By the end of this attachment I want my ass wiping/diaper changing skills to be so good that patients will sigh - oohhh - when I change for them.
Hahaha.

I am so much less scared of feces nowadays..

Today is my first day of work at the hospital and the most significant event that happened was my diaper changing experience.
This patient was in the high fall risk category - which meant that she was not allowed to move around independently and she has to stay in bed restrained by the cot sides, "just like a baby" in her words.

She felt fit enough to walk, and asked me to bring her to the toilet to shit.
When I asked the EN if we could bring her to the toilet together, the EN gave some excuses that I cannot recall, something along the lines that she wasn't sure if we were allowed to do that as the patient was high fall risk, and that since the patients' diapers were dirty already, we might as well let her shit in it.

I tried to ask the nurse to bring the patient to the toilet la.
Because I saw her being pushed to the toilet to pee a while ago by another nurse.. surely it means that it is not disallowed right?
The poor patient kept on blabbering on to me in Hokkien which I translated to the malay nurse who didn't seem to understand the situation, or was pretending not to because it was time consuming to have to bring the patient to the toilet and back.

I know I shouldn't accuse the nurse..
but I felt so baddddd that this poor old lady had to shit in the bed.

She said that she didn't want to do it in the diapers because it would stink..
Just imagine yourself shitting on your bed, regardless whether you're wearing diapers or not, it wouldn't feel good.

I remember the horrible experience when I myself stayed in NUH earlier this year for my leg operation.
If you are aware, patients have to wear this Operating theater gown that is actually one big piece of cloth that doesn't cover your ass.

I had my operation at around 1am if I remember correctly.
Before the procedure the nurse asked me to strip everything [gosh..it was only a leg injury hello.] and wear only the gown and paper underwear.
In my half-asleep state I walked alone to the toilet with the back of the gown flapping - yes, everybody can see everything even though I tried to hold the front, sides and back in place.
I was so mad la.. even though it was in the middle of the night and most of the patients were probably sleeping I still have my modesty lor.
Some more I stayed in C class ward which meant that there were male cubicles all around.. to enjoy the free show :'(

After the operation I woke up to realize that I was still wearing ONLY the skimpy piece of gown and to my horror the ward was already bustling with life - young lives to be more accurate.. the ward was filled with nursing students ready to start work.
I can't describe how embarrassing it feels to be lying there exposed and helpless with students near my age.

The worst part was that I wasn't allowed to leave the bed to pee.
What The Hell?!
I was feeling fine, extremely fine, never so fine before!
But the nurse insisted that I peed in bed, no matter how much I whined and pleaded she wouldn't let me leave the bed.
She passed me this thing called bed pan for me to pee on the bed.
:'(

She was the best, standing beside me and staring..
My bladder had to say, "err.. can excuse me?" before she left me alone.

When I grudgingly peed I was constantly worried that a gust of wind would blow the curtain and .. i think i will kill myself.

What I want to say is that I understand how the patient feels about excreting in such an uncomfortable awkward manner.
So I reassured her that we would chiong in immediately to change her diapers, there will be no smell! and I will hold the curtains tightly nobody will see you.

Dignity.. don't take it for granted.

Labels: attachment

♥Bid Farewell

I remember the morbid atmosphere that lingered in the air when I was attached to the geriatric wards last holiday.
I am sure that I will not enjoy myself working in this field because I don't think I can handle old sickly people that well.
The elderly should be enjoying their lives with their blissful families and little grandchildren after having slogged most of their lives away.
Instead, they are struggling with every breath..

**

When I grow old, I will spend my time nua-ing blatantly in the living room watching TV, blasting it to the full volume (because my hearing will deteriorate), and when my bespectacled grandchildren buried in books laptops ask me to turn down the volume, I will say,
"HUH SAY THAT AGAIN I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

And when they speak with a louder decibel, I will snort,
"MUST YOU SHOUT? I AM NOT DEAF. WHAT A RUDE CHILD."

Then I will complain to their mother that their children are being rude to me in a pitiful manner.

I will be the irritating parent who keeps pressuring my children to have more kids for me to play with.



What is there not to like about kids?
Children are soooo cute, especially those at age < 8 ( when they start mutating into vulgarity spewing, porn-watching pests) .

Little Toddlers are always amusing to look at.
They strut around with an air of grandiose in their onesies and heavy diapers.
They usually walk at such fast speeds that their caregivers have to run in order to catch up.
Their caregivers end up looking like fools running after their little bosses and exasperatedly shouting "don't run, don't run!" or "come back! where are you going?".

Yeah right, the little fellow knows where he is going - to look at babes at the other side of the room, duh, you lowly minion.


The baby bellows, "OBEY ME! or I'll cry. Now, we don't want that, do we?"

The onsie I mentioned above is this

If you think I'm handsome, you should see my dad.

The second onesie says
Miss Muffet's got a spider after her, some chick lost her sheep and it probably got eaten, Humpty's head got cracked open, a big mean wolf wants to eat the pigs, and now you want me to SLEEP?

its cute isn't it?

The moral of this post is: Live a long life to enjoy family happiness.
What you can start doing now, is to eat healthily, exercise and QUIT SMOKING to sustain good health.

If I fail to influence my dad to quit or at least smoke lesser, I have failed as a nurse and a daughter.

Labels: Family

♥Bid Farewell

I'm kind of dreading work tmr and the rest of the week as I feel so unproductive.
I am learning things by observation, definitely, but my skills are not up to par yet for practice.
So I just stand around.

Standing around which means slacking means trying not to fall asleep when the nurses are doing documentation and it is entirely inappropriate for me to look over their shoulders,
and when I have to shift myself here and there so that the brisk walking nurses will not collide into me due to the large volume.

Even though work is quite slack in the polyclinic, I look forward to learning new things there.
Did you know that polyclinics provide services other than giving students MCs when they are too sick to attend school or go to PE lessons?
There are health counselling, antenatal and postnatal counselling, chronic diseases management and such services.!
So exciting right..

I hope to be able to teach a patient how to use the inhaler for asthma tmr.
"Shake the inhaler well first, then press it and suck at the same time."


Today I witnessed an old lady try to use it and she couldn't coordinate the pressing and the sucking after 3-4 tries.
I think she was tired or what la..
The nurse coaching her assertively asked the old lady to stand at the corner, face the wall and wake up her idea.
That will make her more focussed.
The above paragraph is fiction.

Nurses are kind hearted people who won't do mean things like that..
But kind hearted does not necessarily mean gentle though, yesterday I saw how the nurse clean the wound in a rough manner which I think was uncalled for.
Maybe she was rushing for time or that is the way she always did it, but the patient was obviously in pain, wincing like that.

I will remind myself that I will be a gentle nurse.

I know how impossible that seems, judging from how much of a violent maniac I sound like in this blog.
I am not okay.. I just kick babies occasionally.
The best part is, I am going to work in KK after I graduate!
Whahahahahahahaha. *Maniac pervert laughter*

Ok enough.

♥Bid Farewell

Ever since I fractured my leg and lost the freedom to walk without crutches I've started counting my blessings every day.
There is not one morning where I don't wake up and thank my good fortune that I am still breathing.
Haha I know this sounds a bit exaggerated but after becoming a nurse and learning about illnesses and diseases I am able to appreciate health a lot more.

I consider myself lucky that I have a loving family that comes with 2 loving sisters.

Even though they help me grow fat because we love eating.
I just discovered my love for sashimi today.
I never knew that bright orange striped raw food can taste so good.
Anyway. Now I know.
*wipes my saliva

I'm also thankful for having so many loving, generous and fun friends around me who never fail make my day.



Alicia, gerry and I.


Even better when they get along with my family.

and friends who slip love letters under the door with me carrying green stools.



How can we miss alicia? Who do I act crazy with if she's not there?

From here on the photos will have no link to whatsoever because I want to sleep soon.







Please infer from the above 3 photos somehow that I feel like clubbing.
And can the radio and the shopping malls stop playing clubbing music I can't stand it anymore.


Huishan the nicest roommate.
She returned the key of the room one day earlier than me and when she was about to leave so much emotions rushed into me.
We hugged and I told her that she had been a very good roommate.
She said the same thing to me..
I couldn't help tearing up, being the emo elmo person.
If only there wasn't such a thing as growing up, such a concept as time, such a part of life called moving on.

Anyway, back to happy stuff:


Here are my soldier friends.




Loke Caleb and I.

Both of them are so funny that you should be friends with them if u think your ass is big.
You can laugh your ass off.

There was one night Caleb and I and a few other friends went to this supper place to eat roti prata.
With the leftover curry sauce and curry leaf he made a french cuisine.
Get the idea?



I thought it was cute.



Lets go back to count my blessings.

I'm glad I have eyeballs to make different facial expressions.



There is something dirty at the top left hand corner of your computer screen.
Really.
Look.



I count my blessings for having toes.



Or I can't wear slippers.

And fingers..


Without fingers, I can't bowl with friends.


Or pull the trigger.




Or shoot Loke.

I won't be able to play drums too.



I mean, pretend to play drums.


That's loke for you.


I am grateful for everything.

♥Bid Farewell

Packing is a bitch.
I've known that long ago, thank goodness.
Heng that I started moving some irrelevant things home before the exams started so now I only have 250 boxes left to pack.
Phew.

Since my suitcase is packed to the brim already I think the only way out is to wear as much clothing on my body as possible when I go home.

♥Bid Farewell

There are so many suitcases along the corridors and I see so much rubbish dumped beside the dustbin which can no longer take the crap from hostelites.
Even Hui Shan's side of the room is empty already it makes me very upset to see the semester coming to a close so soon.
:(

But I am very glad that I can safely say that this had been a very satisfying and fulfilling one.
I think.. this might just be the best year of my life.

*Tudou.com - the site where you can watch your dramas online - should stop taking my accidental clicks so seriously to redirect my page elsewhere or refresh the page.
Sai you know one episode take how long to load or not?
Some more now that exams are over, the most meaningful thing to do is to try breaking our personal records of not moving for the longest period of time watching HK or Taiwan drama..
which means that the web traffic is heavier and it takes longer than ever to load.
Maybe I should start using a mouse instead of the sensor pad on my laptop. *

*warning- this post will be totally boring for people who don't know my hall friends, so wait for the next post coming up!*

I have to thank a few people for making hall life enjoyable because without your friends no matter what exciting events there are there would be nobody to enjoy it with.

I'm thankful that I got to know this one person called Kevin during my orientation.
He is the most irritating and annoying person you'll ever meet.

He is my best friend.
I am aware that sounds through and through gay but I don't know how else to describe him.
He is not always around when I need him but he definitely tries.
He will not help me do whatever shit I need him to but he thinks of solutions for me all the time.
Even though he's dead tired he will turn up for any chapalang thing I organize.
When I am feeling down I just need to walk to his room and he will give me his perspectives from an adult point of view and it helps me think.

And the best part is that he has done his part as a best friend by investing in me so much trust.
I admit there are times when I want to slam him with my bag, times as in mutiple times a day, but well he trains my patience.. so i guess thats a good thing.
I think he is the best thing that happened to me this semester.

At this point in this post Kevin should be convulsing with ecstasy from my praises - or he is planning to call me to scold me about commenting that he is annoying.
Do that and I will tell the whole world that your burps are smelly.

And then I have my clique of Gerry, Yuting, Alicia and Shimin - the TH chiobu nurses - who are always there for me and helped me so much when i was a handicap.
I will not forget the times when we eat dinner together during formal dinner and talked nonsense together, the times when we stayed up all night to make vday cards for random people, the times when we checked each other's pulses and BP before our assessments, the times when we counted grass together, the times when we stayed up the whole night together to write freaking reports,

the times when Shimin and Gerry stayed up all night long gazing into each other's eyes instead of studying during examination period.
Don't think I am oblivious hor.

In alphabetical order:
1. Alicia - is the nicest person you will ever know. So nice that you can flick her nose, cut her hair or pour water on her MAC and she will forgive you. hehe but if you do it fast enough and speak really quickly "gerrydiditnotme" she won't know what's happening and you can get away scot free.
I remember there was this period of time which I couldn't stop talking nonsense, everybody was irritated at me already just willing me to shut up and rolling their eyes at me but I chose not to stop.
As a result nobody wanted to sit near me except Alicia who accepted my nonsense and still acted like she was okay with me even though she was fantasizing that I would stuff grass in my mouth and stop talking.
I appreciate it.

2. Gerry - saved my life countless times. The most significant time was when my internet connection was screwed up one day before we had to hand in our report and I couldn't get my sources of articles -> cannot write my essay -> sure die.
I was feeling panicky because I thought nobody would help me since they were all busy doing the essay as well..
Until Gerry offered to help me retrieve the articles.
Lifesaver. I will never forget this okay.. never ever!
She just clocked 100 points for that alone.
When I was injured for the span of 4 months everybody just got used to me using the crutches and moving around as though it was normal - as if I didn't have difficulties at all.
Except Gerry who offered to walk slowly with me and didn't act like she was rushing for time.
She always thought about my difficulties beforehand and did it for me in an adequate manner - not offering to help too much, nor too little.
I call that the magic touch.
(Well except when she chiongs for the bus and as a result the bus waits while I crutch-sprint all 400meters. Just thinking of that makes me feel tired.)

3. Shimin - to be honest i am not so close with Shimin.. I felt warmth from her during the start of this semester all of a sudden and it feels goood. Many a times she asked me for my opinion to show consideration to the baika and I do appreciate it.
I also appreciate her input VERY much in indecisive meetings and discussions which didn't go anywhere.
I think Shimin is a clever girl who can think properly and verbalize the pros and cons in a fair manner and also, many times i feel that her thinking is aligned with mine.
I hope to know this pair of skinny legs girl better.
*chills down my spine - imagine the number of hours the meetings would be if it wasn't for her*

4. Yuting! This girl can sing! She is the one to get high with and celebrate after examinations because she is on to play. Hee I like Yuting when she is happy and enthu and bubbly because she just grooves when she is talking and improves the atmosphere.
People think she is the ringleader because of her stern look but she is not serious at all when she is in a good mood.
Oei KBox together on Sunday hor.

Sai I am tired from typing so much.

Huishan my roomie is the best roomie ever.
Another important person is jeslyn but I think I'll leave to next semester because we'll be staying together then! Whee~
There is pamela who comes over once in a while to talk with me..
There is johnson who eats dinner and supper with me once in a while..
There is Winjean and yiling who joins the TH chiobu nurses on various occasions and add to the fun..

There is Caleb, who is the funniest, funnest person I know.
He makes my TH days more enjoyable.
And also Loke, who is always not around, but when he is around, the fun is multiplied 200 times.

There are many other people as well who contributed to this good stay but I'm too tired to type more. so bye.

♥Bid Farewell