Friday Follow and Confessional (Disclaimer: some sadness here)

I am joining up with the Friday Follow because I want blog followers, I'm kind of vain in that way, I'll confess. Plus, I love to read other people's blogs and for them to read mine.

Now, on to my confessional. I confess that today I am having a bit of trouble counting my blessings. I have an amazing husband who supports me, even in this madness of nursing school. He is even willing to move to a town he doesn't like so that I can get a bachelor's degree from Texas Tech University. (FYI, he's never lived in Lubbock so how he knows he doesn't like it I don't know but that's what he says!) Anyway, he is just awesome and I am blessed to have him in my life.

I also have an amazing family who supports me in everything that I do. They are awesome and I couldn't have asked for a better support system than what I have. I include my "in-laws" in that too. I don't consider them to be my in-laws, I just consider them my second family. That's how awesome they truly are. I am so blessed by them. I have told my mom and pop "in-law" that I couldn't have done better if I'd sent out applications, and it's true, they are awesome.

Then I have an amazing set of friends, some new, some old but all awesome! They are all supportive of me as well...so why the down attitude? Why am I having trouble counting my blessings??? Well, there's something that I want, really badly, and usually, I have it all under control and it doesn't bother me but for some reason, it does today. I hate it. I wish that I could make it go away but it doesn't. Most of the time all is well and good but then this stupid issue goes and rears it's ugly head and just ruins everything. Yeah, by the end of the day or even the end of this blog I may feel fine but I don't right now...and it sucks. I really truly want to have children and at this point, I don't even care if they're "biological" or not. I definitely want biological children but I want to adopt as well. You see, I have been diagnosed with "infertility". Now, my "problem" is an easy fix but since I'm in nursing school and don't have health insurance, it's not something that I can "fix" right now. Usually, this is not a big deal. I graduate with my associate degree in nursing next May and I will take state boards and then be a registered nurse, so the "fix" isn't far off but today it seems like it's an eternity. I'm 33, which isn't old by any stretch of the imagination but when we start "trying" again, I'll be 34 which is borderline "old" from the medical standpoint. I will be considered high risk anyway most likely. I don't want that label, I just want a baby, of my own. I want my own child to start with and then we are planning to adopt. We are going to try for "our own" for about two years after graduation and then if we don't have a baby, we'll move on to adoption. I figure that we shouldn't have any problem getting pregnant with help, there's no indication that I can't carry a baby to term so we'll see. I truly believe that once this whole plan gets going then we'll be able to get pregnant, I just don't know how long it will take. Having been down this road once before, several years ago, I don't know how much of it I'll be up for. It's absolutely devastating to have a procedure and then not end up pregnant. Luckily, I am not doing in vitro fertilization (IVF), I can do the intrauterine insemination (IUI) and that should be successful. It's just that I don't know how many times I'll have to do it before it "takes" and I don't know how much of it I can take. I have faith that I am supposed to have children of my own...but I don't know if I am able to wait on God's timing...I mean, I'm 33 right? I know that I don't have control over this whole situation and I firmly believe that all things happen for a reason...but that really isn't helpful right now. I just wish that I could get some kind of "sign" that everything will work out the way I want it to...even though it may not. I'm sorry that this post is so depressing but it's how I feel today. I don't always feel this way, usually I'm pretty upbeat and happy and like I say, by the end of today I'll be feeling better or possibly sooner than that. I just wish that I could control my emotions sometimes. The worst part of the whole thing is, I never know what will set it off. Today it was Facebook. I was looking at pictures of a pregnant woman and reading the comments and it hit me...and it sucks. Don't misunderstand, I am ecstatic for that woman, it sounds like she was having a hard time getting pregnant and I am happy, truly happy for her. I've been there, for twelve years now. I know exactly what she went through. The first five or so years were the hardest because that was the stage where it seemed like EVERYONE was pregnant or had a baby. Now, for the most part, I'm pretty happy-go-lucky about it and am starting to feel better even as I type this. Yet, I have this incredible ache in my heart and my arms even feel heavy. I don't like to feel this way, I feel as though I'm letting everyone, including myself, down, when I feel this way and yet I have no control over it. Maybe that's the worst part is the loss of control. I'll confess, I'm a control freak and yet, this is something that I can do absolutely nothing...it's a lesson that it took a long time for me to learn. If I am supposed to have a baby then I will, regardless of what I do or don't do. God shows me this all the time and sometimes I choose to ignore it or disregard it. I know that it's an issue where God is in control because I have seen people get pregnant when it should have been impossible. My hubby and I know a couple that he had a vasectomy and her tubes were tied and she still got pregnant!!! Tell me that's not a miracle and a divine intervention.

The downside to all of this though, is that I may not be supposed to have children, maybe I am supposed to take care of other people's children. I am going into the medical field, first as a nurse, then as a nurse practitioner. I am planning on being a family nurse practitioner because I get to see everyone, the whole family! However, I have my pediatrics class next semester so that could change everything. I had my OB rotation last semester and my favorite part of that was newborn nursery. It was amazing and hard but in spite of my feelings, I loved it! I have always loved children and wanted children. There was a time in my life that I thought that I was supposed to be a stay at home mom (SAHM) but I really don't feel like that is my true calling. I have been blessed with the ability to be a medical professional and so I'm on that track. I finally feel like I am fulfilling my destiny...but there's still this big question. Babies or no babies? I don't know but I guess we'll see eventually. Thanks for listening/reading and I hope you have a blessed and fulfilled Friday!

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!!!