The Dunlap Daily Dish: Nursing School: Level 1

I officially started nursing school in January, and it’s completely taken over life at our home. I started the year with a long checklist of items needing to be completed before school began: orientation, uniform pickup (white scrub top with green bottoms complete with my very own stethoscope!), vaccinations (TB, Hep A/B, Covid, flu, MMR), and a CPR skills course. Nursing school has been exciting, exhausting, scary, and fun all at the same time! I have missed being present at home, but I have loved the additional purpose, challenge that nursing school has brought to my life. I’ve met some incredible people, I’ve stretched way outside of my comfort zone, and I’m excited to see what the future has in store! We’ve been so blessed by friends and family (especially my mom!) who have come together to rally and support us! It’s definitely been a team effort, and Sebastian has played a huge role in taking the kids to school, making more meals, and spending more time with the kids as I’ve been holed up in my bedroom studying most days.

LEVEL 1 (January 22 – April 12)

I lucked out with a very fun cohort. Everyone is really nice to each other and is usually in pretty good spirits. Study groups quickly formed that have stayed pretty consistent through nursing school so far, and I have mixed and mingled with a few different groups but haven’t really found my home just yet. I prefer studying alone, so I’m okay with it, but I have felt like a loner from time to time! I often sat next to Theresa (cool gal who lives with her grandma and one day wants to own an assisted living facility) or Amanda (amazing single mama who drives in every day from Acoma pueblo) and in front of Kristin (former vet tech sweetheart from Cali) and Daniel (teased as the forever engaged and never married guy). Another group I sometimes hung with included Amber (busy, juggling mama of 3), Sam (cool gal who works in an urgent care clinic whose mom is a nurse), Pete (wild and funny Idaho chick), and Lauren (my church buddy/dog walking friend).

My two main didactic teachers, Ms. Robertson and Ms. Cook, are perfectly portrayed by Roald Dahl’s characters Ms. Trunchbull and Ms. Honey from his book Matilda – one extremely awful and the other as sweet as could be. Lab was my favorite class each week though, meeting on both Thursdays and Fridays, where we got to engage in a variety of hands-on activities. We got to know our classmates quickly as we practiced changing each other’s diapers, feeding one another pudding, counting one another’s ribs, brushing each other’s teeth, pricking each other’s fingers, and practicing taking vitals and doing assessments. My lab instructors were all characters (Ms. Montano the bad to the bone ER/flight nurse, Ms. Gonzales the gentle exterior wild interior pediatric nurse, everyone’s favorite cooky grandma Ms. Alongi, and fun yet sassy Ms. Fogg).

I was also enrolled in two online UNM classes – Evidence Based Practice (EBP) with the incredible Ms. Denmark and Wound Care (perhaps I’ve blanked on this teacher’s name on purpose because I hated that class so much!) EBP was a great course – we basically learned how to write a research paper over the course of the term working on little group projects that culminated in a paper on the effects of light therapy on depression in cancer patients. I really enjoyed getting to know the members of my group (Daniel, Brianna, and Kyle) and found that I emerged as a leader.

One fun thing we did in level one was our first simulation with actors who pretended to be our patients. I was partnered with Amanda. We had to assess our patient and teach her how to use a walker.

Halfway through the term, the lab was replaced by clinicals. I was placed at Lovelace UNM Rehab Hospital along with Kristin, Noemi, Gautam, Yamilet, Cynthia, and Nick. Our instructor Ms. Meo was a finger-snapping former high school science teacher turned nurse. I had a variety of patients including a young woman with a spinal fracture from a rollover car accident, a woman diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis that was recovering from a recent fall, a man who had an aortic aneurism repair, a man learning how to use a prosthetic leg after losing his to diabetes, and a woman with lymphedema. We spent most of our time watching the patients in OT and PT. One of our uncomfortable tasks included waking people up to take their vitals – I always felt so bad doing that! Honestly! Let the sick people sleep!!! Some interesting things that happened included transferring a woman with a gunshot wound to the head to a new room because staff thought someone was trying to locate her to “finish off the job.” I also enjoyed meeting a sweet, grateful young drug addict who was hit by a car and somehow ended up with rotten, black fingers and altered memory. I got to use a bladder scanner, wipe my first bum, watch both a male and female catheter insertion, and take some CBGs. We had to write out super long care plans (12-16 pages) each weekend that usually took all night!

Some of the topics we explored in class during level 1 included nursing theory, ethics, vital signs, perfusion, infection, research writing, dosage calculation, medication administration, different types of assessments, mobility, communication, safety, pain management, elimination, lab values, bandaging, gas exchange, and more! It was hard figuring out how to get in/study for all the assigned readings, assignments, case studies, quizzes, and exams! I finished off level 1 with a bang! Straight As in all 5 classes! Woo! 1 down and 5 to go!