A Day in My Life (weekend clinical day)

I haven’t done one of these in a while, soooooo, let’s go!

Normally my clinical days go from 6:30-2:30, but this was a shortened one (we made up the two hours the week prior).

5:00

My alarm goes off!

Then I roll over, grab my phone, and play my New York Times word games (Wordle, Connections, and The Mini).

 

 

Of course, I also check my text messages and emails.

(Like a good GenX-er, I faithfully check my emails. I can never quite understand why GenZ doesn’t do this! Kids these days… 😉 )

I shower, do some simple hair and makeup, and get my student scrubs on.

Then it’s time to unload my dishwasher…

pack my lunch (prepped the night before)….

and cook some breakfast/make coffee.

I also feed Chiquita her pate. 😉

6:10

Time to head out the door!

6:22

Location: hospital parking garage.

I walk inside, go up the elevators, and then it’s time to clock in for clinical.

6:30-11:30

Clinical time!

What I do at clinical depends on the week; this time I was just doing bedside nurse kind of stuff, so nothing remarkable.

But I was proud of myself because when I listened to a patient’s lungs, I was pretty sure I heard crackles in both of his lower lobes.

And sure enough, when I looked at his chart, I saw that other people had heard the same thing.

I am always happy when my nurse-in-training ears hear things correctly!

I also shadowed a floor nurse, analyzed EKG strips, made some care plans, and did head-to-toe assessments.

11:30

We all went down to the cafeteria with our professor for lunch/post-conference.

Post-conference involves things like us telling each other about the patient care we did that day; on this day one of our classmates shadowed in the ICU, so she was sharing about that.

12:30

Woohoo for a short clinical day!

I left the hospital and drove straight to the gym where I changed clothes (I packed them the night before) and did a workout.

I always put the weights in order before I leave. 

Are they always messed up again when I come back? Yes. But for some reason I still organize them when I leave. 😉

2:30

I stopped at Aldi on the way home for a few items I needed to make granola.

Then I went home and took a quick neck-down shower to wash the sweat off.

3:30

I set my laptop up in my kitchen and got some lecture videos going.

Then I made some overnight cinnamon rolls.

Zoe’s birthday was earlier in the week, but it hadn’t worked out to do her birthday breakfast that day! So this was a pan of belated cinnamon rolls. 🙂

I also made a batch of granola.

And I got some yogurt started and put the jars in the cooler to incubate.

5:00

I brought in my Chewy order and put it away, with Chiquita supervising.

And then I sat down to try to write down some of my day before I forgot it all!

6:00

I made some soup for dinner, put my granola in jars, and cleaned up my kitchen.

7:00

Time for a Zoom call with two of my friends from an online divorce support group I joined back in 2022! We have remained friends all this time, and it had been so long since we caught up.

Their divorces happened for almost identical reasons as mine did, so we understand each other super well.

Of course, I am not delighted they experienced the same thing I did, but it is nice to have friends who can relate.

9:00

All of us were starting to feel sleepy (like me, they’re not night owls!), so we ended our Zoom.

Time to get ready for bed!

I brushed my teeth, washed my face, put my bite guard in, did my Duolingo lesson, and off to sleep I went.

And that’s the end of my day. 🙂