Welcome to Back to School: ICU Edition. School doesn’t start until after Labor Day here in the Garden State, so it’s still summer thank you very much. This means the Trauma ICU is still busy as all hell, which is par for the old summertime course. The Nurse is now preparing to become your teacher and this is hot right? I love Van Halen, all Hot for Teacher vibes over here. I’m feeling a little hot, but mostly well and am typically unbothered by all that’s happening outside of myself.
No don’t worry, I don’t think I’m Clara Barton the school teacher turned nurse and angel of the American Civil War battlefield, reincarnated in the flesh.
If anything I’m Florence Fucking Nightingale. I’ve spent a significant portion of my life, lighting the night of an army of broken and wounded (preferably bearded) soldiers. Oh you bet your ass I did all this healing with the light of my very own magical lamp.
Professional nursing is a lifelong learning endeavor and this is one of my favorite parts of the job. Although I don’t learn new nursing lessons as often anymore, I still manage to get taken back to school upon occasion, usually by a 100-year old patient who looks like a cross between the Crypt Keeper and the cat from Pet Cemetery.
There’s no place like home and I always got the most schooled in the city hospitals with the high level Trauma Centers, which are more affectionately known as The Knife and Gun Clubs of [fill in the city]
Actually Dolly, the kitten we adopted this summer, was rescued from one of the cities I used to work in, one which has a pretty big issue with the amount of stray cats roaming their streets. After my shifts I would walk out to my car, pass by these packs of feral kittens and now I wonder if I met any of Dolly’s ancestors. Dolly and I seem to understand each other even though she won’t let me pick her up and hold her just yet. She’s keeping her distance and that’s okay, she’ll figure out soon enough that one of my core credes is Do No Harm.
Buckle up kids, it’s about to get real wild and weird up in here. Feel free to unsubscribe or unfollow if the woo-woo is simply not your jam. Or if you’re in any way offended by what is my full control of my overt sexuality. Rob and I are off to camp tomorrow with no plan other than to camp in a place with no electricity. Should make for an interesting third date story and don’t worry I always trust my intuition, and sure know what a safe space feels like.
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To Be Continued …
By the way school begins 9.3.23
Check out this new blast from my past high school days. It’s on repeat this morning, damn and please welcome back Mr. Nuno Bettencourt on the guitar. 🔥
Buckled in 😊. Hi Nanny Shirley 💜. Careful out there in the wilderness 😉
Thanks for your rawness, Nurse Kristin, I appreciate the realness. I lived in San Francisco for 31 years and heard swarthy tales of SF General, the City hospital on Potrero Avenue, which was the Wild West 100%. That is also where the AIDS epidemic had its "cauldron", and where epidemiologists began to watch the inception of that terrible plague. Humans are certainly raw creatures and self included. Keep well and grounded and please take good care of yourself! Your voice is needed! Wendy