man that I am married to. I don't know how to help her or another friend that I have in a similar situation. Perhaps I can't help them, that may not be my role in our friendship but I find it hard not to. I don't necessarily give advice but I do listen, if they ask my advice I'll give it freely. I just know that things are never simple and there usually isn't an easy answer when it comes to relationships. 


I think that the best marriages have a friendship element also. My hubby is my best friend, he knows everything about me. I know everything about him. He is the person that I can spend hours and hours on end with and never get tired of him. He may get a little tired of me but he is a man and they need to have time to themselves. I am a little codependent, I'll admit it! I'm learning to get over it and let him do his thing. It seems like we have been together forever and yet it seems like just yesterday that we got married. That could be denial on my part because I don't want to get any older...but, it happens and I can't stop it. I just know that I wouldn't want to make this journey with anyone else. I hope that you all find happiness in your marriages and relationships! Happy Wednesday!!!