For those who have been wondering where I've gone MIA the past couple of weeks, I have started real work and said goodbye to freelancing. I'm now a nurse at the Philippine General Hospital.
I know, things happened pretty fast for me too. I got the call and next thing I know I was back on the bed side again presumably doing what I have been trained for in college. It's overwhelming and tremendously stressful even without the series of unfortunate coincidences I have ran into. Huge adjustments have to be made in a really short span of time and as the Universal Conspiracy would have it, I have been assigned to Ward 1, the Female Medicine Ward, notorious for heavy patient traffic, acuteness, infectiousness and severity of patient cases.
I'm already on my third week, my second at the Ward. Although the first two weeks have been primarily allotted for the General and Ward Orientations, they could only do so much to truly prepare me for what I consider the biggest change in my life so far. The rest, as they say, is up to me.
For what it's like to be in Ward 1, difficult is an understatement and I refuse to use the word "toxic" and the myriad of connotations and socially accepted uses it is associated with in the health care field (don't even get me started on this as I think it deserves another post). Words fail me. What I cannot express with them, I do with tears. Primarily of exhaustion and frustration. Exhaustion with the physical and intellectual demands of the job and frustration with work relationships. I guess what I'm saying is it sucks to be the newbie at work. Especially in a job where superiority and merit is directly proportional solely to length of time spent in the work place. Being at the bottom of the food chain, you are at the mercy of anyone and everyone, and the worst part about it is you simply don't have a choice but to wait until another newbie comes along.
It's really hard to stay positive, but I haven't entirely lost hope. I know things would be better and that there would be brighter prospects for the future as long as I have my goal in mind, but until that happens, I have to wait and hopefully, Better comes sooner than expected.
I know, things happened pretty fast for me too. I got the call and next thing I know I was back on the bed side again presumably doing what I have been trained for in college. It's overwhelming and tremendously stressful even without the series of unfortunate coincidences I have ran into. Huge adjustments have to be made in a really short span of time and as the Universal Conspiracy would have it, I have been assigned to Ward 1, the Female Medicine Ward, notorious for heavy patient traffic, acuteness, infectiousness and severity of patient cases.
I'm already on my third week, my second at the Ward. Although the first two weeks have been primarily allotted for the General and Ward Orientations, they could only do so much to truly prepare me for what I consider the biggest change in my life so far. The rest, as they say, is up to me.
For what it's like to be in Ward 1, difficult is an understatement and I refuse to use the word "toxic" and the myriad of connotations and socially accepted uses it is associated with in the health care field (don't even get me started on this as I think it deserves another post). Words fail me. What I cannot express with them, I do with tears. Primarily of exhaustion and frustration. Exhaustion with the physical and intellectual demands of the job and frustration with work relationships. I guess what I'm saying is it sucks to be the newbie at work. Especially in a job where superiority and merit is directly proportional solely to length of time spent in the work place. Being at the bottom of the food chain, you are at the mercy of anyone and everyone, and the worst part about it is you simply don't have a choice but to wait until another newbie comes along.
It's really hard to stay positive, but I haven't entirely lost hope. I know things would be better and that there would be brighter prospects for the future as long as I have my goal in mind, but until that happens, I have to wait and hopefully, Better comes sooner than expected.
