68 posts tagged “school”

I'm pretty psyched. No more school, no more studying. I'm a MOM again!

I know I made lots of references to tests & stuff on Facebook, but here's the rundown on how this is all working out. I've been taking anywhere from 2-7 credits per semester, year round, since the summer of 2006. The degree I am (was!) working on was a BS in Clinical Laboratory Science. It's a distance program offered by the University of North Dakota - who has a pretty developed CLS program - and they have a deal with the Mayo Clinic for current lab employees to attain their CLS degree, where all of the clinical lab work is done either in the labs here or by staff that come down from UND 3-4 times a year. I already have a BA in Biology Health Professions (with a chemistry minor), so many of my credits transferred from Northwestern to UND. So I had all the prerequisites, I only needed the classes that are clinical lab-specific, like clinical microbiology (different from regular micro in that it only focuses on bugs that cause disease in humans), parasitology, urinalysis (which really is kind of interesting once you get past the fact that you're messing with people's pee - you can find out a lot about someone's health), hematology, and clinical chemistry (which is all those test for enzymes & stuff that get run on blood). Blood banking is also a major component of the CLS curriculum, but since I teach blood bank - actually teach in this very program to an extent - and have a certification in blood banking - they let me out of those classes and gave me credit at only half the cost of tuition. Bargain, eh?

So anyway, that's what I've been working on and complaining about for the last three years. The last couple of semesters have been particularly rough. My final class was a 2-week-long lab in Hematology, which took place in August. I had to register for it as a fall class, though, so I'm still waiting for the "official" final grade on that (even though I already know what I got). After that, I spent about a month studying for two big tests I had to pass. The first was the comprehensive final that UND gives. I have to pass that in order to pass the program. The passing score is only 70%, which normally I wouldn't even blink at because I'm an A/B student.....but this was HARD and I knew it was going to be hard. I was actually more worried about that test than the board exam. So I used one of those worksheets where you color in the bubbles (with a #2 pencil, of course) and then the person down here who proctored the test was supposed to fax that answer sheet in so that I'd know within 24 hours how I did. Well, almost a week went by before I heard about mine. I finally emailed my advisor asking how I did. Turns out that the girl who proctored me faxed one side of the answer sheet twice, rather than faxing both sides. **sigh** But he was nice enough to at least tell me how I did on the stuff he had information on. My weak area was - no surprise - clinical chemistry. The bane of my academic existence.

The second test I had to take was the national Medical Technologist board exam. Passing that test would make me an official certified Medical Technologist, or lab tech. This one is the "real deal," so to speak. I was so stressed about it. I took the test on Friday, Sept. 25 and took the two previous days off work to study. Which I'm glad I did...there was more cramming for this test than I care to admit. So I was able to take this test right here in town, and it was a computer based test. What was really nice was that right away when you're done, this test tells you whether you passed or failed. I passed. I won't get my actual score for another week or so, but beyond simple curiosity I don't even care what my score is. No one will ever look at it besides me and the UND people. The funny thing is, I got a LOT of blood bank questions! I couldn't believe it. I mean, I didn't even study any blood bank except for a few "numbers" things and I was kind of figuring I'd get very few questions on it anyway. That's just the way my life works. I was somewhere between laughter and disbelief when those blood bank questions kept coming up. I totally believe in the providence of God, so I was also thanking Him for giving me questions I knew the answers to.

So now I'm done. Well, pending the result of my UND final. I still haven't heard back on that. The proctor girl is part of our CLS program here and they were getting ready for a HUGE inspection around the time I took the test, and now she's had a baby, so who knows if UND even has the results. I'd think they'd have gotten it in the mail by now. I'll wait a while longer and then email them...I hate being a pest.

My official graduation ceremony is Thursday, November 19. They have a ceremony for us during a time when the UND staff is down here. There are a handful of people graduating from my program, a few that are getting their MS in CLS, and one getting a certificate in laboratory financial management or something like that. I've been asked to speak at the ceremony, to give the greeting from the CLS/certificate students. So I have to figure out what I'm going to say.

Oh yeah, also, many people have asked me why I'm in school when this isn't an advanced degree, and isn't required for me to keep my job or get a promotion. There are a few reasons. 1) The MT/CLS certification is required in many places to even get a job in a lab. By having it you are saying that you have the background knowledge that a lab tech needs. I (and many others) got jobs at Mayo with just a biology or chemistry degree because Mayo's need for bodies in chairs is so huge, they can't limit their hiring to MT's (although it is their first choice). And they have the resources to teach people what they need to know to work in that particular area. I'm a perfect example. So really I'm just getting to where I should have been all along. I don't intend to ever leave Mayo, but you never know where life's going to take you so I feel like I'm more marketable now should I ever need to be. 2) If I do get tired of blood banking and decide to do something different, I know where I would and would not want to work (although I had an idea of that before). 3) Back when I was in college the first time, I'd thought I would get MT certification. My advisor encouraged me to apply for programs. I decided not to, for reasons I won't go into right now, but I have always regretted it. This was a great way for me to do something I've always wanted to do - to take care of what I've always considered to be unfinished business - and I'm thankful that the opportunity was there. It was definitely harder in some ways to do it this way than if I'd just done it back when I should've, but I guess that's the way it goes.

It feels good to be done!  I was going to use this blog post to talk about what I've been doing since then, how I've been rediscovering my life, but I'll save that for later.

The only thing I loathe today is that I'm having a hard time concentrating enough to study for my board exam. I'll absolutely die of embarrassment if I don't pass....which to a normal person would be impetus to buckle down & study. Me, I got as far as coming upstairs to get the laptop for the CD-ROM that came with the study guide. Now I'm blogging.

What do I love today? Lots of things.

1. I love that Bailey starts at her new school tomorrow and is very excited. (And a little nervous.)  We had Meet the Teacher last week and Miss Williams (soon to be Mrs. Douglas - she's getting married a week into the school year!) seems very nice. I think Bailey's in good hands. Now to make sure we can manage the tuition payments every month. We've got a decent little tuition nest egg stashed away should we need it, but we're hoping we can absorb it. (Which means no more shopping for me - waaah!)  When Joey starts, it's going to be a little more challenging. But it'll work out.
2. I love my Minnesota Twins! Seriously, when did I get to be such a baseball fan? I've kind of slowly gotten into it over the past few years but this year has been my dive off the deep end. We have the best back-to-back hitters in the AL (if not all of MLB) and the best catcher and first baseman in the AL, and possibly some of the best right fielders and second basemen as well. What we really need now is some good pitching. Watch out, Detroit!
3. I love Joe Mauer. He's dreeeeamy and so awesome. Well, ok, I don't love him, but I do like him. A lot.
4. I love that I finally found the wherewithall to go back onto South Beach. I wasn't going to, but I spent most of last week hating myself for having gained 10 lbs back over the past 6 months, and I finally decided to quit whining and do something about it. What a concept. It's only the second day of Phase 1, and I'm not as motivated as I was last time, but maybe after the scale moves I'll get more excited.
5. I love that my house has been painted (exterior) and partially relandscaped, and that a new sidewalk is on the docket for sometime this month. It's a mess right now - all buckled and crazy. I'm surprised no one has taken a face plant on it yet.
6. I love that, after a first week of saying he hated it, that Joey has finally decided that he likes being on his football team. He's going to be a defensive end and possibly a tight end as well - I think it helped to know where he's going to be. He was kind of hoping for something a little more glamorous (who doesn't want to be th QB or RB or WR?) but now he's convinced that every position is important or else they wouldn't be out there.  He was so excited last night after practice that one of the coaches had watched him hit and told him "That's the way to make a hit, Joey!" I guess the coach even told a couple of the other guys later that they need to hit like Joey had.  And? He's totally adorable in his pads & helmet. :)

Alright, time to study. I was tempted to study blood bank today because I knew I'd know 99.9% of the answers, but I actually found that boring. How weird and sad to find it more interesting to realize how much you don't know.

I'm halfway through my last class. Yay! It's technically a class but it's actually a lab, and very specificially it's my clinical training, so there are no lectures involved. The lab goes M-Th from 4-7 pm and I've had to put in some extra time because I'm slow & methodical. I'm completely ok with that. I don't mind working hard, but I am truly sick of staring at notes & studying for tests.

What I'm really liking is that I can come home and watch TV and do household stuff. (If I was a better student I'd be reviewing hematological disorders for my lab, but the unknowns this week are open-book, so why?). I'm liking being able to be a wife & mom again. I'm far from being done w/school-related stuff, as my biggest hurdle - the board exam - is still ahead, but I'm enjoying this downtime at home while I have it.

I've been baking, and have even cooked a few real meals. I bought a carpet steam cleaner and have done a room per week for the last two weekends. I said this on my fb, but I'm still amazed at how brown the water is when I dump it out! The carpets really don't look all that different - fresher, yes, and minus a few spots but not necessarily cleaner - but apparently there was a lot of dirt down there. I'm really hoping to keep a cleaner house once school is done. I'm tired of living in filth.

It's kind of funny how I'm enjoying doing all these things that I used to consider a burden. I'm sure it won't take long before housework once again becomes a burden, but for now I'm going to ride the momentum and get some stuff done around here. On some level I think all I ever really wanted to be was a wife & mom so I like the opportunity to actually be those things. Run errands for Brian while he paints the house. Teach Bailey to bake. Watch the NASCAR race with Joey. That's the good stuff.

I've been trying to think of something good to write about. Here's the thing about being in school: you FRY your brain! And it refuses to think productive thoughts. Or even non-productive thoughts.

I'm on a break right now. Every time I hear that phrase "on a break" it makes me think of Friends, when Ross & Rachel were "on a break" and she went out with or slept with or something with some other guy. Or maybe he did. I don't remember, actually, because I grew very tired of that show a few seasons before it ended.

But yes, I am on a break. But not with my significant other. :) On a school break. Last week when the kids were at camp I took a day off from work and just said screw it and took the last 3 tests to close out the summer semester. I could have been more ready, but when you're in charge of your own test schedule (well, to a degree), you get to a point where you know you're not going to know any more tomorrow than you do today and the test just needs to get done. And that's the point I'd gotten to. I'm taking two Hematology classes this semester and finished both of them in the span of those two tests. I got the results of 1 back and it was an 87%. I could have done way better, but like I said, I was done. I should still get a A for the class, or close to it, as long as I didn't bomb the final. I'm not sure I care whether or not I did.

I have this week off from school and while I really should be doing things like giving my house the good deep cleaning it's been needing for, oh, about three years, what am I doing? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I come home from work, I watch TV, I mess around on the computer, and I may or may not make supper. I think I'm on burnout. And next week I have a Hematology lab from 4-8 pm M-Th for two weeks so I'm just enjoying my slovenly ways for a bit.

Have you see the website www.yearbookyourself.com? It's all the rage in my fb 'hood right now and it's the funniest thing ever. You upload your picture and then put it into a template of yearbook pictures that span every two years from 1950-2000. Check out this cute couple:

I actually didn't look a whole heck of a lot different than that when I graduated:

MelissaHighSchool

As you can see, my hair wasn't as big as the fake picture. But I would have loved it if it was! Ah yes, 1991.

Here's some exciting news: Last week was our county fair and as we do every year, Brian and I entered some of our homemade wine into the amateur wine competition. We got a 3rd, four 2nds, and a 1st. This might be the first time that all of the bottles we entered won something. Our first-place wine also won Best of Show for its class, so in addition to our blue ribbon we got a huge purple ribbon and a trophy. That's our second Best of Show trophy! This wine was a Cabernet Franc Ice Wine. It's a light red, very sweet wine from a kit. We'd entered it last year but got disqualified because the judges felt we had put it into the wrong category. But - the bottle was empty when we came to pick it up! We DQ'd you but helped ourselves to your entire bottle. Whatever. One of the judges tipped us off as to where they wanted to see it (we disagreed though, and still do but we put it where they wanted it this year to make them happy). So by playing by their rules we got ourselves a big ol' trophy. Good for us.

Hmm, I think that's it for this brain. Later!

Not long ago I listened to the VERY LAST online lecture of my CLS college life.

For my own entertainment, I will now comprise a list of the things I have left before I will be done, along with a rough estimate of exactly when these things will happen.

• Two tests for Hematology I (one on anemias, hemoglobinopathies, & thalassemias; and one comprehensive final)
• Two worksheets and two open-book quizzes for Hematology II (on anemias, hemoglobinopathies, & thalassemias)
• One test for Hematology II (on anemias, hemoglobinopathies, & thalassemias.....I know, convenient, huh?) All of these tests/quizzes will hopefully be finished by early next week but are due August 5 so I have some cushion time if I need it. I can't believe I'm ahead of schedule for once.
• One two-week lab (M-Th, 4-8 pm, August 10-20; this is Hematology III)
• A CLS final, given by UND, which will cover everything in the program (hematology, microbiology, blood bank, chemistry, coagulation, urinalysis, mycology, phlebotomy, blah, blah, blah) - probably September-ish
• My Medical Technology board exam (also called Clinical Laboratory Science board exam, depending on which organization you choose to become certified with; some people take both. I don't see the need.) Hopefully also September-ish, since the CLS final is designed to be similar to the board exam. I'm hoping I can just do one big study bender and be done with it.
• Graduation! UND actually comes down to Mayo to award diplomas to all of us in this program, as well as a couple of other programs they offer. This will be in November, and there will be an actual ceremony with robes and everything. In all honesty, while I appreciate that they do this for us (I've participated as faculty in the past and it is a nice ceremony), I'd just as soon they mail it to me. Somehow the second bachelor's degree doesn't feel like as big of an accomplishment as the first one did, especially when people at this point in their careers are usually working on Masters. Oh well. I chalk it up to making poor decisions back-when and am just grateful to have the opportunity to get to where I should have been fifteen years ago.

And then, I will stop posting stupid blog posts and fb status updates complaining about school! Woo-hoo!

Undcls

Every Clinical Laboratory Science student I've talked to has, at some point in their schooling, diagnosed either themselves or someone around them with some kind of rare and crazy disease that they've read about. Many disorders present with the same nonspecific symptoms: fatigue, lethargy, headache, malaise, etc. Show me one person - a student especially - who's not worn out and prone to the occasional headache!

So as a CLS student, it was with a very weird sort of delight that I discovered that I actually do have a disorder. But here's the thing: my disorder is in MY WORST SUBJECT!

Chemistry.

Ugh.

I went to the doctor the other day, thinking that I was messed up from my trip down the steps on my butt a couple of weeks ago, and in the process made a comment about being very tired lately. I've been anemic before, and thought it was happening again. Well, as it turns out, my hemoglobin (iron) is fine.....but my thyroid is messed up!

Dang hormones! I never understood them in the first place.

I guess I will go read up on thyroid function now. That will be one section of the board exam that I'll be sure to pass.

My poor blog, it's become so neglected. I promise one of these days I'll actually have something worthwhile to say. In the meantime, I'll try to scrape together a TonT.

Loathe:

• Being tired all the time.
• Watching my poor boy and his friends get crushed in three baseball games over the weekend. This was his second (and last) tournament of the season. We got to the point where we were just hoping for them to make some plays because there was no hope for them winning.
• Having to hear my little boy say, "I stink at baseball!" and try hard to fight back tears even though he was around his friends. :(  (For the record, he doesn't stink. He has some things he needs to work on, but I maintain that he's got potential to be a solid player, even if he never becomes a star.)
• Knowing that Joey's team that's been practicing for 5 weeks on a team we paid $60 for him to be on got crushed by a team of kids mostly a year older than them, that's been together since March, whose parents paid $500 for them to be on. Seriously! In third grade!
• Not losing weight like I've wanted to since we restarted South Beach a couple of weeks ago. I've lost 2 lbs. I started closer to my ideal weight this time so knew the weight loss would be less dramatic, but still I was hoping to see some better results. Oh well. Plug away, I guess.

Love:

• Watching my kids when they don't know I'm watching.
• Watching a project at work that I've been leading for almost a year finally come to fruition. We're working on getting everyone trained and will implement on July 21. The new process isn't perfect, but what process ever is? It's WAAY better than what we currently have. I feel such a sense of accomplishment, and I daresay I'm looking pretty good to the higher-ups! I had a great team, though...which goes a LONG way. I'm proud of them.
• Cuddle Time: a ritual in our house where all 4 of us pile onto Brian's & my bed and just watch something on TV. And cuddle. :) The kids are always asking, "Can we have Cuddle Time?" I love that they want to do it, even when we have to say no.
• The unpredictability and variety of midwestern weather. Last week it was pushing 100; today it's not even 70. As they say, if you don't like the weather in Minnesota, just wait a few minutes. Gorgeous weather is always nice, but I need it to change now & then. I could do without snow, though.
• Even though the games were not so great, at Joey's tournament last weekend I got to meet all of the parents. It was so much fun. In particular I spent a lot of time talking to the mom of a boy that Joey has gotten to be good friends with over the last half of the school year. Now they're on the same team for both tournament and house league baseball. I like her a lot. And the really cool thing is that they're thinking of switching their son to Schaeffer Academy after he finishes elementary school, just like we plan to do with Joey! Crazy. She said she's been praying for a good friend for her son, and to think that my guy might be the answer to her prayers just about makes me want to cry. In a good way.
• Holidays! Because they equal days off work!
• That Brian checked out the X-Files movie from the Bookmobile today. I'm finally going to see it, Kelly!

Are you bored yet? LOL

As aforementioned, I fully plan to give this blog some attention once I actually start having coherent thoughts again. :)

My father-in-law informed me yesterday that he read in the weekend paper that the school we'll be sending Bailey to next year just got approval from the state to go to a 4-day school week, as a cost-saving measure. We don't get the paper and the online version didn't say anything about it. And the school's website doesn't say anything either.

Three questions come to mind about this:

1. Is this official? Don't the parents get to vote on it? We signed the statement of faith which means that we get to vote on important matters. So either that doesn't take effect until fall when she's actually a student, or the vote took place before we were "in the system," or the parent vote hasn't taken place yet because they were waiting for the school board & the state to approve it first.
2. I find it a little bit curious that they didn't at least mention this to us as a possibility when we were interviewing. On the other hand, that was way back on March 2, so maybe the idea was still so far in its infancy that it wasn't worth mentioning. Maybe it hadn't even been born yet.
3. What will we do with Bailey on those off days when the rest of us suckers are at work/school? She regularly stays home by herself for a few hours at a time while we go out, and we have a security alarm, so she would probably be fine staying home by herself. Maybe I could give her a chore list or something. I would also have to find out if there's a state or city law concerning how old a child has to be in order to stay home alone, and for how long. For some reason I'm thinking it's 10, but I'm not sure. My mother-in-law said that Bailey could come to their house, but I don't know how serious she was. Also, we were hoping to completely do away with any day care costs as far as Bailey's concerned.

So I guess we'll see. Hopefully we will be hearing from the school soon so that we can figure out how this will all work. I'm not against it; on the contrary, I think it's a smart idea. Do you think I could convince the Mayo Clinic to follow suit so I could work a 4-day week? Nah, probably not.

I'm getting ready to go to bed but thought I'd hop on Vox for a second. It's a lot of work catching up on blogs!

If you are my Facebook friend then you might have seen that somehow I've actually managed to get A's in four of the five study guide courses I've taken this semester. Which is a shocker when you consider I've been averaging somewhere around an 80% for most of them. I guess that's considered good for these study guides, though, as they're meant to prepare us for the board exam and according to the coordinator, if we get a 70-80% then we're doing well. I can't help but hope that the boards aren't as tough as the study guides. Oh well, whatever. As long as I pass.

Oh yeah, I say "four of the five" because I'm still not done with Immunology. I was supposed to be done the 15th. I'm such a slacker. I'm getting there. Problem is, though, that the summer semester has already begun, in which I'm taking Hematology, with a lab that starts June 1. I think the assumption is that I've at least STARTED the lecture material before the lab. Yikes. I'm using Monday and also taking Tuesday and Friday of next week to get caught up, i.e. get done with Immunology. I've pretty much lost interest in it.

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Moving from the "being a student" to the "being a teacher" front, my CLS students finished their blood bank rotation today. They've completely spoiled me for any future classes I will ever have because they were so fun and all did so well. I will miss them but I'm happy to be able to focus on other things at work for a while, such as the huge project I've been leading for the last 11 months - I'm ready to wrap it up! And I know the students were ready to be done, as this is their last course before graduation.

Sheesh, what in the world am I going to do with myself with no school, no students, and the competency assessment procedure off my back? Maybe I'll get my personality back and will blog more!

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Tonight for supper I attempted to recreate the hamburger with cheese, bacon, & fried egg that I had for lunch the other day. They were pretty good, although not quite as good as Newt's. (Completely irrelevant side note: on that webpage for Newt's, the two blondes at the top of the page are my coworker's daughters.) Brian and the kids loved them, though. (The hamburgers, not the blondes.) I was going to take a picture to put up here but I didn't know where the camera was and I was hungry. Trust me when I say my hamburger looked stunning.

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Brian's going to run the Med-City Marathon on Sunday, his first ever. Tomorrow, Bailey and Joey are running the kids' marathon, where they had to run 25 miles in 1/2 mile increments. Tomorrow they will run 1.2 miles and then will get a medal. They'll get to cross the same finish line as the big people when they run the grown-up race. I'm hoping to get some pictures. Tell me why it is that my kids can run a mile without hardly trying, and for me to run a mile I have to train up to it and even then I can barely do it. I think my lack of endurance can only be explained by a mitochondrial disorder. (OK, not really.)

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We got a new roof this week thanks to some hail a few weeks ago. Insurance paid for it, minus the deductible. The guys who did the shingles did a nice job, but in the process wreaked plenty of havoc. Apparently they were thowing stuff down from the garage roof & somehow chipped the paint on the garage door. So they decided to go into the garage and look for some spray paint to "fix" it. (I know, right?) Well, in doing so they tripped the security system (we had been told they wouldn't need to get into the house so we'd set it when leaving for the day) and with no one around to disarm it, the police were dispatched. Then the dumb thing started going haywire and had gone off two additional times by the time Brian got home from work. I sure hope we don't get a fee from the police department. A guy came today and fixed that, so I guess we're good on the alarm system.

The roofers also messed up our DirecTV antenna while they were working, so we were without that for a day or so. (Thank goodness we could get the American Idol finale over the antenna!) When the guy came to fix it yesterday, we had figured all that was needed was a slight adjustment. Nope - we needed a whole new dish because whatever those crazy roofers did, they bent up the actual dish. How one would do that I have no idea, unless they dropped it. Anyway, that's all fixed and I think between the two repair calls the cost won't be too bad.

But the roof does look nice.

I haven't done this in forever! 

Today I loathe:

• My inability to finish this semester strong. I'm really struggling. It's not that I've lost interest in the subject matter, but I have lost interest in spending all my time on this. I'm fantasizing too much about actually having free time. :)
• Thinking about American Idol tonight, I will be very upset if Danny goes home. He's way better than Kris. Everyone knows Adam's going to win, so in a way I think tonight is the finale, Kris vs. Danny.
• That I heard this song on the radio today coming home from work and I can't figure out what it is! I didn't get a good enough grip on the lyrics to google them, the radio station doesn't post the songs they've played, and of course the DJ was no help. The song had kind of a Maroon 5-ish feel to it (but I know it wasn't M5), and there was a very simple but catch bass line at the beginning and throughout that had a very string-ish sound. (Does that make sense, it was the type of sound you'd hear in a band room, not on the radio.) Any ideas on what it might be? I'm streaming Maroon 5 on Pandora to see if it comes up (which I think it did sometime over the weekend).

Today I like:

• Awards night at AWANA. Not only that it's the end of year for the kids (which means we get our Tuesday nights back until fall), but they both finished their workbooks this year - which is no small feat! My kids make me proud. :)
• Brach's Milk Maid caramels. Yum.
• As aforementioned, American Idol. And speaking of reality TV, I'm happy that my team won on The Amazing Race.
• My students. We are on week 5 of 6 so I think we're all tired (and this is their last rotation before graduation so they've got to be so ready to be done!), but they're so good - smart, positive, cooperative, always have their stuff done, let me know if they're going to be late/absent. I got lucky but now I'm going to be spoiled for next year!
• That I borrowed an immunology book from a coworker that is actually helping me understand this stuff!
• This necklace & bracelet, part of what I got for hosting a Silpada party. I love how colorful & pretty they are.

Silpada

OK, gotta go. Happy Tuesday!