The investigation into ‘CadburyGate’ is now complete. I have to say, I have never experienced anything so surreal in my entire life – in fact, I’m starting to think that I’ve been living in the twilight zone for the last fortnight and those little green men are going to whisk me off into the ether to care for sick aliens…more like little green-eyed monsters wearing a nurses uniform are going to find other ways of sticking the knife in.  You may remember a gorgeous patient that we had on the ward called Helen. All she wanted before she died was to experience one last Christmas. So, with a lot of help from various people around the hospital and her daughter, we brought Christmas forward for her. Not a day too soon either, because later that night she died. Anyway, Helen’s daughter was so touched by what we had arranged for her Mum, that she’d gifted the ward with a huge (and I mean huge) chocolate hamper and a thank you card that mentioned me by name. The next thing I kno...

Christmas and the New Year have gone so quickly this year – they seem almost a distant memory! I was working for most of Christmas and I ended up picking up a couple of extra shifts over New Year too as Jo had gone off sick – too much chocolate hamper indulgence I reckon! It was my first Christmas on the ward – actually, it was my first Christmas in a hospital and I must say, I have really enjoyed it. Don’t get me wrong, it’s awful to think that people are so poorly that they can’t be at home with their families, but the hospital was decked out with decorations and the staff were all in good festive spirits, despite not being at home with their own families.  But it’s not all sadness and illness. I have to walk past the maternity wing on the way to the ward and it was wonderful to see all the new Christmas babies starting their new little lives – I mentioned it to Matt when I got home and I think he’s broody now (I found a crumpled up list in the bin with potential baby na...

I’ve had mixed feelings about Christmas this year… On the happy side, it was mine and Matt’s first Christmas together!! Like proper grown-ups! We both worked on Christmas Day so we decided that Christmas dinner/supper is going to be chicken and chips (home-made of course to mark the special occasion), followed by a share tub of Ben & Jerrys (is there such a thing as a share tub?) and a few glasses of fizzy stuff! We both worked on boxing day too so we daren’t indulge too much.  On the ‘what have I done to deserve this?’ side, on the Christmas rota it would appear that I’m working almost every shift with Jo. Cos it’s Christmas, it’s a pretty scant rota and Steve is helping us all out by working as a nurse, rather than in his usual Charge Nurse role, but he’s basically having Christmas off and working New Year….happy days…not! Jo is furious with me after I arranged for a dying patient to have one last Christmas. We received a huge hamper of chocolate from her daughte...

I am officially loved up! My dates (yes dates, plural) with Matt have been awesome and so it was with a spring in my step that I returned to work last Monday after my annual leave. I must have looked a proper gorm, smiling from ear to ear with that faraway look in my eyes. In fact, during handover one of the nurses asked me if I’d been overdosing on Krispy Kremes for breakfast again!  I couldn’t wait to see my patients in Eden Bay. A couple of my ladies had been discharged, but I had new ones to get to know and then there was the die-hards – the ladies who seemed to have been there forever but who never failed to keep me on my toes. It was lovely to see them again and even more lovely when they told me that they’d missed me. Jo wasn’t on duty my first day back so I was quite relaxed and spent time catching up with my patients’ progress and finding out what I could about my new admissions. I was regaling them with tales of my dates with Matt and we were having a proper...

So here I am – 5 months into my first permanent role as a staff nurse and I’ve actually managed to have a full two weeks off! I’ve been meaning to have some time off for a while now and had actually booked leave in January – however, the events of the past couple of weeks has made me realise that I need a bit of time to think and to recharge my batteries – just some ‘Me’ time, if you know what I mean.   I won’t lie – I was tempted to go and get a sick note and go off with stress, but that would make me feel like a fraud, there are people who are genuinely off with stress and I didn’t want to go down that route if it could be helped.  Dealing with Jo and her antics has started to become a full-time job in itself. Not only did she pull that meds stunt on me, but she’s since made it really clear that I’m on her radar, and she’s picking and poking whenever she gets a chance. Take, for example, the ward round last week.  Steve, the Charge Nurse has asked me to att...

It’s been a couple of weeks now since ‘Denturegate’ – where I accidentally sent Mrs Wright’s nashers off for plastic surgery, and I’m still not fully over it. I know it might seem a small mistake when you think of all the things that can go wrong in a hospital (just look at the NMC hearings on their website to see some of the life-threatening mistakes that are made), but I really disappointed myself. I thought this job had helped me to mature and get over my propensity to cock-up in style, but clearly not.  I’ve been like this all my life. All the way through school I was the kid who couldn’t control her own limbs – tripping up in the dinner hall with a full plate of shepherd’s pie and gravy, knocking things off shelves as I walked past them, knocking people over even…you can just imagine. Being a bigger kid just added to the comedy and I got used to laughing it all off and got a reputation for being the class clown. I was determined to change that now.  Most of m...

I spy with my little eye, something beginning with ‘N’… Nurse ? More like Numpty... It’s been a painful week. Painful in every sense of the word. Let’s start with the physical pain element and get that out of the way. I nipped into my favourite bargain shop on the way home from work feeling quite smug and prepared for the cold snap that’s been screamed out of every radio station. It’s clearly time for 100 denier tights and I grabbed a couple of pairs for less than the price of a mega kebab with chilli sauce! Happy days!! And that was where the happiness ended. Fast forward 12 hours…stumbling round in the dark trying to get ready for work and I am knackered before I even run for the bus, wrestling into these bloody tights. I swear they must have been sized wrongly, as they wouldn’t fit an anorexic scarecrow. I look in the mirror (just to check I’m not severed at the midriff) and see a giant black pudding ring staring back at me – which reminds me that I haven’t got time (or ro...