Birthday Nurse

Every nurse has experiences that they never forget....shoulder dystocias are some of those experiences. Not going to go into detail....but all 7 nurses and the doctor were shaking pretty bad after a very cute and chubby baby destined to be a linebacker came out safe and sound. Scenarios like that are what put lots of things into perspective: ~the high acuity of what I get to do every night ~the great teamwork we have as a unit ~and why home birth is such a bad idea in my book! This mom didn't push very long, nobody would have guessed after a recent sono showed a <7# baby that he'd be a tight fit!! If this mom had tried to deliver at home, the outcome would not have been good.....for her or baby. On a less tense note...I got to deliver a baby for one of my friends from church this week. Those are so fun! Not only do I get to help Mom and Dad welcome their new baby but I get to watch her grow up over the next couple years. It's like a premature ending when I deliver ...

Even though I live in a large metropolitan area, it continues to amaze me how many babies we continue to deliver every month. It's not like we're the only hospital in the city, there are several other hospitals who deliver just about as many babies as we do......and the last few months we've been >350! A week or so ago we had 23 babies in 24hrs...and with only 17 labor rooms that makes for some crazy times! I've been doing lots of thinking over the last several weeks as we're losing some nurses to day shift and have a new traveler with us and just in general about how much the last 2 1/2 years have changed me as a nurse. We were all sitting around talking (one of our rare moments of peace and quite!) about 'seniority' and off all the nurses on our night shift I'm 3rd on the list for seniority. Not by experience by any means, but by employee time at the hospital. And there are several nurses with less experience too. I don't feel like I've be...

July was a record setting month at work...for all times! 361 babies in 31 days...with an 18-bed L&D, no antepartum unit...that's a lot of babies! We had 6 sets of twin, 4 of which happend the last week-and-a-half. I had at least one 3-delivery night (all vag!) plus several 2-delivery nights. We were a busy bunch for sure :) I think all of us nurses are more than happy if we don't break the record again for a VERY long time! It was kinda cool though, I delivered the record-breaking baby one morning(356) and then came back that night and delivered the new record-setting baby (361) that night. How cool is that?! We had a lot of earlier babies too...2 sets of 31wk twins, some 32wk PIH moms...our NICU is full to overflowing! Job security is amazing! I was thinking this week that the begining of August marked my 2-years as a L&D nurse, and my 2-years as a nurse period. I sure feel like I've been doing it longer than that (and am very guilty of telling my patients that I...

I know, 3 weeks is a long time to go without blogging...but 3 weeks is a long time to go without a baby too!! We've all been running our tails off at work the last several weeks, but I've seen no fruits of my labor. I keep getting antes, cervidils or getting a labor patient started and then leaving them blocked, comfy and well on their way in the morning...just to let someone else get the fun of delivering :( Even worse are the nights I've come in and had 3 recoveries to move...that's just the dirty work!! Oh well...I guess it's all a part of the process, so I'll do it anyway. I did get "fired" for the first time by a patient this week. I was more than a little upset and hurt by it...until I found out that there hadn't been a nurse yet that she'd gotten along with...including the "reverend mother" of the unit (the sweetest, most caring, gentle, knowledgeable nurse on the unit). The first words out this woman's mouth were "ho...

So Monday was my birthday, and I wasn't originally supposed to work. But then I switched a shift with another nurse so she could do something with her daughter...so I ended up working. I know nobody likes to work on their birthday, but I thought it was kinda fun! I had put in the request book that I did want a labor patient, because if I was gonna work my birthday, then I didn't want antes or postpartum! The worst part of the deal was that I only got one night off (Sunday night) between my 2 sets of 3 IAR , so that was kind a bummer. But tonight was good! I did get my birthday twin, a nice couple, a good delivery. She delivered right around 2100 and had a little girl! Yay ! It's kinda weird to think that not-all-that-many years ago that was my mom and dad looking at their first baby and not sure exactly what hit them...then here that baby is helping another mom and dad do the same thing! That's pretty cool :) It turned out that we had 3 back-to-back-to-back deliveries ...

It's been a long time since I have wanted NOT to go back to work. Usually I can have a rough night and then move on...but I seriously do NOT want to go back to work tonight. It's been a long first two nights of this set of 3, and I'm just not sure I can do one more. I'm trying to pick out the positives, like I get 8 days off after tonight, and I'm getting to go out of town tomorrow morning after I get off, and I made it though 2 nights I can make it through 1 more...but it's not helping too much! I had a nasty strip tonight, had to run to the ER and catch a baby and then do the recovery of the mom who spoke NO English. I loved my cervidil couple, they were amazing, but their baby just wouldn't cooperate! I'm still working on this "control" thing, and realizing that I can't control what the baby's doing and I can't necessarily "fix" anything, but it doesn't make my pulse any slower when the baby's pulse is! Anyway...

So I have LOVED reading all the comments to my post about the " perfect patient ." So here's my flip side to it...for all of you mom's out there who have labored, or who will labor someday, or any of you dad's/husbands out there who have been with or will be with your wife/significant other when they give birth, what would you describe as your " perfect nurse "? ' Cuz really, that's what I want to be!

115hrs at work in 2 weeks is a few too many I think...but I'm excited to see my paycheck this weekend! 2 full shifts of holiday pay for Christmas night and New Years night, plus all the time-and-a-half pay for extra shifts! Bye-bye school loans...or a least a chunk of them! I wanted deliveries, and I got them! 3 deliveries in 2 shifts is pretty good for a night nurse, let alone me! So I was happy. I went in a hour early for one of the day nurses last night, so I took over a labor and she delivered close to 0100, so moved her out about 0300, did one triage and saw the first day nurse walk in and I clocked out at 0640 and headed home! Thank goodness I have 4 days off now, I think I need them, just to take some breaths and sleep through some nights (ya right) and be ready to go back and not feel like I'm dying. I got to play with my baby from last night that caused me all the problems. He is SO cute! He sure doesn't look big enough to break his mommy's tailbone! I guess he...

6hrs Sunday night, 12 hours Monday night, 12 hours Tuesday night, NO hours Wednesday night, 12 hours Thursday night, 3 hours Friday night after a desperate phone call for help. I am so ready for ONE night off before I go back to work! Really, I love my job, I just feel like I have lived at this hospital this week! I'm kinda getting in a mood for a delivery too. I haven't done a delivery since I caught my baby, and that was the only delivery that I've done off of orientation. I've had ante's ALL week, and just cervidil's before that. I'm starting to worry that I'll forget how to do a vag or a C/S delivery pretty soon! I broke the complete previa girl last night who hadn't bled since several days before Christmas and she bled a little last night. Poor girl, she called me and you could tell she was scared out of her mind. It's wasn't a big gush, but there was definitely blood on the pad. I don't know what they'll do or how long they...

So I was thinking last night after I worked an extra 6hr shift that right after times I think I'm really getting this L&D nursing thing, something else happens that shows me I still have SO much to learn that it scares me all over again! What am I still freaked out about as an L&D nurse? The list seems endless... ~ Decels , no matter what kind, still scare the snot out of me, because it only takes one decel to never come back up again... ~Crash C/S- I seem to get flustered at the littlest things, and at the wrong times anyway. If I can't open a scalp electrode at the right end, how am I gonna rush a patient back for a stat section all in one piece without forgetting something important!? I'm sure it's something that after I do it I won't be so terrified of it, but until that happens... ~A REAL shoulder dystocia - I know how to do suprapubic pressure, but what if that doesn't work? ~ That one time there's no heartbeat...heaven help me if that ever...

***Forwarning...I tend to ramble when I type, so my feelings won't be hurt if you just skim the blog and read the interesting parts. Happy reading!*** To make a long story short...today marked the beginning of the rest of my life...the rest of my life that I've been waiting the last 22 years for. I guess I'm officially still on "orientation" until the end of tomorrow, but today was my first shift on the floor as an official NURSE! Not just a nurse, but a Labor & Delivery nurse...on the same floor of the same hospital where I was born. That's kinda a cool feeling. The nurses that have been there since before I was born don't like it when I mention to them that they could have been my mom's labor nurse, and now I'm coming back to work with them, but they let me hang around anyways :) I just graduated from nursing school this past May, and this has truly been the longest summer of my life. I didn't pass my state boards the first time I took th...