Another Year Another Move Another State

We have finally, finally, moved.

Almost a week later than we planned.

After an unexpected trip to the ER for the man.

After much stress.

We are at our new destination.

And now, now, I'm on vacation.

Starting Over

This is our FIFTH across-states move in the eight years we've been married. That's a lot of starting over. And over. And over. It's one thing to move a lot (which we also do) but to move hundreds of miles away is a beast of a different kind. We moved here by airplane, so you can imagine how very little we came with. I mailed my books before we left, but that was about it. We accumulated an apartment's worth of stuff over the last two years and now I am faced with sitting a small fortune's worth of stuff out near a dumpster. This includes a 27inch tv that the pawn shop wont take because all the TVs are being switched to the digital thing in couple months. A tv, a kitchen full of appliances that I actually like, a table and four chairs, a sofa bed, a sofa chair, and everything else a house takes to function like dishes and lamps and electronics... all outside, in the snow, wasted. Some of the items I think we will try to take to a local good will, but we have so little time and so, so much to do I don't know if it's gonna happen. I should make a commitment to make it happen. sigh.

I'm tired of starting over. I want a house, to sit in, to stay in, to live in for the next decade. No more moving. No more cramped studio apartments. No more packing my life into two suitcases and a box. No more buying furniture and then giving it away or selling it for dirt cheap. When we moved in we said we weren't going to get a lot of stuff because we knew this day would come. But still, there's a lot here. Where did it all come from?

Anyway, back to packing.

Sigh.

It's Happening So Fast, Part 3

Our wonderful friends/neighbors came over on Thursday late afternoon and dropped off dinner they cooked for us. I had spent another few hours at the health center getting two of the million things checked off my list that now reaches the entire length of the Brooklyn bridge. It had also snowed like a million inches and I had to walk home... uphill... because the buses had stopped running to my house because I live on top of the hill. Luckily, I ran into a classmate while leaving the health plan who was also about to tackle said hill, so we did it together. I won't say which of us fell, lol. It was cold, and snowy, and my face burned from the little ice pellets flying by. By the time I got home the man had caught a fire under his azz and had actually gotten a lot done in our basement, which of course put me in a better mood. So, right after my last post things turned around a little. And then, yesterday, a friend came and helped the man move the couches down to the dumpster. Those couches (together forming a sectional) were very heavy because they were also a sleeper sofa. They did this while me and my friends (one of whom is the wife of the man who was helping move the sofa) went to eat sushi for in celebration of the end of the semester. And, yes this couple is also the couple who brought us the dinner on Thursday! (all of that to say, they're wonderful and we're going to miss them)

So me and the girls had sushi last night at a beautiful place with bad service but cheap and good sushi. I'm going to miss them and our pow wows. I just kept thinking "this is happening so fast." Not school... that was really, painfully, slow. But now that the semester is over, and my to do list is getting longer and longer and the countdown to when we leave is getting shorter and shorter, it all feels like it's happening very, very fast. I've been getting messages about integration- what to bring, who to meet with when, and tasks that should be completed before I start. This of course adds to the mega to do list (I feel like I should name my to do list something jazzy at this point, lol) but is also exciting because I remember being stressed about whether or not this was even going to happen. My friends talk about how they didn't want the stress of setting up their own site and moving over break and meeting new people in a new setting as their integration experience. I can understand that because this was definitely more stressful than just letting the school stick me in boston or south dakota or something. But the reality is that we all couldn't stay in the area, there were only a few spots here and some of those were taken by people who had been at the same place the whole time they've been here. So I wasn't going to take any chances getting sent off to some unknown place where I still would have had to meet new people in a new office and sub lease my apartment and be away from the man at one of the most stressful (I'm assuming) times of my midwifery education. Um, no thank you. I'll take responsibility for my experiences, even with the added stress that it has definitely caused. This is certainly not the ideal, doing all of this in a short period of time. But being home with family and not having to pay my own way for a while, that's fabulous. The chance of learning my clinical skills alongside a midwife of color- which both of my friends have had the opportunity to do, but I don't know if they really understand how much of a blessing that is, and how much different it is when you never have that as minority student- is going to be fabulous. Not yelling at an interpreter phone all day, fabulous. Being in the city and building connections where I actually want to work, fabulous. I think I need this in order to see myself as a midwife, and when I'm finally there, and can finally breathe and not worry about all that has to be done before I can get there, the stress will no longer matter. Oh and the bonus: not having to move over graduation or while studying for the certification exam. So, yeah I'm stressed, and I've cried about this whole integration madness, and I'm having to pack up fast so that I'm not stuck here for Christmas, but still... I'm leaving and you know? I'm happy. I mean really happy. Happy that I finished this looong leg of midwifery school. Happy that my friends made it through, too. Happy that the man is still here by my side. Happy that I have so many people rooting for me. Happy that my family is coming up for graduation, but really we could all just as easily go on a cruise with all the money it will take :o)

We also talked about graduation plans, but that's like a whole 'nother post.

The Bliss Before the Breakdown

First, I'm done. I actually finished the semester. I don't know how successfully, but finished nonetheless. There was a moment during the exam, at the second to last page, where I didn't know the answer to one single question. 10 questions. All on one page. I just laughed. And laughed. And laughed, sometimes even out loud, but I don't think every one is in their own mental hell and didn't really pay attention or care. I just had this feeling of... bliss. Like, you know? There aint nuthin I can do about the fact that I forget to study hepatitis in pregnancy. I mean I didn't study one ounce of it. The questions were over hep B and C, comparisons of which is more dangerous, ect, whether you get hep c from contaminated water (yes) etc. I knew none of those answers. The other questions on the page were about asthma. ugh. and bronchitis. random. So, I laughed as I looked at that page full of guesses.

And then I turned the page.

Last night I drank something that tasted like a cross between champagne and white wine... it was a German Riesling and it was great. Over the semesters I have developed a tradition for how I handle the night before a big exam. I study all day, then, I stop at a decent hour, somewhere between 9 and 11. Then I usually take a shower and get something ready to wear for the next day. Then I have a drink. A good one. More than one. And I relaaaaaaaaaaax. Then the next morning I look at my one most important sheet... it's titled "I will not go into this exam not knowing:" And has the things that I feel are most important or that I've been running from/skipping over while studying. It also includes lab values, etc that I feel are basic and should be able to answer off the top of my head. I only allow myself one page, and no tricks like writing really tiny. It give me something to say "ok, if I don't know anything else, I know this." This whole ritual has really helped me keep myself in check in that time the night before and the morning before an exam. Of course not much on my list was actually on the exam this time, lol, but I still felt really calm going into it.

Then I got home... and hit a low.

Isn't it weird how one thing in your life can be going so well... or least be done... big cheesy grin here... but the rest be a big mess? Home is a mess. Everything about it.

We have a million things to do before we roll out of here on Tuesday.

And I feel like I don't have any help to do them.

Let me go back a few months. We had this grand plan. The man would stop working on an agreed upon date, and then collect unemployment and pack us up so that when the time came we wouldn't be stressed. There were also some career-related things he wanted to work on while he was off. Well, unemployment never came. Long story short, in this crazy state that we hate, you aren't owed unemployment simply by virtue of working for a few years. You have to seriously be granted it, like by a trial and hearing. After many weeks of BS, a fake azz "trial" wherein he was denied but told to reapply (no kidding) he was not granted any unemployment. So, ok, whatever. I still work, per usual, and we can live off of what I make. BUT this also means that for anything that is not a budgeted item, we are using savings. Ugh. Ok whatever, that's the way it turned out. That's ok. What's not ok is that we're leaving in a matter of days and my house isn't packed. What's not cool is that there was a very short list of things we decided he would be responsible for... over the last three months... and none of those things got done. (If this were his blog, he would say "yet") So I've been standing back because I hate that 'mama' role thing that happens between us when I keep trying to ask about the progress of things, it's like asking "is your homework done" everyday. I also don't like when women ask their partners to do something and then proceed to do it themselves because they don't like how the other person's doing it, so I tried not to do that either. My point is I was very purposefully standing back to let him do it his way, on his time. But, some of the things were time sensitive.

For example, our car broke down like a month ago. This became one of the things on his list of stuff to take care of. I wiped my hands of it because we decided he, who was home all day and not packing, nor working on his own projects, could handle it. Well, he didn't. I started to nag. I said do something. Get it fixed, or get it towed, or donate it to charity (it's not worth anything) just do something. I don't want the city to tow it. I don't want a ticket on it. I don't want to end up paying some stupid fee for something that can be totally avoided right before Christmas... right before we move. What does he do? Nothing. I am running around like a chicken with my head cut off trying to pass my full time school load, my call shifts, and my clinic days, and do my job, and the other random house stuff that is my responsibility- like making sure all the bills get paid to who they're supposed to, and can not/will not deal with this car. Packing and the car = the man's job. Do you see where this is going? Yeah.

So, about two weeks ago, apparently, someone hit our broke down, parked on a residential street, car so bad that they totaled it... smashing the trunk into the midsection of the car. How did I find this out?

Well, on Monday night I opened my mailbox and had a letter from the state. Before I could read past "state vs..." I panicked and thought, "how can I be sued when I'm still a student?" and was all freaked out... until I read the rest and saw that it was state vs some other girl. Phew. So I call the investigator at the bottom of the page. He tells me this woman has hit my car and do I want to add my damages to the other damages in the case. I say, I dont know, let me talk the man and get back to you. I now start yelling about the situation cause I am pissed because I have been asking him to handle this for weeks. The next day he goes to where the car is and, of course, there's no car because the city police have towed it. He is clueless as to what to do next. And this brings me to an ultimate frustration of mine. Why in the hell can't you figure anything out?!?!? So I'm thinking, ok... he's not going to figure it out how to process through these kinds of things unless you leave it up to him to figure it out.

But he didn't take any initiative to figure things out.

So as moving day nears, I'm getting even more frustrated, and of course am looking at the days ahead, and them impending 4-8 inches of snow forecasted for tomorrow and am thinking, I gotta do this myself. He isn't going to do it. And that's when I break down. Right here in the house.

I think of all the shit I have to put up with on a daily basis. And I'm angry that there were two tasks that he had to do and he did not one of them. I have to call multiple police stations because there are a million little cities in this little azz area and I have to find exactly which one towed the car. I have to figure out how to go about paying for all the days that have accumulated from the car sitting there for soooo long as he sat here on his azz. I'm left trying to add these tasks: go to the police station to get the police report to see if this woman had any insurance, call said insurance company if it exists to file a claim, if not, get some money to pay the tow and storage fees, then go find this place and the car (this is after I've called the guy to set up some kind of deal to sign over the car to him so I can get the plates back), return the plates to the DMV- required in this dumb azz state when you cancel your car insurance policy to prove that you aren't driving an unregistered car and to prove to the tax folks that you don't owe them any money because here you must also pay property taxes on your car! I'm adding these things to a list that is already incredibly long and filled with things like: get that second physical, follow up appointment for shingles that cursed me a few weeks ago, stop by student health and get this SECOND PPD read because when I took the time to go get my immunization record yesterday they realized they had LOST the results of the one I had done in August, so "come back on Friday for an accurate set of records," a three hour meeting with my thesis advisor, a meeting with my academic advisor to check out for the semester, pick up a rental car, and on and on and on. And while you're at it, do it all on public transportation. And pack up the house cause not ONE box is really packed. And do it all in, oh, 5 days or so. And while you're at it:

"Can you make me some pancakes?"
"Are you serious?"
"Is that a no?"

Here's the thing. I'm tired. And he's sleeping... all day... most days. I know he's depressed. I know it sucks to be him, according to him, I get that. I understand how he got to this place. I watched it. I know his history. I know how far he's come. But today, right now, I don't give a shit. I'm tired.

I'm tired.

I'm tired.

And I need help. And I'm disappointed that someone who loves me is watching me, or snoring through, me work my azz off and it doesn't at all compel him to get up off his own azz. I'm teary, but they won't come. I think it will come after the move. I think it won't come because I know I have a lot to do between now and Tuesday. I am not at all confused about the fact that it will all work out. Afterall, I know me. I know I will do what needs to be done. But I'm not supposed to have to do it by myself. I swore I wasn't going to do it by myself. But what else am I going to do? There is not time to

Breakdown

Breakdown

Breakdown.

The Liver is NOT on the Left

Yeah. I've reached a new low. While trying to understand the right upper quadrant pain that is associated with HELLP syndrome, I just could not figure out why this pain would be on the right... is it referred pain? No. Of course not. FYI: your liver is on the right side of your body. Now, of course I knew this at some point. But right now my brain is mussssssssssssh.

To top it off I had a so-called annual this morning with a CNM who did nothing but give me a pap and refer me to a physician for the rest. She refused to give me documentation for a physical (understood, because she didn't give me a physical!) but neither did she listen to my heart, my lungs, or feel my thyroid- all of which I have been taught for the last 2.5 years is part of an annual well woman exam??? Ummm. ok. She then preceeds to ask me who is seeing me for primary care. A midwife!! Hello!! It's in my chart that XYZ, CNM is my "primary care provider," yes she does my routine health management, she does all my screenings, she does all my exams, including the GYN stuff.

Now. If I had known that YOU weren't going to give me a full exam, I would have NEVER made an appointment with you in the first place. I would have begged to put into a slot with my midwife. And I do not think it's fair that you will be billing for a well woman check up when all you did was a pap and half hearted breast exam. But I digress.

Where does this leave me? Having to go to the doctor's office yet AGAIN next week to get the annual exam I was expecting to get today. And I have to wait until 2:20 in the afternoon to get it... I was hoping to leave in the wee hours of the morning on Tuesday so that I didn't have to drive 6 hours in the dark for this move. Ugh.

Off to a Good Start

I woke up at exactly 8am without an alarm clock. Isn't it funny how you can mentally tell yourself what time you want to get up and have that happen? I am such a better person in the morning when I get to wake up naturally. This is my last study day, and I'm determined to make it a good one. I cooked a bit pot of ziti last night, got some coffee and tea ready, printed everything I need to study today, and I woke up happy. Within the next 15 minutes I will be fully dressed and walking out the door to the library.

I think I'm off to a good start.

This Is It

The final exam is in about 24 hours. Nothing is sticking and I am of course freaking out. I got a call from my lil sib today who was of course freaking out, and I was so calm and so sure of her impending success, but I can't seem to find the same place of peace for myself. I know I don't know a lot, and it's bugging me. I feel like a fraud. I look at a lab panel and try to pick out the abnormal values and I can't always do it. I ask myself what goes into calculating a BPP and what number am I looking for? And I draw a serious blank. I mean a real... blank. I'm sitting reading the details of multiple gestation and getting irritated at how much I'm supposed to know about stuff midwives barely touch, and how very little I know about "normal." I'm trying to remember the labs I order to diagnose HELLP, and right when I think I know, I ask myself ok, now when the labs come back how will you know if they're normal or not? Yep, back to picking out abnormal lab values.

I don't know what the hell I'm doing.

And no matter how many times I tell people that, they reassure me that I know exactly what I'm supposed to at this point.

I don't buy it.

Maybe I'll learn it at integration when I'm learning it all through real life scenarios, in real time, almost full time for 3 months straight?

It's Happening So Fast, Part 2

We're moving.

A week from tomorrow, to be exact. I can't believe it. The man is packing up the apartment while I study for finals and write my final papers. We're moving home, and couldn't be more thrilled. It was very, very shaky for a minute- turned out that we all of a sudden didn't have everything needed for me to go to integration in January, but just last week it all came together (thank you universe) and I here we are... getting ready to move. This has been such a grueling experience. We've been lonely, away from our families. We've been stressed, dealing with the privilege we've encountered and become a part of. Yes, we've adapted to, and recognize our participation in the privileges that come with being in an ivy league environment. The resources are incredible. I will miss that about this experience. I will miss the buildings, their mahogany and marble and stone beauty and solidness. I will miss the opportunities to go to talks, presentations, receptions and luncheons about a very wide variety of topics. I will miss access to a massive network of information- miss clicking on links that automatically take me to articles instead of pages requesting payments for the right to view. I will miss the 24hour access to a quiet place to study and the door to door transportation that takes me there. I will miss being able to check out books for months at a time... more books than will ever be available at a public library. Yes, I'm going to miss this place. Honestly, what I just described is one of the reasons that I'd love to work at an institution like this. But surprisingly... I've put my PhD aspirations on hold for a minute...

I had wanted a PhD in nursing, but lately I feel like I want it in anything but nursing. I still haven't fell in love with the profession, and I don't think I ever will. After fighting for respect as a midwife (which is a given and something one pretty much expects and accepts as part of joining the profession) I do not want to do the same in nursing. It's too much. While I appreciate the idea that multiple paths/entries into nursing and midwifery allows a larger cross section of women access to the profession, I do not like how much that negatively impacts the way other people and profession view us. I also don't want to spend my entire life in a position or profession where I am & for always will be a "midlevel" citizen. I already feel that... that... smallness... in other areas of my life. It's odd... I thought it'd be different because these are woman-dominated professions. I thought I'd feel more empowered by belonging to them. I thought I'd find the challenges of working within these communities negated by a sense of sisterhood. But that hasn't happened. I find myself wanting to study something different, but similar. Something like public health, or reproductive biology, or health sociology- with a focus on women for all of them. I don't really know.

All I know is that because I am unsure, I can not simply go straight into a nursing PhD program. All I keep thinking is... yes there's a shortage of nursing faculty, yes that shortage is only going to get more and more drastic... but at the same time, we know why there's a shortage, and we aren't that close to solving it... the salaries are not going to reach those of other postgraduate educated professions, despite the fact that we're still paying the same tuition as everyone else... as long as it is a field dominated by women, and women are undervalued in society, the pay is going to continue to be measly... and I deserve better. I've worked too hard. Sacrificed too much. Have waaaaay too much debt. Am simply... unwilling... to give my entire life to a profession that can not give me what I need. But, what I can do, and am planning to do, is define what kind of midwife I want to be with careful thought and investigation about combining midwifery and something else to make the perfect career for myself.

I must put in the effort to create a career that is personalized, fulfilling, and sustaining.

It's Happening So Fast, Part 1

Well.

I had my last class of midwifery school. Ever.

It's surreal. My final is this week, and it's going to be hard, as it should be. But I'm done with classes... like, there are no more... like, I never have to sit through a midwifery class again. Meaning I've almost, actually, done this thing that I set out to do. True, I have all of integration to go... a lot can happen in 3 months (integration is from mid January to mid April) and I have the comprehensive exit exam at the end of it, but that's its own challenge. And of course I have to finish my thesis. But the challenge of sitting through classes every week, both midwifery and nursing classes, is over.

I've been here for two and a half years. I've sat through a few interesting lectures and discussions, and that's much appreciated. I've had people say one small thing that sends my mind into overdrive, excited about going home and reading up on it, intrigued. I've witnessed some very strong midwives juggle research, clinical practice, family commitments, and call shifts all at the same time. I am so grateful to have witnessed this juggle up close so that I can make a better decision about where I want to go from here. I have met talented, bright people who I would not have ever known, and even if we don't keep in touch, I am glad to have met them. I have studied at tables in rooms of buildings where I was never supposed to step foot- with other students who get what that means. I've met the people who conduct the research I respect... people who I would have never met if I had not left home. I've seen artwork other people read about in books. I've been taught by women who are historically respected in this profession- even if I choose to think a little more critically about who they are what they've done. I've had more opportunities than I ever thought I'd have access to. I've been inspired to write about my own life, and the other brown faces that have contributed so much to this profession without much recognition. I LEARNED A LOT ABOUT MYSELF THAT I COULD NOT HAVE LEARNED IN ANY OTHER SETTING.

But I've spent the last 2.5 years in windowless classrooms, sometimes bored out of my mind. I've had a lot people say some of the most racist, non-checked bullshit I've ever heard in a classroom, which left me angry, distracted, and near tears. I won't miss that. I won't miss those disparity statistics being presented without context, that left me feeling less than on so many days in class. I won't miss the blatant disrespect people have for poor people that they don't think twice about sharing because they have no idea that the people they speak of are sitting right there in the room with them. No, I won't miss that at all. I will not miss the assault on my sense of self-worth... the feeling of impending loss of sanity... the acute sense of being distinctly outside of community. No, I'm not going to miss that at all.

Several people said that they got a little sad when they realized we were all together (whole nursing class of nearly 100) for the last time in our last class of the day. I didn't feel that. I felt intense joy. Giddiness. My friend emailed me in class and said she couldn't believe it was almost over! I emailed back "OMG OMG OMG!!!!!" and that's exactly how I felt. So. friggin. excited. So happy that I did not, ever, have to sit through another nursing class. I felt like I could breathe again. After that we had a reception at school. A classmate made some smart ass comment about what was available to me to eat per her usual entitled, judgmental self. Then I let everything I had been wanting to say to her about her comments in the classroom indirectly directed at me and her blatant disrespect come tumbling right on out. Since the moment she looked me in my face and verified that she didn't care whether I graduated with the class or not, I've kept myself a safe distance from her. Everyone had been tiptoeing around this girl, upset at her disregard for the rest of the people in our class- talking over people, answering questions posed to the teacher, and more. Well, I knew it would happen; I knew I was going to blow soon but I never thought I could be so civil... musta been the champagne- I was in a happy mood, lol. So, I drank good stuff, ate lots of chocolate, said what I had needed to say for so long, and enjoyed every minute of it.

Now I'm working on a final paper for a nursing class.

...

I'm exhausted.

On Writing a Thesis, Part 3

Yesterday I spent all day working on chapter 2 (methods) of my thesis, and I still have one more section (data analysis methods) to finish the chapter.

Today I work up to the sound of a metal shovel on concrete outside my window- too early in the morning- got up, looked out and saw snow. I crawled back into bed and haven't moved since. The first complete draft of my thesis is due tomorrow.

I still have the literature review section + results, and discussion to write (or as much of them as I can, considering I'm not really done collecting data yet) by midnight tomorrow. I have a good argument for why the results and discussion won't be done... but there will be no excuse for the literature review, so I guess I can start on that first thing in the AM if I can't pull myself out of bed tonight... this is so sad, and I know it.

But I'm writing this post because it's part of the process. I'm starting to dread writing. It wasn't always like this. I feel like my thesis is crap (the writing- not the data... interviewing midwifery students has been the best part of my semester) and like when it's over I'll want to bury this thing under a rock somewhere far, far away.

I heard it would be like this. I'm glad that I had fair warning. But there really isn't anyway to prepare for the frustration.

In other news, I caught two babies in the last 6 days, and will putting up HIPPA-compliant birth stories soon.

I really appreciate the comments you guys leave! Since I haven't managed to put newer folks in my sidebar, everyone please pay Giyen at baconismyenemy a visit- I am a dedicated reader of hers now.

On Writing a Thesis in Midwifery School, part 2

I've been away cause I haven't much to say. It seems like all my thoughts lately are about how tired of school I am and about how much I have to do and I fear those are very boring things to hear to most folks. But then I remember the purpose of this blog is to tell the truth of midwifery school, so I really should write more...

Today, and tomorrow... and the next day, and the next... and the next... I will be working on my thesis. Specifically, working on finishing a complete draft, which is due by Monday. I have exactly one chapter... and three or four (depending) to go. I hate school right now. Today so far I have typed out a transcript of an interview (like 10 pages single spaced) which is a kind of torture I don't wish on anyone who isn't getting paid a handsome sum, and tried desperately to finish the methods section (chapter 2) which is close to being done, but isn't there yet. I keep staring at the pages like they're going to write themselves. Wishing they would write themselves. If I had this to do over again, I think I would do a survey monkey and call it a day... but then again, the live interviewing was the best thing ever. I still have a couple interviews to do... so my analysis section is going to be the roughest of all as I haven't collected all the data yet.

I spent the first several hours in a beautiful library, but now I'm in the grad school cafe... but it's getting noisy so I'm considering a move to a library... but I'm hungry because although I've had like 6 cups of coffee and a croissant and a muffin and a nutragrain bar, I haven't had any food. I think I may have to go home and regroup. But I know that if I do, I won't get anything else done tonight... not that I'm getting anything done write now...

UGH.

I hate school right now.

Yesterday I caught a baby girl... oh crap I need to turn in an eval for that birth... sigh.

I need to find time to study for my advanced midwifery final... and do a case analysis that's worth 50% of my grade... and a take home professional midwifery exam that looks like it will be at least 10 pages before it's over... and create a portfolio for the same class...

slooooooow dowwwwwwwwwn minority midwifery student

one thing at a time...

THESIS.

Oh yeah, that's it.

That's what's due first.

How many hours left? Oh about 500 hours of writing but only 125 or so to do it in.... and 8 of those will be spent in class tomorrow.

What was I thinking when I signed up for this?