NCLEX exam this Monday

Gentle readers,

I have not forgotten you, nor have I failed the NCLEX exam. Yet. The orientation process at work has been so stressful and so literally tiring that I simply gave up blogging and reading my GoogleReader for the time being. At work, they tell me I'm doing well, but it doesn't feel that way. I have yet to go through a day and finish everything satisfactorily.

Also, I have made some mistakes. My worst has been with a patient who was playing games with us on a day when I didn't have time for it, and starting spitting out oral meds, then refusing everything. I eventually got the patient to agree to take crushed the very needed pills at the end of my shift and crushed some extended release pills without thinking about it. Luckily, no advserse results, but you know that was one of the days when I did not feel good after work.

Actually, for a period of about 3 weeks, I started drinking every day and probably drank more in that period than the entire year previous. Not good.

I'm sure most new nurses have the same feelings of inadequacy I do, but it has been very rough.

Anyhow, I am scheduled to take the NCLEX this Monday at the Pearson VUE office. I'm planning on holing up for a while--maybe calling in tomorrow and Friday (Do I dare?) and spending those days and the weekend in a motel or bed and breakfast. So far, I have studied about a total of 4 hours. I do not have high hopes. I find it almost impossible to combine the stressful floor orientation and the book studying, so heinous is the book studying to me. I don't know about other people, but I measure out my time in spoonfuls of anxiety, not spoonfuls of chronology. I have had very little time to study in other words. I have spent some time staring out the window, doing laundry, cleaning the house...

And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?

Anyhow, if I don't pass, I'll have to stop orientation and then I'll be back in the situation I wanted originally, which was to pass the exam before taking a job. I mentioned this to the HR department at work when I went in, but they wouldn't give me a position unless I started orientation right away. Well, they got their way, and now we'll see how things go.

Wish me luck.