Example 1 of why a nurse's humour is so very wrong

It was week 3 or 4 of being a student in the emergency department, not unfamiliar territory since I'd been working as a patient care assistant (PCA) for two years at royal Darwin Hospital. It is a little hard to explain public hospital culture in the territory. RDH is full of patients that sit in their bandages on the grass, many have lice and scabies, drop rubbish wherever it falls whilst picking through each others hair like monkeys out the front of the hospital-nice look. My favorite though was our very generous 4 hour absconding rule where you may or may not need the police to retrieve the patient, or if you were lucky they would make their own way back in their own sweet time - even sober sometimes.

This paticular day I am dealing with an older, but not old gentleman with peculiar habits. The chart says one particular mental health condition but I am seeing more obsessive compulsive disorder. During breakfast and morning cares it is so frustrating it starts to get testing with the 'I can only have this or this, it must be in this type of cup', and various assisted repostioning. I sigh and get on with it.

The doctors come and talk with the patient and request a 'hot' urine specimen. This is a fresh one which needs to be sent to pathology within half an hour for renal tests. We try the urinal bottle on the bed when he thinks he can go, he needs to stand up, fair enough we say we'll try sitting on the edge of the bed, it can support your weight..still no good. Two of us help the patient stand steady and it still doesn't work. He asks to go to the bathroom, fair enough..pity with his fussiness this involves much fussing around but we finally get there. He sits on the toilet and I have to hold the urine bottle in the front as he grips the bars on the wall. I am crouching next to him and my preceptor stands at the doorway, the frustration of dealing with him during the morning is beginning to make us lose our composure.

'Its coming its coming' he says..nothing happens for a moment..then he starts to loudly fart foul smelling wind. I look up at my preceptor she is starting to lose it, within seconds she has ducked out to safety. I just look at the floor and bite my lip, hard. 'Now it's coming' he says enthusiastically but no urine materialises. The farting getts louder and the smell intensifies, I start to hear shit being fired out, sloppy with machine gun force into the bowl. It's too much! I am currently still on my haunches next to this performance. 'I'll be back in a minute' I manage to mutter, mid choke, and sort of climb out of the small cubicle crab style. I shove the door shut, and one look at my preceptor is too much. I am sitting on the floor outside the bathroom unable to speak, laughing so much I can't make a noise, or get my breath, tears rolling down my cheeks. this has set my preceptor off and the other staff at the desk are not sure what to think. Both of us try to calmly tell the doctor why we couldn't get a hot urine specimen, but it comes out with staccato sobs of laughter and its infectious, he is laughing by the end of the story too.

I regain composure and help the poor man back to bed and make him comfortable. whilst fixing up another patient in the quite open ward we apologise for our carry-on. 'Oh don't worry about it, we've been putting up with him all morning' she says. Toileting patients is usually just part and parcel of the job and appropriate, but the morning had just got more and more frustrating that the laughter valve just had to release somewhere.

Midlife crisis? male only? where would I apply?

I just read a mate's blog about this and apart from a toy boy what would I do if I had a crisis?

Do women really have midlife crisis? You do hear about women changing teams, nah does nothing for me.

The flash car and the motorbike is the blokey track, I'll have to make do with the 10 yo Commodore with mags. Yes it does still have all four mags though I did have to buy another spare thanks to the fucker that stole it on nightshift and left 2 bricks under the corner of the car.

Hmmm I could randomly meet people and build a little black book, ahemm think I did that, now what? Get a boyfriend finally and try to get used to their kids? Trying that at present, it makes me feel old and conservative, and I'm not sure I can handle the kids. That sounds awful I know, maybe its just because it's all new I have never been in that situation before.

I want lovely friends that can make time to come out listen to loud music and drink away the troubles occasionally, and veg out, watch silly movies and laugh ourselves sick too, or potter about out bush, debate in an art gallery or explore in a mueseum. Is this too much to ask?

Internet introductions

I'd just met a new friend, always a bit nerve wracking and we were edging our way into his friend's gig. It was in a tiny theatrette, we weren't too inconspicuous. We had had a few quick drinks to calm the nerves and the band was playing, they started into a new song. I began to listen to the words..OMG! I felt like they had a roving spotlight and it was pointing right at us. It was about internet dating, (the singer was a best friend of his from way back).We gave each other nervous sideways glances, gulp.... self consciousness set in as the song went on so did the cringing. It was like getting heckled by a comedian when you've turned up late. I had heard the lead singer had met her boyfriend/guitarist on the net, but this wasn't making me feel any better.

The song was finally over! Thank god! the songs that followed were a blend of folk/bluegrass/rock, with some amazing music and lyrics. The guy in question is still my best mate, though he's engrossed in work interstate. I still remember the above moment like I'd been like a rabbit caught in headlights though.

a quick snapshot

Ok lets just get this intro thing out of the way, who am I? why am I blogging?

I talk to lots of people and I get sick of repeating myself and I'd like to tell my stories and thought in a more concise interesting way, then if someone is really interesting in finding out about me they can just come here.

I'm 38, which I can't really believe, mentally about 25. I wouldn't want to go backwards cos it was hard enough the first time around. I have two boys aged 10 and 15 which we did the merry-go-round with the special needs circuit. I work as a nurse, but I am in the early years and still learning. I separated last year and whilst hard it was freeing in a lot of ways.

I grew up in central Victoria, Australia and I'm back here now after 15 years, which felt like going back to square one. In the meantime I've lived in Brisbane, Townsville, Adelaide Hills and lastly Darwin.

Being back at square one here in the country feels weird, it's so 'white bread' here , especially after Darwin. a lot of people here haven't really been anywhere or done anything. Maybe that's harsh, maybe I envy their contentment. When my ex was thinking about life after the army I thought hell I don't know which state I want to live in even. Then I became a single parent, and like my sister said, as a shift-worker with two kids you really don't have a lot of options :(

So anyways here I am still trying to work out who the hell I want to be and gradually ticking off the boxes to establish life as I want it. That's enough about me, the following posts I would rather release my humour and skewed view on things.