The Nursing School Diaries: Day #2

It was all about the choices.
Choice A: turn around,go home,whisk my forgotten iBaby off the charger, & speed madly towards the hospital,praying that the traffic gods would be kind to me & that I'd be able to get to the right (yes,top) floor of the deserted parking garage (yes,they particularly hate students,they make us park as far away as humanly possible) & my butt across the grounds to the 5th floor of Obscure Building X before 6:45 am. Forgetting your phone is a crime punishable by death...because you need your phone to look up the 1,001 things you don't know.(thing is...you have to sneak off to the bathroom to do it,because should someone see you & think you are "texting" you are in big,serious trouble) Yes,our instructors encourage us to sneak off to the bathroom to do "questionable" practices. (or,should we need to text/find them...because the unit is so darn huge) Being late also means a Plan for Success..but if your instructor is lax on the "lateness" definition(or,is late herself,which some are) sometimes you just gotta take that risk & turn around,grab your phone,& go back. So forgetting your phone is a definite no-no while being slightly late just might be forgivable.

Such was the position I found myself in, one morning this week. I made it to the hospital by 6:40 & rushed over to the assigned meeting place,making sure I hadn't forgotten my backpack/purse/food/car lockup/permit displayed...& was there before my instructor, so everything was great.It was a busy day,as we acclimated to the computer system/healthcare setting/patient load etc...but by 9:30 I figured it was time to check my bg & grab a bite to eat.

Yep,I'd forgotten my PDM/meter/backup insulin vials/syringes in my car. I was also starving to death,but with no way to check my bg/bolus I didn't dare eat. Figured I needed something though so I ate a banana. There is a fate worse then ketoacidosis, & it's called "Plan for Success"...I didn't dare tell my instructor that my meter was out in my car,lest she write me up for not being prepared. In the meantime, my Dex crept up steadily towards 300 & I tried to just focus on making it to lunch,when I could go out & grab my meter/bolus myself into euro glycemic bliss once more.

12:30 came,I went out & checked..only 267. Felt more like 500,what with ketones slugging away through my circulation but I corrected,bolused for lunch,walked back to the rest of the group, & tanked up on fluids.(my insulin was fried..good thing my infusion pod was perfectly ok or I probably would have been in DKA)
Made it through the day,picked up the baby, spent the evening attempting to get my blood sugars straight & the ketones cleared. It's hard when you can't take care of yourself because no one else is allowed to do "X"...no slack cut unless you are dying.(& in that case, you'd be "relieved" of your clinical duties." I clearly have much to learn..in this crazy juggling (school,diabetes,family)life.

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