Usually, for me, clinicals are exciting and I’m learning new stuff and kicking butt. It’s my strong point. In my book, clinicals trump testing.
Some of my peers hate clinicals though. Or they struggle. Which is fine, everyone has their strong points.
So, imagine my discomfort when I fail at life on the floor. Okay, maybe that’s exaggerating a bit. But, today was probably the roughest day for me. It wasn’t terrible, but it didn’t meet my standards for sure.
This instructor is new and a bit intimidating. She also expects us to be on the level of new grad. Which we are not. Because I still sign “SN” for STUDENT nurse after my name. Which means that new grad expectations are a little high. She will ask questions in a drill instructor format and if you take a second to think about it, well, then you must be unprepared. She has a really dry sense of humor which I find funny most times, but at other times you can’t tell if she’s joking since she is the instructor and you’re the student.
I’m not exaggerating- one of my classmates cried today!
I’m walking by in the hall, she says “Got a minute?” Sure, I say! Go to postpartum, grab a bed, come back, finish string up my LR and Pitocin since I am in L&D. Actually, I didn’t even finish. I was in the middle of it when a nurse walks by with an IV kit and my instructor stops and says “Oh, Laney can go!” I can what?
“Go start the IV in 10.” Can I have a minute? “Why?” she asks. Well, I’ve never done one on a real person before and the last time I saw it done was last semester. “Oh, well don’t tell the patient that!”
In I go, kit in hand- sweaty hands that is. Into a room of a patient who I haven’t met yet and is staring at me angry, tired, and pregnant. I get it started and rip my tape. I open my needle and insert. “Wait for flashback, wait, wait. You need to be able to see flashback.” I see it, it’s right there! I start advancing the cath, she takes over and finishes advancing and then is like “retract the needle, retract it, now, now, now…” Well, I thought you were taking over, how do I know what you want me to finish and not? So I retract. Is there a little trickle of blood like in the simulation hand at school? Nope. Gushing blood! It’s shooting out of the hub! Blood all over the sheet. I mean, I didn’t know blood could do that. I panic and try to plug it some, which is not good. So she’s telling me to “grab that, grab that” and pointing at her blood vials that are on the other side of me. She had said originally for me to step aside after retracting the needle so that she could do the blood draw. Well, I did. And then she’s telling me to come back with her stuff and how come I stepped aside. I hand her the stuff and get it all taped up. Her telling me not to touch a certain spot where I wasn’t actually touching, but that’s alright. Clean her up and get out.
“Your technique was terrible.”
I realize that. I also realize that I would’ve done better with a quick review before doing my first stick on a human after being interrupted from hanging my meds on my actual patient.
OH and she brought up my tendency to be running late. Not actually being late. Just me running late from my house and getting there right on time instead of 15 minutes early like some of my peers. She said “I hear you have a tendency to run late.” True. I don’t do well with mornings. I have a hard time waking up. But why are you bringing it up to me when I have not been late to one of your clincals. I have only been late to one clinical my whole time in nursing school. Yesterday there had been admittedly a mix-up and I went upstairs because I had seen a different class in our meeting spot. It was one of those times where I was riding on the up elevator and she was riding down, so we missed each other things. But I wasn’t late and the unit staff accounted that I was up there waiting. So why is she telling me “You need to work on that” when I haven’t been late.
Bah. I felt so flustered after that and dumb. I hate feeling like that.
Now I know though. So I guess that’s something. I’m the type of learner that does something once and retains it over reading it in theory. Simulation lab is definitely different from real life. Bah.
