roly poly

i have noticed more than ever how weight conscious i am. it drives me crazy.

my mother consistently says i am very fat. she used to say it even when i was quite skinny. however today i realised those days are gone and im not so skinny anymore. however i dont believe i have a problem, but my mother does, therefore i am dieting.

tonite i ate lettuce, tomatoes, tuna fish without oil and 1 slice of bread. oh and an apple. which is all great for me, but kind of bad when u watch the rest of your family guzzle down somerset pork with gravy poured all over it.

sometimes my mother makes me really miserable, makes me feel like i am the worst person on earth. and the ugliest. i know i'm neither, but when u are told such things on a daily basis, u start to wonder just how many elements of truth are in such accusations.

i suppose its for my own good...but it really doesnt make me feel good. dieting and eating healthy is fine...being insulted and feeling like shit isn't.

oh what the fuck am i moaning about. if i don't think about it too much, its no big deal and no top priority. don't think, don't amplify.
and 99 red balloons go by.

bubble burst

I did not feel like writing today, so i decided to share a picture i drew

Coats can be deceiving...

This is something I did around christmas time...i still can't show my face in Nicholsons in Attard after this episode.

My mum's side of the family are nuts. Absolutely crazy. Which is why I love them and feel so comfortable around them. The make me realise where some of my nut-so behaviour comes from and thus i console myself. So when my mum invited them all for christmas tea I was more than pleased.

So off we went together to the supermarket, buying things to fill up our rectangular 3m x 2m glass table, cuz my mum believes that it isnt a real tea unless the whole table is full of food.

at a point I got bored and wandered off, and what did I see? The most delicious thing one could ever eat: Cadbury Chocolate Chip biscuits, the luxury pack. My mum doesnt really like to buy such unhealthy food, but hell, it was christmas and if i asked her tactfully, i knew the answer would be yes.

so i looked around for my mum, saw her brown coat, approached her trolley and in a voice that sounded like i had a pole up my ass, i placed the biscuits on the rim of her trolley and said:

"Eat me! Eat me! Yummy! Woo hoo!" while shaking the packet about.

Silence.

I looked up into the brown-coated lady's eyes and they weren't my mother's. I looked at the biscuits and then back at the lady who looked like a constipated tortoise.

"Oh, heh heh, sorry, bye!"

This is not the most embarassing moment in my life, but it definitely ranks in the top 20 :)

parting is such sweet sorrow

due to a well deserved 2 week break from nursing, I haven't really had any incidents to write about, so today I will post a story I wrote last year. enjoy. or don't, because i don't care either way.

Parting is such sweet sorrow
All good things and bad things come to an end. Everything has some sort of finale and it leaves one with a variety of mixed feelings. Four months have passed and the new semester draws near and therefore a new ward. I leave my old fogies and meet new ones. I can’t say I do this with a particularly heavy feeling in my heart. In fact I don’t. I recall in my first year I was so happy to leave that first ever wretched ward that I skipped down the corridor of the hospital with joy screaming “I’m free! I’m free! Woo hoo!” No kidding. Little did I know that an even worse ward was waiting for me, but back then I was a novice and knew little better. Now I have a better idea of what can or cannot be in store for me therefore I leave with caution, rather than jubilee.
However, I must say my last day at this ward was quite eventful. I had a very interesting send off indeed. Incidents were occurring non-stop, from the moment I walked in to the moment I kissed those wretched walls goodbye. Well, I did not actually kiss them because that would be suicide due to the amount of bacteria which has certainly accumulated there over the years but no worries because it was my last day. I was noticing how some of my patients progressed, but a good number regressed and it is almost depressing.
For example, Rosaria. When she arrived, she was alive and kicking, really great. She was talkative, lively and good natured. Then the regression took over. She stopped eating, stopped getting out of bed. She basically just stopped. And of course, because she refuses to get out of bed, just guess what she has now? Your friends and mine: bedsores! Deep, oozing, cavernous bedsores covering her ass and back! The smell is horrendous; the image of decomposing skin makes one want to vomit! The worst part is she brought it all upon herself. Not to mention, she now spends her whole day shouting and screaming about how she wishes to die. Well, on my last day, her wish finally came true and I felt so incredibly sorry and I felt like it was not fair. But it is. Death is very fair. We are born, we live and we die. It’s the timing which isn’t sometimes.
I was ecstatic about leaving behind one particular diploma student. She would get on my last nerve. She is short and ugly and she stinks. Her hair is poorly dyed and is the colour of straw and has the same texture, with a thick line of dandruff surrounding her side-parting. Jane and I christened her E.T. She even talks like E.T. Hell, I just wish she’d go home! The most disgusting thing about her are her hands. The tops are dry and peeling and red and the dried up flakes are simply caked with fungal infection. We told her over and over to go to a dermatologist but she refuses to listen. So fine, have disgusting infected hands; suit your bloody, fungus-filled self. She also would always make this tremendous effort to speak to me in English. I told her many, many times that I can understand Maltese perfectly but still, she insisted. Her broken English would irritate me. Very much. She only seemed to understand and be able to say one word; “eugh, that’s disgaaaaaaaasting!” whenever I would help her bathe patients she would just stand there, arms folded saying “disgaaaaasting” (disgusting) at intervals. YOU STUPID WITCH! WHY DID YOU GET INTO NURSING IF EVERYTHING MAKES YOU SICK?! YOU IDIOTIC TWERP! AND ITS DISGUSTING NOT DISGAAAAASTING IGNORAMOUS! YES, ITS DISGUSTING, LIKE YOUR HAIR! EVER HEARD OF HEAD AND SHOULDERS OR DO YOU TAKE PRIDE IN BEING THE SNOWFLAKE KID?!!! FUCKING HELL! AND FIX THE CRUD GROWING ON YOUR HANDS, BECAUSE THAT’S DISGAAAASTING TOO!
I was certainly glad to get away from her.
Unfortunately, on leaving this Ward I also had to get rid of Jane because she was transported to a different ward. We are both acting as apprentices to the BSc fourth years, because their practical exam is so difficult that it is impossible for them to do it on their own, therefore the tutors assign a younger student to help them out during their practical. What fun. Its not like the fourth years are bitchy or anything. They are not. They are simply very neurotic and on a power trip to make sure that you do everything perfectly. That’s right, its hell on earth. Oh well, when I’m in my fourth year, I will make it a point to inflict the same punishment on the poor victim who happens to come under my wing. I can’t wait. I hope I get someone I dislike so I can make her suffer.
Someone I know who won’t be missed is Catherine. She is 82 and has an amputated leg which makes her believe that she is very special. She has this nasty obsession with her toe-nails and whenever she sees me she makes me cut them. Yuck. They will be yellow and curly and smell of turd. Not to mention hard. Apart from having to scrape the grey gunk from underneath each nail, I have to saw through them using a blunt pair of nail scissors which is no easy task when your nails are so hard that you can put the makers of steel toe boots out of business. It took me on average half an hour to get through her foot. I just thank the Lord she did only indeed have one foot.
My next ward is orthopaedics. I wonder what will be in store for me over there. I wonder if it will be grotesque women, horny men dying for a bed bath or students who act like they own the hospital. I just hope it will be colourful and inspirational. I owe it to my readers ;-)

terse nurse

I'm making a conscious effort to stay away from nursing for a while. After my disastrous practical I have developed a sort of revulsion to the whole profession. I just hope it will pass in the next 2 weeks.

The problem is that staying away from nursing sort of throws out a whole portion of my character...

The sweet, endearing nurse. Personally, I'm really quite sick of this persona which I consistently seem to hide behind, being concerned with everyone else's well being and kicking my own to the kerb. I hate the way people see me. I hate what they think I am.

This sounds really teenage right? Yeah it does. Well, I don't give a shit. Everyone feels these things all the time. Then you get those bullshitters who say they don't care what anybody thinks of them. Liars. You are all liars.

Its such a case of Whats my view? well, how am I supposed to know. Whats to review? well, how objective can I be?

I don't want to quit nursing. I love nursing. But whoever invented the expression "Getting there is half the fun" should be dragged out into the road and shot.

all sorts of funny thoughts

this is a poem i remember from childhood, which i like very much:

Half Way down by A.A. Milne

Half way down the stairs is a stair where I sit.
There isn't any other stair quite like it.
its not at the bottom
its not at the top.
It isnt really anywhere, just a place i like to stop.

Half way down the stairs isn't up and isn't down.
It isn't in the nursery, it isn't in the town.
And all sorts of funny thoughts
Run round my head.
It really isn't anywhere,
its somewhere else instead.

the pretension and the tension

I had a practical exam today. I prepared and I felt prepared but for some reason I can't exactly say I did particularly well.

The things that went wrong (they are quite comical really):

1. My patient began to cry out in pain in the middle of my exam. Great, just great. "I have a tummyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaache! AJMA! AJMA!" Now, she did this just this morning and I told her she has had an operation and to have some patience and that it will go in time. Nope. She screams during my exam. I end up looking bad because she does this during a procedure. I felt stupid repeating what I already said this morning and lost points because I did not communicate with my patient.

2. I am now incredibly nervous and answer almost every question thrown at me incorrectly, not because the answer is beyond me but because I can't stop thinking what a loser I am for losing points when it came to patient communication, especially when I know chatting and blabbing is basically what I do best.

3. I am taken to the treatment room in order to show them how to prime an IV set. They told me that I dont have to talk if I don't want to while performing this act. I did it perfectly...at least I think I did. So that was fine. I also set the drop rate and that was fine.

4. Time to administer drugs. I think, yeay, time to redeem myself, I studied these. I open the chart and find out they changed all this patient's drugs from intravenous to oral tablets. Fuck. I get confused and panic and get pissed off. I know how to give the drugs and all the procedures ect... I thought I knew all the side effects too but I was hardly asked any. Instead I was asked stuff about diseases which I didn't know...well, I did know them but at that point I was dying inside. I was asked questions about a disease my patient didn't have. I was asked questions about clinical procedures on the ward which were apparentally carried out incorrectly by qualified nurses therefore I said them incorrectly thinking they were right.

5. My patient pipes up saying she is to be discharged and I am asked about her discharge planning. I did not know she was going to be discharged so I did not know her discharge plan. At the end of the exam, a staff nurse tells me she was not going to be discharged until tomorrow.

6. When giving the patient's history I could not figure out whether the patient had cancerous polyps or not...but then I remembered she did but I still lost points because I said I wasn't sure.

7. I also happened to wear ugly shoes and that didn't help.

When I re-read all these things I can't help but think what a disasterous human being I am. I was totally prepared but I still managed to fuck everything up.

Alot of people tell me I am clever and a great nurse, but when I see or do certain things I can't help but think that it is all false pretense. Quoting American Beauty, in order to be successful, one must portray an image of success. Well, I'm sorry but the image just isn't enough. I know what it takes to be successful...it isn't the image, it isn't the hardwork...its luck. And to hardworkers like me, its really quite heartbreaking.

But, to see the good in the bad, I did pass, so I guess the examiners saw something in me. I don't know what, but maybe it was a certain je ne sais quoi.

Honestly, it all makes me very, very tired. 1 year to go. I hope it goes by quickly. The stress is going to make my tiny brain inch its way out of my ears.

With a capital "V"

so today I had a day off and decided to go to our one and only capital city Valletta. I love valletta, its where I want to live, it is where i feel like i belong. it is such wonderful city, oozing with character...its what a city should be...very inspirational.

therefore this morning i decided to roam the streets of valletta by myself. I got hungry and bought myself a baguette from Jus Cafe and went walking down to the ID card area to overlook the sea. There are many moments in my life where i miss canada and i start to think about how life would be if i were still there. This wasnt one of them.

having finished my baguette, i began to walk up to the more metropolitan part of the city. on my way up, i witnessed this couple fighting quite vociferously. i stopped to watch, as other locals did. however, on my arrival, one of the spectators told the angry couple to stop it, because foreigners were watching. i looked around for these foreigners and i found everyone looking at me. i guess i was the foreigner.

Since I am a clothes junky i went looking about for intersting, original stuff at bargain prices. i was semi-successful. but really, my shopping trips to valletta arent about the shopping. its about enjoying the city, the way it triggers the five senses. i can feel the heat beating down on my sunhat, i can taste my mint-chocolate ice-cream i bought from a gelateria, i can hear the locals arguing and the "monti" blasting out wretched pop tunes, i can see the hideous and out-of-place ben and jerry's stand near cafe cordina and i can smell horse urine mixed with pastizzi as i pass by cafe perfection. this city depicts everything and everyone i know and love.

it may not seem like paradise. But hey, its home.

Where have all the flowers gone?

Sometimes I feel like i'm going insane and i think my philosophy on life is completely warped. I cant believe the lack of compassion that exists among people as young as us, people who believe that you should give someone as much shit as possible so he becomes a stronger person.

Now how completely warped is that? Beat someone with actions or words until they become crippled so they can become stronger. what a load of shit! And then people tell me that bullying and abuse is something that everyone has to go through in order to "prepare you for life" because life is full of "dicks, assholes and pussies, and no1 wants to be a pussy".

Well what about all those others who aren't? It honestly makes me retch to think that all people can focus on is the bleak part of life...or maybe their lives are already so bleak that its impossible to break that wall now.

What irks me most about all this is the attitude some people have about abuse...they tell me, look i was bullied and i never asked for help, i confronted it, i wasnt a pussy.

Perhaps, but most of these people who turned out so inexplicably well are ex-drug addicts, have many failed relationships and can only view the world as being full of "dicks and pussies"... all behaviours which often have stemmed from some kind of abuse.

So I really dont know. Is it my philosophy, which is really quite like Plato who always tried to seek knowledge of the good, that is so mistaken? Where have all the flowers gone?

rest in peace amen

Something I have learnt about being a nurse is how not to be afraid of death. After looking at the state of some of the old people I treat, I think death seems like a way out of eternal misery. I have also come to the conclusion that I really don’t want to live after I turn 65. I don’t want the last look at myself to be a reflection of wrinkles; saggy breasts and doughnut roll flab. I would definitely rather die. Without any doubt. Neither do I want to become senile and wander around aimlessly depending solely on nurses like myself, who honestly rarely have a clue about what they are doing.
Up until now, I have only really witnessed two dead people. It made me think a lot about death and dying and strangely enough, life itself. I remember on my first lesson of o level biology we did the seven vital functions and I was so fascinated when the teacher mentioned death as one of them. Anything living has to die otherwise one cannot say it ever lived. So paradoxically death is definitely a part of life. A part of life I am thinking about more than ever lately. Death is something nobody likes to think about or talk about. I remember last summer my uncle died and I could not believe I would never hear his voice again or ever see his face smiling at me. Now death is different for me. I’m used to it and I have come to terms with it and even though I hate myself for saying this, I now find it kind of comical.
I remember a colleague and I were washing a patient in the morning and she was joking and walking around and was feeling absolutely fine and great. Not once did she call me Rosemary’s baby, she-devil or threaten me that if I touch her she would make me eat her nephew’s shit. Therefore, by my standards this woman was having a good day. Actually, better than good. Outstanding if I may say so. Any patient who does not accuse me of being one of Satan’s nearest and dearest is definitely feeling very bright and chipper. When we finished bathing her, we got her to sit on her sofa, tidied her area and went on to get another patient ready for the day.
Before I knew it, lunchtime rolled around and it was time to dish out the pig slop the hospital gives these old ladies to eat. I have come to believe that one truly becomes old when one actually starts to look forward to eating hospital food. The usual menu is compiled of limp, pale cabbage, under cooked potatoes and meat that looks like the lunch ladies simply emptied out the days vomit bags and added a little Oxo cube for flavour. Yet, my old fogies eat this meal (a very inappropriate word to use for this steaming shit) with such gusto that it almost makes me want to reach out for a vomit bag. I walked into the eight-bedded room and started to give out the trays of food and feed those who cannot feed themselves. I approached the woman who I had encountered that morning after, please note, I had given the other seven patients their swill. I placed her tray on her bedside table and prepared for my usual lunchtime speech:
“Josephina, I am putting your food on your table. Shall I cut it for you?”
But Josephina was fast asleep. I gently touched her on the arm and repeated myself.
“Josephina! I am putting your food on your table. Shall I cut it for you?”
I started to get a bit peeved. You idiotic old woman! Eat your damn slop before I push your face in it! Jesus, is it such a difficult concept? Food on plate! Food goes in mouth! Food is swallowed! Remains of food are removed from nappy the following day! It is not something out of the ordinary!
I felt her face and my hand slipped over her carotid pulse, situated under the chin. I noticed it was not beating. Fuck. The old cunt was dead. I had walked into that room a grand total of seven times and had not noticed. I called the nursing officer.
“Mary, I think Josephina is dead.”
Mary came in and checked for herself.
“Oh yes, I do believe you are right. Ha ha! And you bothered to wash her this morning!”
Yes, it was a comment like that, which truly brightened my afternoon.
We called the doctor who certified her as dead and that was it. She was placed in a metal cart and wheeled away. That was the end of her.
My second death experience was far more nerve wracking. It was one of those freaky coincidences that keep me from restful sleep.
Grace was a very large 88 year-old woman. This woman was big. She was wide. If she was responsive and did not suffer from stroke, she would have been the most successful sumo wrestler that ever lived. And if that didn’t work out, she could always nab the great career of being a human beach ball. Needless to say, Grace hardly lived up to her name. Apart from the long voluptuous beard and moustache sprouting from her mouth areas, she had the biggest bed sore on her ass. Now, a bedsore, to those of you who are not in the know, is a disgusting, often gangrenous and cavernous wound. To make matters worse, a bedsore stinks. It smells awful. You walk into the room of a bedsored-woman and say to yourself “Hmmm, something is decomposing here, God it stinks! I’m suffocating! My lungs are being intoxicated! Sweet Mother of Jesus, get me out of here!!”
That morning, the sadistic qualified nurses sent three students, including myself to wash her. We looked like three toothpicks trying to manoeuvre a watermelon. I took on the brave task of removing her nappy and I exposed the offensive bedsore that was caked with diarrhoea. The smell was absolutely phenomenal. I was about to add my semi-digested breakfast to the mess. I wore 3 pairs of gloves on top of each other and tried to think happy thoughts. I started to think of that Boo Radley’s song, it goes “wake up it’s a beautiful morning! See the sun shining in your eyes!” well, it certainly was not written for me. Hell no. I thought to myself “Why doesn’t this somewhat androgynous excuse for a female just die!”
And you will not believe it, but two hours later she did.
The nursing officer and one of the male staff took on the job of stuffing her with cotton wool, as is standard procedure. They wrenched her mouth open and started stuffing her, choking her with wadding and cotton wool while us first year students watched in horror. The nursing officer turned to us and said, “Well, girls, this teaches you a lesson. Don’t eat fattening food. It will gives us too much work when you die.” The eloquence of my nursing officer has never failed to astound me. The metal cart was brought out and the diseased Grace was heaved in. Unfortunately, she was too big for such a narrow cart and her arm remained hanging out as well as a little flab. And she was gone.
Death is such a casual occurrence. Especially in medical wards filled with social cases who are really there because they simply have nowhere else to go. They are literally sitting there, waiting to die. When I was relating this story to my father, he was disgusted by my lack of respect for the dead. Well, what’s the sense of that? If she was not respected when she was alive, it is quite futile respecting her now. Too little, too late. We live to die; otherwise we cannot say we ever lived. How completely warped. But such is life. I guess.

first time I went to the ward on clinical practice...

My very first day in a surgical ward. My very first day as a practising nurse in a real live hospital. How exciting! I was finally one of those glamorous, all merciful nurses like on television. I could not have been more wrong.
I had no idea I would be required to manually bathe patients. It simply never occurred to me. I mean, possibly the stench of human excrement as you walk through the doors of the ward may give you a hint that the excrement will have to be disposed of and that is a nurses job. Ah , well, I guess I am a little slow on the uptake.
In any case, I guess I misread the job description when I applied for a BSc in nursing because I certainly did not think I would ever have to scrub centenarians for a living. To make matters worse, this task requires a certain amount of skill and learning. Therefore a senior nurse whisked me off to one of the old ladies’ rooms to get the ordeal over and done with.
However this was not done before I was clad in an apron and gloves. I started to smell a rat, among the many others things I could smell in that ward: excrement, urine, vomit, blood and now a rat. The cogwheels of my mind started to churn. The apron was to protect my uniform, all well and good. But gloves? Then it all fell upon me like a ton of bricks. These old people are going to be putrid, envaginated in bodily juices, bitten by bacteria and fucked with filth. And I will have to remedy the situation.
I pull back the curtain and I close it in shock. I was presented with an old woman, four times my size and completely nude, her breasts sagging down to her thighs, her white pubic hair glistening through the mucous in the bright clinical light above. I felt my stomach rise to my throat. I closed my eyes. Please God let this be a nightmare! But I opened my eyes and the stark hag was still there. I had no choice. I had to wash her.
I grabbed the face cloth and soap and it really was not so bad. At least she was not bloody or wallowing in her own shit so I counted my blessings. Then, my aged playboy centrefold dropped a bomb:
“Wash me well between my legs! It needs to be scrubbed!”
I said to myself, ok, that’s it, I’m taking a BA in anthropology! I took the face cloth and scrubbed. I thanked God for gloves and a strong will.
I have no idea why, but I turned my head to see the expression on my patient’s face, to see if she was just as embarrassed as I was. Needless to say, she wasn’t. The disgusting old fuck was enjoying it. She even had this disgusting orgasmic smile on her disgusting hairy old face and she was playing with her disgusting hanging tits!
Well, I finished her off and walked out of the room with the senior nurse. I was in a state of shock. My first day on the job and I already wanted to quit. We went for our half hour break and for some reason I could not eat anything with melted cheese on it.
The senior nurse told me that I’ll get used to this in time. The thing is, does an eighteen year-old really want to get used to seeing atrocities? Well, I guess I did. And I still do. Which is why this episode is my first and not my last.
Pica

Meow.

Yesterday I had to go to work to chose a patient for my practical exam. In this ward there happened to be a patient with mental disabilities. This patient required an operaton, and operations are not carried out in mental institutions so lo and behold, there she was, in the ward I have chosen to do my exam.

Throughout the course of the morning I kept hearing this faint "Mew! mew!" around the ward. I kept telling myself, I'm going nuts, I'm hearing things, until I approached this patient's room, where I saw her hungrily attempting to eat a live kitten. She had the orange ball of fluff in her hand and was gnawing at it. All the poor kitten could say was "Mew!"

"Put the kitten in my hand!" I said sternly.
"NO." said the patient, sternly.
"Give me the kitten right now! You don't eat kittens!"
"Its like chicken."
"No its not, it has hair! And its orange! And it meows!"
"Mew!" said the kitten, appropriately.

With reluctance, she put the kitten in my hand. It was no bigger than my 2 hands cupped together, his eyes hardly open. I took him to the treatment room and wiped the spit off him and let him free in the garden where there are other cats always running around.

I have now seen everything.

the exams take there toll

I am tired of studying and I can't wait to enjoy my summer. Thank God, this year i actually get a summer since they changed our shift! We used to have to work mornings throughout June, July, work a shift in August and then we get september off. this time, we get june off aswell as september! woo hoo! and still get paid!

I have 2 exams left, one being critical care, a subject I loathe and the other is the dreaded practical. Practicals make me so nervous...I hope I manage to think of everything...
The practical reminds me a bit of a play. Everything you do is never actually done in real life. Quite ridiculous really. So basically you have to rehearse it beforehand a few times and on the exam date its like opening night with a very critical audience being the examiners.

Oh well...hopefully in another year I can say good-bye to all this.