Moving On

So I've been in Ontario now for nearly 5 weeks.

5 weeks.

It hasn't seemed that long. Mike said that last night, and I think that it's good because maybe the next 8 weeks will fly by quickly and I'll get to see him sooner. That would be nice.

Last week was a bummer. My dad called to tell me that I got a letter from the Ontario Nursing people saying that I was missing a piece of information in my application and that my application was stalled. I called the BC nurses (that was the piece missing) and they said they couldn't send that piece needed because I hadn't got the results back from my exam. So there was nothing I could do, and my application for RN status in Ontario was stalled. I was hoping to have it all DONE this week. Now it could be three or four more weeks. I was so angry and so upset because I'd put in so much time and it was all going so wrong. I was mad that I had asked direct questions about things and didn't get all the right answer from people the first time. I was angry that I had to still be working as a care aide when I should be working as a nurse...for twice the way. I was angry that I felt so incredibly helpless in this process. I did everything I thought I was supposed to do based on the information people gave me. When I called the woman in BC and told her my plight, she seemed empathetic. I mean, I asked her what I needed, then explained my situation and was told "yes, we send this and it's always fine"...and then it wasn't. But she called me bacl 10 minutes later and told me to call her the minute I got my exam results back and she'd have the correct form send immediately, and free (the first form, which was wrong, cost me...and I wasn't happy already that I'd put in so much money for a job I'd hardly work at). Literally, I started to cry on the phone. She said she'd help me out, and then "I hope I've made your day a little"...and she had. This whole process has sucked. I don't ever want to go through this again. And for one person to say that they'd actually do something for me, I just felt like someone had listened. Someone wanted to help. I've done this completely alone, and, honestly, have made a lot of mistakes. There wasn't any one person who could give me all the information as to what I was supposed to do, or how, or where. I got tidbits of information from Ontario and BC....and it didn't always match.

I'm glad I've had the opportunity to work as a care aide for a while, and get to know the facility before I'm supposed to be in charge of it for a shift, but I don't want it to be all that I do. I already feel left behind when it comes to m classmates. I missed out on Undergraduate nursing last year, when I could have been working in interesting nursing placements (the ER, ICU, neonatal...whatever..) because I attempted to work in Ontario (they waited 3 weeks to tell me they didn't hire for the summer, and in the meantime I missed the UGN application date), and now I get all the facebook updates of my classmates finishing their specialty courses and working in cool places, or of them getting their first real nursing paycheck...just getting out there and doing the things we worked so hard at to learn in school...and I'm stuck wiping bums all summer.

I'm being pretty harsh, and I know that in 10 years, this slow start isn't going to have made a lick of difference, but when you already feel like you've missed out when you haven't even begun, feeling like everyone else is "making it" when you're stuck in a web of bureaucracy really F%&@ing stinks.

And the worst part is, is that the more I feel like things are going wrong, the more I feel like "of course, it shouldn't be a surprise if it turns out I failed the RN exam" ...Like, things are already on this sucky path, it would only be natural for me to be the person who fails. Something else I have to do - another hurdle for me to jump over while everyone else drives past me.

And so last week, after the woman who told me she would help me hung up, I took the keys to the Buick LeSabre and drove to Stratford. I just needed to drive. To get out and be able to yell and scream and cry. I thought "I should go see a play - that would certainly take me out of my life" but I needed to have the car back for supper...and I ended up doing some "shopping therapy"...expect it was at Giant Tiger. GT is like a discount Zellers. My shopping "spree" was $33....because I'm broke (working as an on-call care aide doesn't exactly rake in the dough) and I have $1800 in debt on my credit card. I can't even mourn for the perceieved loss of my life properly.

I am feeling better now, almost a week later. It's still hard to talk about it, especially when I meet new people at work and they find out that I'm a new RN grad, and "when do you start as an RN?"...and I can't tell them, or even explain it because it's so damn complicated...

That's what's happening in nursing land this week...blah.

But the good news is that I think I'm on the mend