Mid-Internship Crisis

T-Minus 6 months until internship graduation. I made it past a few of my hardest and most difficult rotations (thankfully), the first part of my case studies, and some quarter life crisis BS.

And now I find that motivation is hard to muster.

With work and internship and "other" stuff, I find myself absolutely exhausted. I'm ready for a break and worse of all, I feel like I'm so tired and worn out that I'm not retaining anything. Excitement is dead, motivation is dead, and I just want to take a week-long nap.

I also realized that after taking forever to adjust to AZ, I'm probably going to have just as hard of a time going back home to my old life. But I suppose I'll get there when I get there.

Short post, but I decided it was time I wrote at least something.

Toodles.

2 Rotations Down!

Wow! It's been way too long to have any viable excuse. As you can imagine, a lot has happened since our/my last post. I've finished my foodservice rotation (thank all that is good and green in this life) and yesterday I just finished my first community rotation at WIC (Women Infants and Children). Foodservice was a beast! There are so many big projects. Add that to my 120 mile commute and you can imagine how little I got done once I got home. However, I survived and moved on to WIC.

This last week I've been surviving on little sleep and I've realized that I've now reached the age where I can no longer function on 3-4 hours 5 days in a row. Somehow I did it but I was exhausted the whole time. Every morning the first thing on my mind was how anxious I was to climb back in bed that night. My project binder for Foodservice was due on Monday and I pulled a near all-nighter getting it finished. It was tedious, time consuming work and I won't lie... I left it until the last minute. I was just so ready to be done with foodservice and not think about it anymore that I put off putting the stupid portfolio together. Hundreds of pages, sheet protectors, dividers and spreadsheets later... I handed it in. Phew! (Due to the inherent lack of sleep I did not have the where-with-all to document this monster of a portfolio with photographic proof)

Meanwhile, I was still in WIC rotation, attempting to hone in my counseling skills. I realized that while I enjoy one on one counseling and nutrition education, I am not confident enough to dive in. Definitely something I have to figure out and work on in the next rotation. I did remember why I want to work in community, especially if I can manage to do so in relation to maternal and pediatric nutrition. I got to sit in on some awesome appointments with a lactation consultant. I learned a ton about breastfeeding and I was/fascinated. I'm sure that my roomie got tired of hearing about breastfeeding after about week 1. Sorry guys! It's just so cool!! :) I love the idea of helping moms give their babies the very best of the best.

I can't believe that I'm already 4ish months into this internship year! 2 rotations down and ready for a 3rd. On Tuesday I will start my first clinical rotation back in French camp. Yep! Back to the 120 mile commute. Clinical doesnt have the projects that foodservice did so hopefully I'll have a little bit more time on my hands. It's daunting facing clinical! I'm not scared but I'm a little apprehensive. Out of the 8 of us interns I'll be the first to start a clinical rotations. I'm diving in headfirst, ahead of the pack. Not that I have much choice! :)

Sacramento is starting to feel more like home as I get more comfortable with the area. I absolutely love my co-interns. We have such a great time when we actually get to spend time together and when we aren't together, we have our on-going group text to commiserate on topics such as: the spastic and unpredictable scheduling that we endure, projects, preceptors etc etc. :)
I miss the other peas. I get to talk to Ashley once in a while and it's always a day brightener to catch up. And Stephanie... are you out there? I miss you!

Anyway, Tuesday it's a new rotation. Thankfully it's at a hospital where I already know the clinical staff so at least I'll be saved the difficulty and stress of getting to know a whole new group of people. I would promise to blog more often but well... you can see how that's going for all of us. I will promise to try. I feel like there will be more interesting stuff to write about with a clinical rotation...

Have a great three day weekend!!

Insulin

It's been a while, yes. If it weren't for having some sort of stomach bug or food poisoning today and not being at internship when I should be, I probably wouldn't be blogging.

I made it through my first rotation! Last week was cardiology. Here I was thinking cardiology was pretty straight forward... Well, not when you're in a brand new place and still on paper charting. I was super lost, my ADIME notes were a mess, and I was just on overload. It got better throughout the week. I got to watch a cardiac cath procedure which I thought was super cool! If I got too close and saw blood on the doctor's hands I'd have to back off a little and try not to get queasy. But x-rays are thankfully in black and white ;)

I survived that and am now on to Diabetes. I do really like it so far but my gaps in knowledge are kind of horrendous. Insulin? Oh yeah, that's the hormone that makes the glucose get absorbed and utilized into the tissues and not stick around in the blood. There are 30 different combinations, actions peak times, and mechanisms of insulin and insulin lowering meds? Balls. Gotta start memorizing I guess. Why does every medication have to have two names? Or three even? I'm not a pharmacist. But it is important to know.

Electronic charting > paper charting. Just saying. I got spoiled with EPIC and now I'm back to using cerner, which after using paper charts, is heaven. I couldn't read anyone's notes for crap. I thought my handwriting was bad. Not to mention page long progress notes and initial assessments had my hand ready to fall off.

Anyways... Life has been hectic. Prior to leaving CA, I thought I had arranged for a way to get student loans while I was in my internship. That crumbled and now I find myself working back at Starbucks and despite starting two new "jobs" at the same time, it is a blessing. My manager is awesome and I don't think I could have hoped for a better job to coincide with the internship. With that said, internship from 8-3, driving straight to work and starting at 3:30-4 until 10pm makes for a very long day. I'm not 19 anymore and my bones start to ache after being on my feet all day. But I will be thankful to at least have some income while I am studying for my exam.

Since moving here in June, I haven't really had a chance to visit home. I miss it like crazy and when the bf comes to visit, it's like he brings a piece of home with him and when he leaves, I feel a very overwhelming sense of homesickness all over again. I would drive home for the weekend, but the majority of my work hours are on weekends since my availability is so limited due to internship. I have contemplated if I ever get a full day off, to do a turn around driving trip. I am that desperate. I keep reminding myself that it's only for a year and that I am away from home for a reason, whatever it may be.

<3

Daily Roadtrips

Ok this is ridiculous, I'm the only one blogging. Granted, I'm also the only one who hasn't actually started my rotations yet. I'm sure that after tomorrow, my time for blogging will be non-existent and you'll soon see why....

Last week was orientation where we were given all of the information that we will need for the upcoming rotations and such. On day 2 of orientation I received my rotation schedule for the year and just about vomited on it. Yes, I actually felt nauseous. For those who don't know much about the internship I'll give you a quick run-down of how they generally work. All dietetic interns complete supervised practice rotations through (usually) 3 major categories of nutrition; Foodservice Management, Clinical Nutrition and Community Nutrition. Beyond that, each internship is a little to a lot different in how they break up those rotations, how many of each they require, where they send their interns to complete them and how quickly they are done. Some internship programs are paired with grad classes and some aren't. 

There! you've now received a very general overview of internships in the dietetics world. 

(Oh and most of them are 100% unpaid, very few offer a stipend but no wages.)

Now... My program is 12 months long, a very FULL 52 weeks long. I will be taking grad classes in succession with all of my rotations through Sac State but a lot of them, if not most of them, are shared with the dietetic interns at UC Davis. Kind of cool! Talk about networking.

So, back to my schedule and my nausea. My very first rotation as a dietetic intern will be my least favorite area of the field... Food Service, and I was placed at the facility that is the farthest away. What's "far" you say? Oh how does 60 miles one way sound? yup! 120+ miles to drive 4 days a week for 8 weeks.

When I started calculating my driving time and adding in and 8 hour (possibly 10-12) work day, the drive back, then whatever homework, studying and projects I need to work on, my stomach dropped and I felt a bit of a cold sweat.

But wait! There's more! After my Food Service rotation I get a nice 4 week community rotation in Sacramento (20ish minute drive) phew! Then .... my first clinical rotation is right back at the first hospital for another 9 weeks. All in all, I'm spending over a third of my internship year driving 120 miles everyday. Blech!

Needless to say, it has been a challenge accepting my schedule and what it means for my upcoming year. I'm really in for it. I just have to remember that this is done one day at a time.

Tomorrow is my first day of rotations and I'm kind of excited to just dive in and I'm really apprehensive for obvious reasons. I guess tomorrow I will see how the drive goes... Wish me luck!

The City of Trees

Dear Peas and other audience members,

I made it to Sacramento! I had a few weeks in between leaving my job and actually moving but they absolutely flew by. I had the opportunity to have a couple of days of vacation with my mom, then made a small roadtrip with my older sister up to my niece's 3rd birthday party. Then it was back home to pack up all of my earthy posessions (WHY do I have so much stuff??!)

It started out like this...

 and ended up looking like this...

Pretty depressing huh??

There's nothing quite like seeing all of your belongings packed up and stacked into a car. Such a weird feeling. Thank goodness for my parent's suburban and their willingness to make such a long drive with me.

I had some trouble settling my lease on the apartment and even the night before I moved I still didn't know if I was going to have a place to move into. Talk about stressful. They gave my roommate (my cousin!) and I every assurance that it "should" be ready by the 9th and told us that could be our move in date but they also made us jump through every hoop imaginable and then do it again through the same hoops. So, we showed up at the apartment and were told that paperwork still wasn't approved. SERIOUSLY?! so long story short, we decided to scrap that apartment and stay in the same complex that my cousin was currently in. It's a nicer apartment and it literally took 15 minutes to fill out the application, get approved and have a move-in date for the next day. phew!

So Mom, Dad and I stayed in a hotel overnight and moved in the next morning around 11. Yay!

I find it significant that the only pictures I took of the apartment on moving day are of the kitchen. Haha!

I have a feeling I won't be spending as much time here as I would like to.

Anyway, it's now been a week since moving day and I can't believe it. It's been pretty strange to adjust to a new city, new roads, new home, new people etc. I miss my real home and my friends and my family. It's crazy to think about how far I am from everything and everyone I've known for my entire life.

Yesterday was the last day of our intern orientation and I am successfully overwhelmed. There was so much information disseminated and it's difficult to process much less understand everything that's going on. We met at the director's house today for lunch with all of the past interns which was very enlightening. Everyone definitely expects that we will feel overwhelmed at they are so ready to help us out. It's great. 

There's so much more to tell about what I've found out about my schedule and my rotations and class but I'll have to put that in the next post.

I wanted to write a little bit here before my rotations start and I'm waaaay to stressed out and frazzled and short on time to do it. :)

I'm anxious to get started next week and also extremely nervous. I feel totally unprepared... 

*I'm going to "try" to keep up with my other blog so if you want to see what a soon-to-be-broke intern eats, you can read about it by clicking HERE!

Split Pea Soup

It seems like my motivation to post so far has come from someone leaving. Friday was Stephanie's very last day at work so we planned to have lunch. What I didn't tell her was that I had invited the boys to join us. So, I left work, picked up Panera for us and left the boys in the cafeteria with the food. She was pleasantly surprised when she came around the corner.

She looks extremely distraught at our parting but...  it was all just an act. I think her true calling was Hollywood, not dietetics ;)

I'm so glad we got to do something fun on her last day. Makes me wonder what in the world my last day is going to be like. I think I'll probably just fade off into the sunset...

So... The three pea stew is now resembling split pea soup. All three of us in our respective states. In a few weeks it will be my turn to pack it all up and head North. I'm anxious for some reasons, nervous for others and excited for all of it.

This last couple of weeks and especially the last 2 days have been very strange without my partners in crime there with me. I've reached for the phone to call their extensions, or opened a draft email before I realize that their email accounts don't exist and neither one of them are sitting at ANY of the extensions in the hospital. Weird. I'll have to get use to it I guess. Only 24 days until it's MY last day. I still can't believe it.

Steph: Enjoy your roadtrip. I'll be thinking about you. I can't wait to hear about everything new!

Love from the littlest pea to the rest of the stew/soup :)

Ronery

Now that two peas have left the pod, dearest Casslyn is solo. BUT she is not alone.

Only one week away from home, I am already feeling a tad homesick. For the first time in... God knows how many years, I've had time off and am dying to spend time with friends and family but they are ~450 miles away. I feel like I didn't get enough time to cherish being home, seeing family, and eating with friends. I, however, am very grateful for wonderful roommates and if I lived alone, I would have died from roneriness already.

And then I think about how much of a baby I'm being because I'm only one state away.

Monday is the day! I should have a better idea of what I'll be doing for the next few months and possible for the next year. I'm a bit nervous, but it definitely helps that I get to start with the two girls I've been getting to know over the past week, which reduces the anxiety a bit. Here's hoping my director is nice! And I'm glad I'll be getting food service out of the way first.

I'm looking forward to hearing stories from Stephanie's road trip to Texas!

<3,

Yours Truly

And So It Begins...

I don't know what I pictured for the first post on this blog but I most likely imagined something creative and eye-catching with a touch of humor. Instead, I'm writing about how crazy this all feels! Surreal is the word that has been swimming around in this head of mine. It's been months now since the three of us girls sat down to put this blog together and even longer since the idea struck Stephanie like a brilliant, shining moment of clarity and yet... none of us have had the motivation or...bravery (?) to write anything. So.. I'm stepping out and taking the leap!

Today, the first pea has moved. =( All the sudden the months (ahem, years) of planning are no longer in the future. It feels so strange that it's actually happening. Maybe I was waiting for someone to give the three of us a playful slap on the shoulder, chuckle and say "juuuust kidding, you'll all be staying right here, working as Diet Technicians for the rest of your lives" Instead, all the sudden Ashley is gone, poof! no longer residing in the same city, much less state, as me and it's just too weird! This last week of work without her has been very strange. We always joked with our coworkers about being a package deal. On the days that we worked together I found myself referring to myself in the plural, "we're on our way" or "we're off at 5". Now that she's not there I realize just how true it was. We really did become a package deal whether the hospital liked it or not! :)

I've been shoved over in a corner at the smaller rehab hospital this whole last week so I've barely seen Stephanie either. I guess they figured if we aren't going to work together anymore, it may as well happen cold turkey and they just decided to initiate "operation separate" ASAP! 

So now, Ashley is gone and settling into her new place and Stephanie is following very soon. like... next week soon. I have no idea what I'm going to do for the next 5 weeks without these girls. **siiigh**

I certainly hope that I haven't put any of you off by making this our first post ever but I just felt the need to document how the true beginning of this all has felt. 

Next month, it will be my turn and in 7ish weeks I'll be packing up and heading off to a new city as well. All the sudden it seems very, very real and very very frightening. But then what's an adventure without a little fear right?

I miss you already Ashley dearest! Have fun settling in and  getting comfy with the new roomies. :)

Soon we shall all three be writing from different states about our own adventures! I can't wait!