At First I Was Afraid, I Was Petrified...

Starting a new school, meeting new people, being expected to take in copious amounts of new knowledge is daunting enough on its own..add in a clinical placement in an area you've never been exposed to before..and panic really sets in.

Some of you may remember way back in December 2017, a little Snapchat video I made after a particularly stressful day of trying NOT to pass out. I had been on a specialist vascular surgical ward for roughly 2 weeks when one of the Sisters asked if I'd like to see a VAC dressing..."Sure!" I proclaimed..full of excitement and eager to learn..I had no idea at this point what a VAC dressing was.

Cross-section of a VAC dressing in situ

I bounced along joyfully to the patients bed space, ready to learn..not knowing what to expect..and that's when it happened. The sterile cloth was whipped off the patient to display a lovely..terrifying..forefoot amputation. I felt my insides quiver. My head went light, it seemed as though the floor had disappeared from beneath me. I looked at the patient, with my over-excited smile still stuck on my face, and almost certainly horror in my eyes, to see if he had noticed that I was about to pass out. And then I realised that I was holding my breath..and I should probably stop that. I took a big, deep breath, desperately trying to compose myself..I braved a second glance at the fresh amp..and suddenly my fight or flight response kicked in..it probably only took about 20 seconds in reality, but it felt like a lifetime..I began chatting to the patient, and slowly but surely we got through the dressing together. He was so kind about it, and actually found it hilarious that I was so taken aback that he mocked me for the rest of the day. At the end of that day, I was almost certain that Vascular nursing was not for me.

I spent the rest of my placement worried that I would be faced with a similar situation, knowing that I definitely would. I dreaded my theatre placement because I now felt that maybe I was a lot queasier than I had originally thought. All the years of taking care of my brother every time he injured himself had never turned my stomach, and yet all of a sudden I was doubting myself.
During my theatre placement however, I realised that the trick was to just keep breathing..as simple as it sounds..any time I felt light headed or queasy, I noticed I was holding my breath. I found a way to get out of my own head and although I knew there was a patient attached to the body part that the surgeon was tirelessly working away at, I found a way to overcome my fear.

Fast forward to the end of Year 1..in fact, my very last day on placement. I worked with a regular agency nurse who, up until now, I had only seen in passing. I had been on the same station for 2 weeks and knew most of my patients and their needs. At the start of the shift, we sat down together and made a plan, I asked if I could take charge of arranging discharges and changing dressings which she was happy for me to do. It felt so good that after such a tough year, someone had confidence in me and commended me for how I worked. Anything I was unsure about, I ran by her and the shift ran smoothly. We discharged half of our patients and I was writing up the notes when a Sister came
walking by and said "Zoe..do you want to come and change this larvae dressing?" I didn't even think twice about it.."yeh sure!" and up I got..without hesitation. 

Larvae before exposure to the wound

Sister undressed the wound..a forefoot amputation..asked if I knew how to redress with larvae and let me take the lead. I got stuck in, applying sudocrem to the edges of the wound to protect the healthy skin, I placed the maggots in their little teabag onto the sloughy area and placed a wet dressing over to give them a drink. I bandaged the foot up and the job was done. The lady was so lovely and had chatted away to me the whole time about nothing in particular. When I look back at how much I've progressed since the beginning of Year 1, I can honestly say I've come a long LONG way. I never imagined that I would feel perfectly happy and comfortable to touch an open amputation when I couldn't even look at one a few months ago. I felt a huge sense of achievement and am so proud of myself. 

To any new students, I would say take each day as it comes. Even if you are terrified, you will surprise yourself! 🎔


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My Journey Into Nursing

One of the most common questions I get asked is how I got into nursing. 

My path wasn't a conventional one. I didn't finish my A Levels and left school when I was 17. I felt that not knowing what career I wanted at that age, made University a waste of my time when I could be out working. So that's what I did. Over the years I have worked a range of jobs, from being a festival bar maid, to a ladieswear Supervisor. I did a short stint as a Sales Ledger/Bookkeeper and worked self-employed as a nail technician and spray tanner. I always wanted to be in a customer-facing role and felt really comfortable in leadership roles, its where I worked at my best.

One day I just thought I need to make a big change here..and that's where it all started. I applied for a few Care Assistant jobs with domiciliary companies and accepted an offer with an amazing company in Wolverhampton who gave me all my initial training and really put me on the right path. The support from them, even to this day has been unreal. Unfortunately, travelling was an issue for me, so I stepped down from my permanent role with them onto the bank, and moved into a residential care home. I spent almost 4 years there before leaving to have my daughter. Working in the care home had many ups and downs and gave me experiences that I will never forget. I loved my residents as you may know from previous blogs but felt that there wasn't much room for career progression for me. After having my daughter, I went to work for a GP surgery as a medical receptionist for a while and after my Grandad fell ill, I decided that I wanted to be a Paramedic..(Yes..I said Paramedic).

I started the Access to HE course with all intentions of applying for Paramedic Science, but again struggled to see where I could progress in the role (I didn't have a whole lot of info about this at the time) so I took some time to think things through and come up with a new plan before deciding to apply for Nursing with the view to becoming an Advanced Nurse Practitioner/Emergency Care Practitioner.

During the Access course I volunteered with St John Ambulance which I absolutely loved and I applied to my local Trust for Work Experience. Both of these helped with my application into University. I was originally applying for Bachelor of Nursing courses, when I stumbled across the MNurs course. The MNurs is an integrated masters degree and had much higher entry requirements so I applied on a whim, not thinking I would get in. I worked my little butt off to get good grades and to my amazement, managed to meet every single requirement for the MNurs..and here I am..I've just finished first year, and have 2 months off before starting the 2nd year of my course and 3rd year of overall studying. I will be 31 when I qualify and then have a lot more training planned to get to where I want to be. I know it will be hard work but its totally worth it!