Update

• Days to Graduation:  12
• Days until Jerry gets home:  10
• Shifts left to complete:  5
• Final paper completed:  Nope
• Anxiety levels:  marginally better.  Being super busy working with sick people always helps distract me from my small-time problems.

NG tubes:  As in nasogastric tubes.  As in tube that theoretically ends in a person's stomach via their nose.  You watch the demonstrational videos.  You practice on the dummies in lab.  But you just don't really get how awful they are until you are shoving one down an adorable 90+ year old woman's disoriented nose.  So you can promptly push 4 (freaking 4!) liters of GoLytely through it in the following two hours.  Oh the story gets so much worse, but I'll save it for the post graduation highlight reel.  For now let's just say that when it was over and this sweet little disoriented lady is watching liquid being pushed into her stomach with a syringe she looks up at me and innocently says, "Is this how you always help people honey?  I never dreamed of this."  Picture the little Nana from Happy Gilmore when you run this scenario in your head.  She's also patting my hand while speaking.  She's not angry, she's bewidered and just wants to understand why I am doing this to her.  This was after a horrifying catheter insertion, multiple blood draws, an NG tube, failed attempts at sedation with pharmaceuticals and 3 of the 4 liters of GoLytely.  Plus the blood pressure cuff made her scream every 15 minutes because her arm had a circumference of about 5 inches and was full of the lab tech's stick attempts at her tiny, fragile, dehydrated veins.  Her memory reset about every 15 minutes too.  So I was continuously explaing why WHY we had shoved tubes into her nose, bladder and arms.  Not surprisingly, the nose was what bothered her the most.  Yes, this is pretty much how I help people.  And no, I don't feel great about it right now, ma'am. 

One other anecdote.  Jerry currently resides just a few hours from where my dad lives.  With his new wife and her 5 young children.  It's a whole big awkward situation, but suffice it to say that I spend as little one on one time with this awkward situation as possible.  My dad invited Jerry to go fishing with him for the day.  Jerry agreed thinking that the party would consist of my dad and perhaps one of my uncles.  Imagine his delight when my dad brought the whole awkward situation with him in the form of his new wife.  About 5 hours in he texts me "Ask me how much fun I'm having."

So...to sum up.  Everyone is having fun.