Just a vent about not being part of the group, pity party...
** This post mentions a very upsetting EMS call I was on, please don't read it if you think it may upset you.
I know nothing good comes from creeping on facebook and yet I just did anyway...
I had one of those people you may know thing pop up and I did know her, she was a woman I went to nursing school with. And her profile pic was her and several other women from my class (10 years ago) We originally started out not friends due to a comment she made about something. (She worked at a restaurant where I use to live, and commented about the trash over there. I assumed she meant the tourists but she said she meant the locals...) Anyway despite getting off on the wrong foot, we kept a light friendship.
Anywayyy, point I'm getting to is I didn't keep in touch with anyone from my nursing school. It seems that I was supposed to make life long friendships though. That's what you do in nursing school. I was thinking back to then (this is not the first time) and I'm really sad about how things unfolded there.
I was already feeling like an outsider, I really did through my 20s because I came from such an poor background (I live in the trashy neighborhood after all)....THe people I grew up with didn't go to college, they got pregnant, or went to jail or sadly, a few have died from drug use. So I always felt like a fish out of water around when I then thought of as out of touch rich kids.
To make matters worse, about a month into my first semester, I took a call (I was an EMT) for something very upsetting. Its been over 10 years and I am still bothered by it. I was called to a unresponsive 5 week old baby boy. I don't want to go into detail of what was there when we got there, but it had turned out the father murdered him. I sunk into a very deep depression after that. My partner that day, I just talked to her recently and she admitted she almost quit being an EMT after that. At the (stupid) recommendation of my captain I did not attend the debriefing. I regret that.
I spent nearly a year in a bad way from that call. I just couldn;t get it out of my head, I couldn't sleep, I couldn't have fun, it weighed heavy on me. A few years later a friend of mine said he noticed how bad I was following that call...I hadn't realized anyone noticed...
About a year into nursing school I started to come out of it, but the clicks were already formed. I didn't share with them what happened. I don;t know why.
But that first year I didn't talk to anyone really. I just did my work. I just couldn't stomach to hear their (or anyone in my life) petty talk when all I could think about was that poor baby. It seemed like nothing else mattered.
It didn't help that I was still poor and struggling to keep a roof over my head . I have been on my own not by choice since 19, and I couldn't stand to hear these girls at 20 something talk because I wasn't living the extended teen life (still with parents, parents paying for school)...
Well, things have change. DH and I are not poor, at all. And I found myself wishing that I was in a different place mentally during nursing school. I wish I could tell them what was going on. Of course I wouldn't contact them and do that...but I'm just saying. It kind of sucks...
That must have been such a traumatic call for you; how awful.
I think you are absolutely right about life long friendships forming among nursing students. My mom is 86 years old and still keeps in touch with her classmates. The ones who are still living anyway!
That's terrible that you had to experience that. When my mom was a nursing student, she worked at a teaching hospital in NYC, and she has a lot of really awful stories. It can definitely shape you.
I'm sorry you didn't get to have the experience you wanted, but things happened as they did, and you are probably a lot tougher from it. I'm still in college now, but sometimes I think back to my high school years and how those could have been better. I was very shy- I had a very terrible experience in middle school in which my childhood friends of 8 years decided they didn't want to be friends with me anymore. It made me incredibly insecure and self-loathing, so I just sheltered myself from everyone in high school. I made a few friends, but I was never able to open up or trust anyone. I regret all of the times I could have connected with others, but it was a learning experience if anything.
My mom was also very shy. She's kept in touch with a couple of people from nursing school, but mostly her friends are her current coworkers.
.....And I found myself wishing that I was in a different place mentally during nursing school. I wish I could tell them what was going on. Of course I wouldn't contact them and do that...but I'm just saying. It kind of sucks...
I'm so sorry you had the experience you did. I can only imagine how traumatic it must have been. I can see why it shook you to the core as a young woman and took a very long time to process. Kudos to you for being able to hold it together enough to continue with school.
Here's a random thought though - can you think of anyone that you were in school with that you felt pretty comfortable with? Someone that you would know how to contact now.
Perhaps reach out to them. Explain briefly that some things were going on at the time that kept you more reserved - but that you'd always admired them and would like to stay in touch. If they're local, maybe you could meet for coffee. You don't have to tell them all the details now. As friendships develop those things have a way of coming to the surface anyway.
One of my favorite sayings is that the best time to start something is yesterday. The second best time to start is right now.
I can't imagine witnessing something like that, just reading about it brings tears to my eyes. Such hatred is unthinkable. I can only think that if a father is so evil as to do that then maybe that little baby boy is in a better place. Had he lived he may have encountered a lifetime of abuse at his father's hands. Angels belong in heaven.
What's a debriefing? Sorry to sound dumb, I just don't know.
It's true that during college years is when we make our closest and longest friends. At the verge of adulthood at our first forge into independence we just so happen to spend all our waking hours with the people we go to school with and those bonds are lifelong. My college friends live all over the world and we may not see each other for years but when we do it's like we're right back in college finishing each other's sentences and smoking cigarettes like we haven't grown up. There is no way to replicate that. It must suck to feel left out but things happen for a reason and you always have to think of the positive side of that. Back then you and these people were not on the same level maturity wise. Now that you are the bond is not there. You went through something traumatic and couldn't rely on them then to help you through it. You knew what you were doing when you stayed out of their group, trust yourself that you did the right thing.
But I know exactly how it feels to look back and wish you'd done something different about a traumatic experience. When I had my son my post partum depression was off the charts. I didn't know I had it and I knew I was to expect the baby blues. But nobody seemed to notice that I was dying on the inside. All I could think about was death, my baby falling down and hitting his head. I couldn't sleep because I was so scared of my baby dying. I thought that was normal to feel like that and nobody noticed I wasn't well. Total regret.
I'm sorry you had to go through that. No wonder you went through such a rough time since it would have been SO bad to witness.
Your story of not being included feels very much like my life too. It's good that there are more of us out there, not that we haven't been 'in the group'. Maybe the ones like us can band together and form our own awesome packs!
Thank you all.
Vickie Chickie - I'm not really close with any of them at all. Since then I've made and kept coworker friends but none of them I went to school with. It was really just a very difficult time in my life, and I wasn't really wanting to make friends there. I had friends that were EMTs with me, actually I'm still in regular contact with the EMTs I worked with from over 10 years ago before I was a nurse. I have friends in the hood lol....in my town...my friends did noticed I wasn't myself but nothing was really said to me at the time. And my EMT friends, they got it, because they have had bad calls to...just those girls in nursing school, they really were just in a different place, they were like a bunch of clueless teens (they were actually teens but nothing was different about them and teens) they worked teen jobs if they worked at all, they lived with their parents, parent paid for school...The people I was friends with were regular adults...I felt like that call,,,that those kids in nursing school wouldn't get it. It would be like me telling a child what happened, because that's how I saw them, as children.
Palestrina- I still get teary when I think about it, even after all these years. What you said, about that poor child not enduring years of abuse, other people have said that too. Of course we had to go give statements and depositions because this went to court and they told us that they found healing ribs fractures when the autopsy was done. At 5 weeks old...do you have any idea how hard they would have to hit a newborn to fracture its ribs? Newborn bones are pretty soft to allow for birth....and those fractures were healing, meaning they have been hurting this poor child from the day he was born. I'm glad I wasn't a mother then. I had my kids a few years later. Even now my newest is almost 4 months and I just can't imagine hurting such a tiny defenseless baby. It makes me so sad to think that this baby needed to be loved and that there are so many people that want kids and can't have them, that would have loved this child....
A debriefing is when the people on the call meet with a professional and talk about what happen and are given resources for if there's an issue. My captain at the time said they are a waste of time and don't stop you from feeling depressed. He has had a few really bad calls so he was speaking from experience.
I'm so sorry you dealt with ppd. I had it pretty bad after my first baby, and I believe mildly after my others. I think I'm dealing with it now, but I have taken steps to address it as best I can this time without medication. (Though I have been on medication in the past for ppd) It such a horrible feeling to feel so lost and have no one step in to help.
Its also hard to look back and realize just how bad you were and wish you had done something to get out of it.
I wonder if your captain told you they were a waste of time because he's a man and sometimes certain men don't like to ask for her. My father is like that, even if I paid him a million dollars he wouldn't step into a psychologist's office for a second, never! You may have just gotten some bad advice from a well meaning captain.
As for the PPD, well I can go as far as to say that I can't go through it again. If it were just that then maybe, but also because my SPD was so painful and didn't heal for years after I gave birth and had to undergo a whole year of physical therapy. The SPD and PPD combined together keep me from wanting to get pregnant again, I just can't go through it again. The pain both internally and externally were awful. Otherwise I would have loved to have another baby.
Last edited by Palestrina; 07-17-2015 at 09:03 AM.
sorry about that EMS call. I can only imagine how bad it would affect me to see that.
I have gotten a bachelor's degree and have gone back to become an RN...currently in school. I have two people from college I was still friends with, and it's not necessarily who I thought it would be. I don't even speak to my maid of honor at my wedding...not hard feelings, just grown so far apart and live far apart. I am still close to my best friend and close to another girl who has kids my same kids age who I was a good friend to during her divorce...so even though you might not be close with them when you graduated, who knows, things change.
In nursing school now and I get along great with my classmates...but I really don't expect to be friends with them later. First, I'm older and in a different place in life. Second, we are all trying to keep our heads above water in nursing school I don't think it's like my 4 year college experience where we had less difficult classes and could just drive around all night and watch movies.
You are never too old to make a new friend, but that won't happen if you are stuck on a past you cannot change. Some of my closest friends I have made in my 30s. Don't give up...keep yourself open to new friendships. What about the nurses you work with?
Another thing...DO NOT look at Facebook to judge your life. Everyone on there is faking...almost everyone. I read somewhere some smart advice to not judge your life vs the careful image someone else has cultivated on Facebook....your blooper real vs their highlight real.
My gut tells me if there was a true friend worth having in that group, they would have been more empathetic to you at that time.
sorry about that EMS call. I can only imagine how bad it would affect me to see that.
I have gotten a bachelor's degree and have gone back to become an RN...currently in school. I have two people from college I was still friends with, and it's not necessarily who I thought it would be. I don't even speak to my maid of honor at my wedding...not hard feelings, just grown so far apart and live far apart. I am still close to my best friend and close to another girl who has kids my same kids age who I was a good friend to during her divorce...so even though you might not be close with them when you graduated, who knows, things change.
In nursing school now and I get along great with my classmates...but I really don't expect to be friends with them later. First, I'm older and in a different place in life. Second, we are all trying to keep our heads above water in nursing school I don't think it's like my 4 year college experience where we had less difficult classes and could just drive around all night and watch movies.
You are never too old to make a new friend, but that won't happen if you are stuck on a past you cannot change. Some of my closest friends I have made in my 30s. Don't give up...keep yourself open to new friendships. What about the nurses you work with?
Another thing...DO NOT look at Facebook to judge your life. Everyone on there is faking...almost everyone. I read somewhere some smart advice to not judge your life vs the careful image someone else has cultivated on Facebook....your blooper real vs their highlight real.
My gut tells me if there was a true friend worth having in that group, they would have been more empathetic to you at that time.
Thank you. I have friends lol..I did say that I am still friends with my old coworkers from both nursing jobs and even ems jobs. I was just bummed that I didn't have the classic experience in nursing school because on top of having nothing in common with the other girls, I was in a huge funk.
I'm also not comparing my life. I did see a group picture so I know she is still friends with some people from our class, but I could also see she was still single. When we went to nursing school she was a few years older than me, working as a waitress and living with her mom. I was an emt, dating my now husband and supporting myself. I actually think I have a great life generally speaking. Sure my kids are little and that's limiting, but its temporary. I am happily married, I have 4 beautiful kids, my dh makes 6 figures a year, I have wonderful friends, an education so I can further my own career when the kids are older, and we are less than a month from closing on our dream home in a great neighborhood. My family has their pluses and minuses, but everything in my life I had control over I worked to make it great.
That was the other issue, you were saying everyone working to keep their heads above water. This is going to sound arrogant but since this is the internet I'll go ahead and say it. I never struggled in nursing school and the students seemed to bond over that. They often studied together and stressed together. I carried an A (ok a few Bs too) average with little studying, and little effort. I would often play dumb and not share my grade because I didn't want to be *that* off putting. This was something I had a lot of practice with through grade and high school. I had just always been very book smart. Of course now after 4 kids, and years of sleep deprivation I'm lucky I can tie my shoes...but there was a time when I was very bright. I went to a few study groups in nursing school in an attempt to bond but I was more focused on chatting and they were more focused on actually studying, and which I didn't really need.
Last edited by GlamourGirl827; 07-19-2015 at 08:30 AM.
Just a vent about not being part of the group, pity party...
