Chaos!

I am not sure if that is the best word to describe the last three weeks or not. But this is really my first chance to sit at home and breath a little before venturing back to work on Monday morning.  I have been working at Sharp Mary Birch Hospital for Women for 3 weeks now. One weekend all the family was here for Zack's 30th b-day, one weekend 

we flew to Lodi which happened to be our 5 year anniversary, and last weekend we were visiting in Whittier. 

The first two weeks at Sharp Mary Birch were spent on the night shift in clinical orientation. I had the opportunity to meet some really great nurses and staff on the night shift. Everyone has been so inviting and friendly. While I have been making great new friends at Mary Birch, I can't help but miss my wonderful friends at PIH who I miss seeing everyday. 

This past week was my first week in clinical orientation on day shift. This week really wore me out...I am not used to working these 12 hour day shifts. Waking up at 5:30am all week has really wiped me out on top of working 12 hours shifts. I am sure I will get used to it, but I am currently still used to the night shift routine.  On my day off on Wednesday, I slept pretty much the whole day. Tuesday morning at work around 8am, the operator announced overhead, "Sharp Mary Birch would like to welcome the Joint Commission!". For any of you that work in the medical field or in the hospital you will understand when I tell you that I had a moment of panic! For those of you that don't know, the Joint Commission provides national accreditation for all hospitals and their surveys come unannounced and last about 3-4 days. Ours ended today; and we passed!. I can honestly say that I was very impressed by the state of readiness of the entire hospital and staff. I was relieved that I was still in clinical orientation and just missed the responsibilities that I would have adopted as the NICU CNS had I officially been in the role. I now have one more week of clinical orientation before I start taking over my role as the NICU Clinical Nurse Specialist. I am looking forward to actually starting in this role and seeing what's in store! On a side note, I was told today that the question going around is "how old is she...she looks like she is only 12 years old." I guess that's my introduction to the fact that I really need to prove myself and just

 acknowledge that I am starting a new role and I know a lot but I still have a lot to learn! I am definitely up for the challenge.

I think all Olivia wanted to eat was our French Fries!

Well, Ryan and I have also been able to fit in a little time to hang out with my brother,  sister-in-law and niece. We celebrated Zack's 30th birthday. Him and Julie went to Disneyland for two days and we took Olivia to the San Diego Zoo. We have also baby sat a couple of times already. We are having fun with that. Actually, Ryan baby sat yesterday while I was working. While I thought this might be chaos in and of itself...I was completely mistaken. When I arrived at Zack and Julie's after work, Ryan nearly had Olivia to bed. I walked in as he was reading her bedtime stories...what else...but Goodnight Gorilla! Of course this is the story about the zoo keeper and the gorilla.