Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Working on My Night Shift

Last year, I took a class in which we had to write a descriptive scene using all five senses. At the time, I was a day-shift RN, working 7 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. I wrote a paragraph about the experience of waking up early and the joys of coffee. It started with "Every 5 a.m. is the worst thing thing that has ever happened to me...."

It was in the middle of winter in the Indiana, and I truly felt horror and misery at having to wake up at 5 a.m., scrape the ice and snow off my car, and hit the frozen roads of Indianapolis. Maybe I have a little Seasonal Affective Disorder?

So, now, it's one year later, and I'm what I never thought I would be: a night-shift RN. And although I do think the night shift is wreaking havoc on my skin, I'm actually relatively at peace with the night shift, especially as a traveler. Who wants to have to learn how to utilize the crazy, disparate paper-and-BASIC-computer-charting system to learn how to, say, discharge patients?

I do, apparently. Well, want is not the right word. For the upcoming schedule, I'm being moved to days. Now the 5 a.m. wake-up call looms again. However, this time I'm in SoCal, not the Midwest. Will that early morning be as gruesome without a frosted windshield? I guess we'll see.

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