I really have to apologize for the dearth of posts lately. I've got no good excuse except for the usual premium on spare time that comes with nursing school. So that aside...

A Summary: I really want to talk about my experience as a UNE (student nurse extern) in the ER over the summer. I freaking LOVED it. On speaking with some of my classmates, it seems that I got pretty lucky in my placement, because my particular ER is small and ultra-inclusive - there simply wasn't enough help to go around, so I was always considered part of the team, and like an extra set of hands. Turns out some other people placed on Med-Surg/postpartum were viewed as subpar RN stand-ins. As student nurses we are mandated to take a smaller patient load and lower acuity than staff nurses - which makes sense. Yet some of the staff nurses took the perspective that the UNE had it easier and so made their jobs harder, where other nurses saw us as a bonus to the existing staff and as lightening the load by taking a patient away from each of the other nurses.

So I am even more grateful that I had such a positive experience this past summer. I was on the unit from May through the beginning of September. My scope was pretty big. There were a few things I couldn't do at all or without RN supervision, and some of my meds needed to be cosigned, but I worked really hard and helped out a lot. I almost never sat down except for a quick charting session. It got to the point where I was starting to anticipate the flow of the ER and what might be done for certain patient presentations. I asked questions and clarified interventions. I saw several urgent presentations and maybe even a couple of emergencies, although I still haven't witnessed a code or done CPR on a human. I made real differences to several patients. I learned how to work as a team, contribute, and COMMUNICATE. I made more money on shift differentials then I ever expected (woo night shift!!) - but, most importantly to me, I gained so much experience in the nursing role and, like, quintupled my comfort level with all the psychomotor skills that made me so nervous in lab. I saw so much this summer.

Some of my coworkers were more difficult than others to really learn from. One in particular struck me as an exceptionally competent nurse, very confident and knowledgeable, but she was like a prickly pear to talk to. I guess like your typical Type A ER nurse (for the record, I'm pretty much a Type B introvert, and I still enjoyed the ER, so don't let anyone tell you otherwise). I got a lot out of shutting up and watching her, but forget asking her any questions, she didn't have time for students. Or so it seemed. And there was the charge nurse who wasn't the best teacher. But the overwhelming majority of my RN/LPN coworkers were super kind and patient with me. They all made such an amazing difference in my practice and I told them so!

Would I recommend Alberta nursing students be a UNE during the summer after 2nd and 3rd year? Unequivocally YES. It's like nursing school on speed. You'll start making sense of the theory in ways you didn't expect. You'll gain the psychomotor skills to actually do lab skills on real patients without your instructor hovering over your shoulder, and while you do those skills you'll start to work patient teaching into your practice. Then in 4th year you'll have real-world examples to back your shit up when you write papers. Or blogs.

A Conference: I was the fortunate recipient of a travel bursary to the CANO annual conference in Halifax, NS. There was supposed to be another student who went, but I never met her.

In a nutshell, Oncology Nurses are seriously knowledgeable. They are also awesome because, from what I experienced at this conference, they are valued as collaborative and worthy team members even by physicians (kind of a hard status to come by, it seems) and are extremely supportive of complementary/alternative medicine (CAM), not so much because of the evidence surrounding CAM but because patients want it and find relief from it, and they need their primary providers to be open and knowledgeable about it too.

The conference was 4 straight days of learning. Corporations sponsored almost all of our meals, and during each meal there was a presentation on some new wonder drug or different approaches to patient care. There were also a multitude of workshops to attend, where nurse researchers would present their latest abstracts and findings.

I had a lot of difficulty integrating myself into the conference because, as specialists, the presentations were operating at a pretty high level of comprehension. The conference attendees were almost all advanced practice nurses - NPs, CNSes, and tons of nurses in research and academia. They would debate different chemotherapy drugs and weigh the pros and cons, and things like that, which was kind of meaningless to me as a student. There was some stuff I did learn a lot about, such as a yummy dinner symposium at which we learned about treating clogged CVADs. I don't remember learning much at all about CVADs in class. The dinner was beef and chicken. The beef was served medium-rare, and pretty pink/fleshy in the middle. It was at that moment the presenter posted some photo examples of blood clots extracted from CVADs. They looked eerily similar to my beef dinner. At which I thought, "Only nurses would be totally cool with watching this as we eat..." mmmmm :)

Another challenge I found was the huge jump, not only in experience, but in age between myself and the other attendees. Being as they were almost all out of bedside nursing (and with the commensurate experience), I'd peg most of them as 40+. Not that there's anything wrong with being 40+. It just didn't give me much to talk about with them. So most of the time I would sit down with a new group of people at a table, introductions would be made, and they would ask me where I worked.... when I would say "Oh, I'm a student".... and the conversation would awkwardly shut down or divert amongst the RNs. It made for kind of a lonely time at the conference although I did meet and network with lots of people. I even met the lady who does the clinical placements for our local Cancer Care centre, where I am hoping to get a placement for my preceptorship.

The CANO BoD contacted me after the conference and wanted to get my perspective as a student attendee. I think I will recommend that they try to designate a "Conference Guide" for future conferences, who can assist the students to really understand the presentations and kind of bring it all together. I think I would have benefited from some kind of debriefing.

On a totally positive note, several of the nurses I sat with were really pleased and happy to help me understand the presentations. I could see that a lot of them were probably involved in teaching. So that was really kind and super helpful. I got a ton of notes from all the presentations, so I might be able to review them once I am practicing and maybe they'll make more sense. :)

A Project: Through my work with CNSA as Informatics Officer, I have been working with CASN and CNA on developing informatics competencies to add to curricula for undergraduate nursing education. I think it's cool that I'm working alongside some heavy hitters in academic and professional spheres on a project that will impact the future of nursing education in Canada. At our teleconference in August, we needed to elect a chairperson for our committee, and some of them suggested that it would be a good experience for me. I think so too, but I really don't know what I'm doing as a chairperson. I told them that if they were patient with me I'd be happy to take on the role. Part of this means I will be presenting our findings to a stakeholders' symposium in Toronto at the end of November. At our last teleconference I discovered who would be considered a stakeholder. I'm super pumped/terrified to meet these people, but wow, what an opportunity.

An iPad: It's no secret here or anywhere else that I have a special fondness in my heart for Apple products. I was one of the original hires to help open the first Apple store in Western Canada (which was a pretty fun day! :). The love is waning a little bit with Apple's continued pricing structure, surging popularity, and militant control of how I enjoy my products, but, on the whole, I still can't beat the user-friendliness of iOS/OSX. Can't argue with the fact that after I convinced 4 of the family members who called me all the time with computer issues, I don't really have to troubleshoot anyone's crap anymore, because it doesn't need troubleshooting.

So when I saw the reading list for this semester, and noticed how much of it was PDF academic articles, I winced and wished there was some way I could read these in a more comfortable manner. I really try to avoid printing anything because I am cheap and scatterbrained. I also hate reading articles on my laptop because of i) the searing pain in my lap once my computer's been on for >20 minutes, and ii) I am way too easily distracted by Spaces.

So I started checking out some different kinds of tablets. Initially I was intrigued by Samsung's Galaxy 10.1 since I might be converted to Android. I certainly am willing. Anyway, after lots of research and playing with tablets at Best Buy, I decided the extra $50 or whatever was worth the negligible decrease in performance/portability/resolution in exchange for an exploding App Store and seamless integration with my existing tech setup.

Anyway, I bought the iPad last Saturday on an extreme trial basis. I had very specific criteria in order for any tablet to be superior to my laptop. I was/am ready to return it if it didn't work for me:

1) It had to be incredibly easy to integrate with my cloud server on Dropbox
2) Accessing and editing documents on Dropbox had to be seamless
3) Accessing and editing PDF articles and class notes had to be comfortable and realistic (nothing too complicated)
4) Google Calendar had to play nice with iCal or an acceptable equivalent
5) There had to be apps out there to make it superior to my browser-based existence
6) OSK is just not realistic for me, so I wanted a great/portable Bluetooth keyboard

Today is day 5, and honestly, I don't know how I got by without it. I LOVE curling up in bed, locking out the rotation, and reading/annotating my PDF articles or even just web browsing or watching Netflix. I am beyond impressed with how most software seem to integrate with Dropbox or other cloud servers.

Right now I have been using Goodreader to read/annotate PDFs, Quickoffice Pro HD to view/edit my Word/Excel docs, and iProcrastinate to manage my workload. Unfortunately iProcrastinate only has an iPhone app at this time, but it syncs up with my Macbook so it's all good. So nice to be able to see what's coming up next between all my classes.

Tomorrow I will try AudioNote especially in my Philosophy class. The prof is very much a talker, and doesn't tend to summarize her points in any logical fashion, so I think recording her lectures and having them timestamped to the notes would be a great thing. We'll see how it goes.

I have been finding a lot of apps that might be suitable to nurse-types, so I was thinking I might do a review of these in the future so you can get a feel for it without shelling out money.

As far as the keyboard setup, I was heavily swayed by NNR's review of ZAGG's keyboard. I checked out Future Shop and found one open box, missing the USB cable. Since I have a few of those anyway, I sashayed up to the sales guy and asked him to "make me a deal" on it complete with flirtatious lashes. He knocked off another $20(!) for me, dropping the price from $100 to $75. Excellent. I love the keyboard, too, although it's good that I don't have man hands, because the keyboard's certainly petite. Together with the iPad, it still weighs roughly 2/3 less than my Macbook, not including the charging cable, and it definitely takes up much less valuable space in my bike pannier.

So altogether, between the cellular data, the apps, the cloud integration, and the ZAGG keyboard, I am quite pleased with my setup. Bonus points for form factor, weight, battery life, and lack of hard disk drive. I will continue evaluating right until Saturday of next week which is the end of the allowable return period.

Anyway, I have been blogging away from yet another new app - Blogsy. I really like it. Even better than I like Blogger's old back end. I used it to write this blog post - I am hoping that the improved mobility will make it easier for me to blog when I have the desire instead of waiting for when I have time at home with my computer.

I guess that about covers everything. For now. :)

I'll keep this short because I was on a weird shift last night at the ER to try and cover the peak times, and then I went to my other job today, and I'm trying to catch up on sleep before my 0800 class tomorrow.

It's crazy to look at my syllabi and see all 400-level courses.

This fall semester is my final lecture-based term; Jan-Feb is my consolidation and then Mar-Apr is my PRECEPTORSHIP!

I put in my preceptorship placement requests yesterday after a lot of serious thought. Basically, after much deliberation and longing to try every specialty but being restricted to only 3 choices, I finally decided on Oncology, Cardiology, and Corrections.

A few that fell on the cutting room floor were PACU, ICU of all types including CCU, public health particularly women's sexual health, and a brief daydream of something extra crazy like OR. I also didn't consider asking for Emergency since I wanted to try something new.

Why not critical care? Although I'm tremendously interested in it, and I KNOW I'd learn a lot, I spent a lot of time reflecting on the criteria to excel in my preceptorship. Some of those things include initiative, the ever-elusive "critical thought", and transitioning to a grad nurse role. I honestly don't think I'd be able to excel in those criteria in ICU. Yeah, a 10-week preceptorship would be an awesome orientation to the floor, but really, it would just be an introduction. In my final preceptorship I'm expected to be a grad nurse. I feel like I'd spend so much time being a fly on the wall, I'd be too afraid to get in and get my hands dirty, so to speak.

The choices I picked are ones that I think have opportunities as a newbie nurse to actually show some initiative and capability as a health care provider.

We had to provide some rationales for our choices, and these were mine:

1. Oncology: My interest in Oncology stems from both the prevalence of cancer diagnoses across all patient populations as well as my family’s experiences with cancer. I feel uniquely prepared for a preceptorship in oncology nursing as I am currently completing the ONDEC course through the Alberta Cancer Board. I am also a student member of the Canadian Association of Nurses in Oncology (CANO) and will be attending the CANO conference** in Halifax this September to learn more from dedicated Oncology Nurses about their specialty. In return for receiving a travel grant, I have agreed to write a journal article for one of CANO’s publications and I am hoping to write about my preceptorship experience and transition from theoretical knowledge into practice as a graduate nurse.

2. Cardiology: I have worked as an undergraduate nurse in the Emergency setting over the past summer. I have tremendously enjoyed working in the ER and have found that one of our major patient populations are either experiencing acute cardiac changes or have a history of cardiac/vascular pathophysiology. Having worked closely with several former Cardiology nurses, I admire their extensive knowledge of this specialty. As I have been invited to stay with the ER after I graduate, getting first-hand experience with this specific population will be extremely educational and give me confidence when working with new-onset cardiac concerns in the ER. My RN coworkers have commented on my willingness to get involved and ask questions to further my understanding, so I believe I could meet the required objectives to excel in this placement.

3. Corrections: My first post-secondary program was in Policing, of which I completed 50% of the course credits. I still have a strong interest in law enforcement although I am geared more towards prevention and rehabilitation rather than apprehension. At the ER we also had several inmates transferred to our facility for treatment. I believe that with my educational background and ability to respect and work with corrections patients without judging their histories, corrections nursing would be a unique opportunity to make a positive impact in an underserved population.

**In other news, as you read, I am going to yet another conference! There are just so many opportunities for students to get involved in Nursing. I have some other projects I'm excited to tell you about. But that post will have to wait until, at least, I get a decent night's sleep :)

WaHOOOOoooOOO FOURTH YEAR!!!!!!

Wow, arguing for privately funded/delivered healthcare in a crowd full of nurses (and a model that I don't personally ascribe to) was probably the hardest thing I've done in school. But we went out there, we stirred the pot, we pissed people off, and people gave us death stares- but we defended it with all our hearts and received many congrats from attendees on our convincing arguments. We even earned a shout out from Linda Silas, president of the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions (CFNU), who said we deserved academic credit for our work!! Wow, it was so intense. I loved it and it terrified me. More updates to follow once I am on my home computer :)

The view from our podium:

-- from the cellular desk of undergrad RN

I read her books before I ever started nursing school, and here she is :)
-- from the cellular desk of undergrad RN

Noms galore! There are so many people here and it hasn't even officially started yet! We will be rehearsing soon and then later a wine & cheese charity auction. Rumor has it there's an iPad up for grabs.... I was just getting a little thoughtful over how 4 years ago today, nursing school was a pipe dream for me, and here I am now sitting with hundreds of like-minded future nurses in a profession I have become so passionate about. Life is amazing like that, I guess :)
-- from the cellular desk of undergrad RN

This past weekend was a total whirlwind, finishing up a CFAM assessment on my patient family, getting ready for the Big Debate, and getting absolutely slammed at work due to the huge snowfall we got this month.
I just wanted to check in and say I am still working on that post I mentioned, and OMG I'm in Toronto!!!
Will keep you posted on what the conference is all about. Stay tuned :)
-- from the cellular desk of undergrad RN

I don't know if I have previously shared one of my guiding life philosophies, but I will now.

After a FANTASTIC decompression in the sun (and a pretty fantastic sunburn, might I add), a red eye flight, and return to the snowy northern wastes, I checked my email to find the following -

Congratulations,

You have been chosen to be a part of the 2011 CNSA national conference's national team! 

Aaaaannnnnnnd cue heart palpitations. There are only 5 of us on the team. For the WHOLE COUNTRY. zomg. I'm pretty sure I'm the only one from Alberta.

So now I realized that I actually will have to roll up my sleeves and make this trip happen, aka booking even more time off work, sending my regrets to the STTI induction, and pleading my case with the school faculty as I would be missing 4 days of L&D clinical*.

And practice, practice, practice what I am going to say, so that awful presentation Will. Not. Be. Repeated.

In front of the likes of 600+ CNSA members, Tilda Shalof, and Jean Watson, no less!!

* I think I sent a pretty compelling argument to the faculty. I may have indicated that the academic nature of the conference should be valid course credit. I also may have indicated that it would be a pretty sweet name drop to my fairly-recently-accredited university.

** I also checked all of my final course grades and found that I kicked ass on my finals. Especially my Nursing/Acutely Ill course, which was the one I really cared about. Booya!

From my experience at the conference a couple of weeks ago, I discovered there was so much more going on at the student level than I had ever thought. It really is my nature to get involved with everything (one of my clinical instructors described me as a juggler, tossing around so many responsibilities, and turned it into a moral cautionary tale, but I digress). It was only natural, then, for me to want to get involved with CNSA.

I am interested in running for a position as regional director or maybe higher (!) next year, so I was clicking around the CNSA website trying to suss out some kind of information for the next election period. In my hunt, I discovered information pertaining to the National Conference taking place in Hamilton ON next year. Check out those keynote speakers! Tilda Shalof! Jean Watson! Man, I spent the entire summer before nursing school reading Shalof books and being excited about nursing. Not to mention the 5 page essay I wrote on Watson's Theory of Caring a few weeks ago. A-mazing.

Then I realized that there was (yay!) another opportunity for me to attend a conference for free (yay!) if I applied to participate on the CNSA National Team.

From the briefing:

It will be the goal of the 2011 CNSA National Team to explore and debate contemporary issues in nursing and how diversity affects, and may affect, the next generation of nurses.

As nursing students it is never too early to advocate for change and challenge the present and future state of healthcare in Canada – the 2011 CNSA National Team will address the challenges of the contemporary nursing student, how they may be effective in the promotion of change, integration into an “old school” health care culture, and how to effectively manage these diversities.

It is our personal challenge this year to hold a debate on the changing healthcare system and to provide insight into the issue of public versus private healthcare in Canada and the affect it will play on the role of the nurse.

They have assigned a few interesting topics for discussion, and there are some other ones on the table.

• Public versus private healthcare in Canada, and what it means to us 
• How we are different or the same as generations past; i.e. technology, traditions 
• Some of the barriers we face as nursing students, i.e. stereotypes 
• How can we maintain or improve the quality of health care and advocate for change as needed
• Our diverse opportunities for work and how can we use them to make a difference in the health of our society 
• Globalization in nursing

I've never met an essay question I didn't like, so this was a fun and interesting spin on my comfort zone. I can write persuasive position statements without too much effort but the very idea of PRESENTING and DEBATING and DEFENDING those - now that's exciting! And a little nervewracking terrifying!

Those of you who have been longtime readers may remember my philosophy on life - if it scares the shit out of you, DO IT. I try to tackle my fears head on. It's the only way to know exactly what you're capable of. This is the philosophy that got me through solo skydiving, scuba diving, BUNGEE JUMPING (my all time greatest fear - the video isn't mine but it's where I jumped), and the various other questionably-risky behaviour I have engaged in with the intention of figuring out just what I'm made of.

I guess what I'm getting at is this is something that I am, yes, passionate and curious about. I want to discover more about the professionalization of nursing and see how I can be involved. However, and I think most would agree, it's a big jump from idly pondering the future of nursing to defending your ideology in a debate in front of hundreds of peers and nursing leaders.

It freaks me out.

Therefore I applied.

The only real downsides to this opportunity being the giant potential for failure, the fact that I will miss some clinical time, and I will also miss my STTI induction ceremony, qq.

Wish me luck... and feel free to pass on your views!

So, the conference just finished up and I am back in the airport. There was an incredible amount of information, discussion, debate, and theorizing about what it means to Be A Nurse in this coming decade and beyond.

I am inspired and grateful for my sponsorship to this event. If they hadn't sent me, I may never have realized the importance and relevance of the Canadian Nursing Students' Association. In fact I am seriously considering running for a position with the Association for my 4th and final year of undergraduate studies.

You know those experiences where your worldview is completely shifted and refocused? That was me today. It was like a camera, which has been zoomed in on my idea of nursing, suddenly zoomed way out to a much larger perspective and made my head spin. I know I'm waxing a little poetic here but there were so many interesting and inspiring topics today. I am SO GLAD I got to participate in it. I really do feel like my nursing potential has been magnified and refocused.

Without going into too much detail just now, because I want to do them justice, I am planning to do a little writeup on each of the sessions as an additional resource for you all to share.

I will say this: I am so influenced by what I read and hear that I don't even realize I'm being influenced. As you all know, I'm really passionate and excited about my chosen field and I have been since the very start. A big part of that passion is filled by my voracious appetite for nursing topics, lectures, stories, and discussion, which I usually fill by checking out allnurses.com. Of course a lot of the discussion revolves around frustrations and dissatisfaction, be it with life or scope of practice or employers or clients or families or other disciplines. These discussions have been subtly negatively impacting my perspective on the reality of nursing. Be warned, people, that your in-the-moment opinions may be a reflection of the content you're exposed to. Consider whether they accurately reflect what you believe to be true.

A LOT of discussion on AN involves debate between whether nursing is a trade or a profession.

Is nursing defined by its skills?

It seems to me that most (and I use this term cautiously, I haven't been psychoanalyzing the threads or anything) of those nurses who feel undervalued and crapped on and not like a real profession believe that nursing is essentially a skilled trade, and that BSN students like myself are subpar clinicians and (I quote) "stand around theorizing instead of working".

To which I challenge - isn't theorizing a HUGE PART of working to my full scope of practice? As a Registered Nurse, working with Licenced Practical Nurses who nearly duplicate my scope, isn't my defining feature SUPPOSED to be that I address patient care from a wide holistic focus which would include taking the time to conceptualize appropriate care?

I've heard this said before and I always dismissed it, but it's true, and it's very much in line with my previous musings - anyone can give a bed bath. Any monkey can pass meds, change linens, insert a catheter, change a dressing aseptically, or do any number of the tasks that I used to think were the defining features of a nurse and ultimately the purpose of my education. My graduating without knowing these things cold will only slow me down until I learn them.

The point of this degree, and I now see this developing in my thought process, is to get me to think. This makes me smile because I remember on one of the very first days in first year, I asked my instructor what the difference was between an RN and an LPN - she said that I would learn how to think. It's important to recognize that LPNs also know how to think, but every single course I've taken in school has developed and engaged my worldview, and it is so much broader than it was even a year ago. So yeah, those extra 2 years actually will make a difference and I say that from my own experience.

Another idea that jumped out at me today was for all of those who say "sure, wait till you get into the real world", while in the same breath acknowledging that nursing today isn't what it was 25 years ago. They rail against the system; the role of the nurse being defined by the physician, the lack of respect, the lack of collaboration, and warn all of us bright eyed naive students that we're going to get eaten alive -

Well, thanks to today's intercollaborative panel, comprised of Medicine, Pharmacy, Social Work, Physiotherapy, Registered Nursing, and Practical Nursing, it hit me that it's not just nursing that is graduating new students. Every single discipline is evolving and acknowledging the scopes of other professions, and those changes are reflected in new grads. The physicians I graduate with today I will be working with tomorrow (theoretically) and it's going to be our ball game. Collaboration is alive and well in our student population and will be alive and well in practice. Eventually, of course.

What I'm trying to say, in a long-winded kind of way, that today I remembered and reinforced that I will be changing tomorrow by my actions, attitudes, advocacy, and values.

I would also like to give a shout-out to Saskatchewan's attitude towards Registered Nurses. For those who don't know, Saskatchewan is the birthplace of single-payer, accessible, universal health care enjoyed by all Canadians. It has a long history of strong nurses and seems to have a lot more respect for healthcare than my home province of Alberta. In fact, Saskatchewan passed the Registered Nurses Act. They have their own act! It protects the title of 'nurse' for RNs only! By comparison, the nurses of Alberta and several other provinces fall under the Healthcare Professions Act. Saskatchewan's nursing speakers prided their profession as compassionate caring and conveyors of change - NOT as skillmonkeys, handmaidens, or tradespeople. When that many people are speaking that passionately about their profession, it's time to listen.

I was also introduced to the unfamiliar practice of Saskatchewan nurses identifying themselves by name and title at every opportunity. For instance, the president of SNSS was introduced as Braden, Nursing Student. One of the speakers was introduced as Barb, Registered Nurse. Everyone did this, every time they introduced themselves to anyone.

A simple act but it highlighted the pride in their title, whatever stage of nursing they were in, every single time they said it.

A fine tradition and one I will be taking with me to the clinical setting. Hello, I'm Undergrad RN, Nursing Student - to whomever may ask.

Anyway I've rambled on and on and if you made it to now I will personally send you a chocolate bar. Look for detailed session synopses coming within the next week or so. Have a great Halloween everyone! I am flying back home within an hour!

I'm now sitting in the airport waiting for my flight out to Saskatoon. I'm SUPER EXCITED! First conference ever! There is so much I want to know:

- ideal career pathing for critical care nurses
- CRNE information
- what the hell nurses should be putting on a resume
- what other student nurses think about

I'm also excited about staying in a hotel tonight. I love hotels. Big wonderful beds with big wonderful pillows and small wonderful sample things and coffee pots and all that jazz. And when you're done you just throw the towels in the tub.

That's actually kind of how I roll at home, but anyway...

Hey, boarding call. Will update soon :)

Guess who's going on an all-expenses-paid conference trip to sunny Saskatoon?

This girl, right here!

Oh, I have horseshoes up my ass.

I am SO excited about this. I've never been to a conference before. It's next weekend and I will share all.

There are several workshops but the two I am most interested in are Family Centered Care and Nursing the Future. Looks like there are also some perks like a job fair and stuff - not that it will help me much as a 3rd Year but it will help me pick the recruiter's brains and find out some things that could help me land a job in a year and change.

Thank you everyone for your positive vibes. I was reading back through some of my old posts and I am so glad I started this blog. It's really helped to remind me how far I've come.