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Instagram post 2185954718529320955_6816277 And as you become more successful,⠀
The amount of haters will grow. ⠀
There is a direct correlation⠀
As you check off more boxes⠀
Smiling as you go⠀
They are watching⠀
But do not forget⠀
You were not born to please other people. ⠀
Getting their approval ⠀
Was not part of your bucket list.⠀
Keep your head up 
And
Eyes fixed on your daydreams⠀
Because soon⠀
They will no longer be daydreams⠀
It will be your reality⠀
If you keep this mentality. ⠀
So⠀
Envision your future self often. ⠀
Set your intention daily.⠀
And get to work.⠀
-⠀
Sincerely,⠀
My exhausted jotted-down thoughts post nightshift 3 in a row. 😂 .
💾 Save this post for motivation 👍🏼
Instagram post 2184325088189709002_6816277 Y’all asked for ECMO education...I’m gonna break it down real simple. 👌🏼 ECMO stands for ExtraCorporeal Membrane Oxygenation. “Extra” = outside, “corporeal” = body so, outside of the body. Membrane oxygenation = oxygenation by a membrane. Outside of the body. Ya?

There are two types of ECMO. VA or VV ECMO. Veno-arterial or Veno-venous. First letter is where you’re pulling from and the second is where you’re returning blood. VA ECMO provides heart and lung support. VV is solely lung support. Blood is pulled from the body via cannulas and travels through an oxygenator to be oxygenated and for CO2 to be removed. We control the amount of CO2 removed via something called “sweep.” Then it is returned back to the body. ⠀
⠀
This treatment is a last resort for patients when other conventional therapies don’t work (max ventilator support, max pressors/inotropes, end stage heart failure etc) and there are contraindications of course. But it does work and use of ECMO is growing. ⠀
⠀
Examples of patients who may require ECMO include but are not limited to: septic shock, aspiration pneumonia, ARDS, pulmonary embolism, cardiomyopathies, myocarditis, cardiac arrest. The list goes on.⠀
⠀
These patients are SICKY SICK. K like not well. The ECMO specialist cannot leave the bedside, we are constantly monitoring these patient’s vitals, intake & output/fluid balance and also typically manage the CRRT machine along with it. We are responsible for maintaining therapeutic anticoagulation to maintain circuit integrity, checking pre and post oxygenator ABGs as well as patient ABGs, serial electrolytes, hourly pulse checks to make sure the big cannula doesn’t occlude perfusion to the lower extremities..managing sedation for patient and circuit safety, and sometimes paralytics for ventilator compliance or to decrease oxygen demand. ⠀
⠀
There is also another nurse doing patient cares, medications, possibly managing another device in addition. Who here does ECMO and who wants to?! Doesn’t want to? 😂😝 .

Save this for reference later 📋
Instagram post 2182341693549085563_6816277 TONIGHT AT MIDNIGHT. ⠀
⠀
Wow. If you would have told me a year ago that I would be designing and opening an online shop I would have laughed 😂. I have been working very hard over months and months to design some #nursemerch with a sassy and trendy flair to it. Over the years I’ve had numerous situations where I wanted to buy a nurse a graduation gift, thank you gift, etc, and I was so disappointed in the tacky stuff that’s out there today! (ive seen enough incorrect EKG clip art designs, thanks) Next thing you know I’m designing my own products... that I’m actually excited to gift to my friends and family that are nurses or in school! 🏩📝⠀
⠀
I feel like I have no idea what I’m doing combined with excitement combined with extreme gratitude FOR YOU. You guys that have followed along my nursing journey... YOU have made an amateur blog that was created to get through personal trauma, into a community that gets me excited to keep going, move past my struggles, and continue to spread positivity in nursing. So thank you, THANK YOU 💖⠀
⠀
Shop link will be posted tonight at midnight MST in stories. 💋
@lipstickandlifesaving
Instagram post 2180256768918308180_6816277 Rest In Peace Nonna ❤️
.
My sweet grandmother passed away this weekend surrounded by family. It was very unexpected and sudden, and I am so fortunate to have gotten to Canada in time to be with her when she passed. Also feeling so grateful she was able to make it to my wedding in Arizona just last month.

This was my first family member being cared for in the ICU. I always wondered over the years how this would go for me, and I am so wowed by the hospital staff who were so accommodating to me and my giant loud Italian family that took over the entire waiting room with people, pizza, and biscotti 😂
.
Not only that, our family included 5 nurses, 2 RTs, 1 medical student, and a million questions. You can only imagine how annoying we would be for that night nurse...but wow. She pulled up every CT, ABG, CBC we asked for, without a single roll of the eyes. This was closure for us. She also made EACH of us one of these EKG strips that she hand cut, and placed a heart bead with her favorite color. THIS is nursing. Don’t ever forget the little things you can do as a nurse in these situations. This meant the world to us.

Nonna you were a light in all of our lives. Always so happy, and had a social life I could only dream about. Heaven gained a beautiful angel this week 💖
Instagram post 2175612208598498198_6816277 This guy here is a Total Artificial Heart (TAH). 🖤⠀
⠀
It is implanted as a last resort for biventricular failure either as a bridge to heart transplant or as destination therapy (this stays in forever). The patient’s ventricles and valves of the heart are completely removed and this goes in their place. Crazy right? 🤯⠀
⠀
In this picture you can see the mechanical metal valves and if you look closely in the middle you can see yes, that is VELCRO that attaches the two plastic ventricles together. The flappy suction cup looking parts around the valves are sutured to the patient’s atria. ⠀
⠀
These patients are usually in the ICU for months...but once they become stable, they are able to go home attached to a 13.5 pound portable pump that runs on battery, and worn as a backpack or shoulder bag. This becomes their new way of life. 🎒⠀
⠀
Who’s taken care of a TAH patient before? Opinions on this therapy? Would you say yes to this if it was your last option to live⁉️
Instagram post 2171229601102553105_6816277 One of my posts from a few years back but still a good reminder to my fellow nurses as winter rolls around 🏥⠀
⠀
“Patients do not put their trust in machines or devices. They put their trust in you. You have already spent years studying, training, doing research & seeing patients. And you likely have many years of education before you. ⠀
⠀
But please remember the more skilled you become, the more specialized you become, and the more dependent on technology you become — the easier it becomes to lose your humanity, forget your compassion, and ignore your instincts. ⠀
⠀
I have one last piece of advice: Never ever lose your moral compass.” 🖤 Margaret Hamburg, MD⠀
⠀
In this photo the patient is on ECMO, Impella, CRRT, and a ventilator.
Instagram post 2167776739236018984_6816277 Back to reality, but forever in the honeymoon phase with you 🥰💕
Instagram post 2166988458923700901_6816277 No costume necessary for this little boo 😻⠀
Happy Halloween!! 🖤🎃👻
Instagram post 2164105909876567483_6816277 and then i realized⠀
that to be more alive⠀
i had to be⠀
less afraid⠀
so i did it⠀
i lost my fear⠀
and gained my⠀
whole life 🌿
Instagram post 2163375963684331623_6816277 Behind every successful woman,
is a tribe of other successful women who have her back 💕
.
Nursing is too stressful of a profession to tear each other down. We all need to support one another, & nurture each other’s growth - whether you have days, months, or years experience. We all have something to share and contribute. YES YOU. Girls compete with one another. But women empower each other.
.
Tag some of your work bffs that build you up 🙌🏼 or laugh WITH YOU when 💩 hits the fan 😂
.
Mine are @em_bracken @brianabuenoo @jusi_j @elyshabeth @_thatsamoangirl @beebreezy @maryykaii and of course @themaddiward if we worked together haha maybe one day 😜🤷🏻‍♀️

Lipstick & Lifesaving

Nursing

10 Things You MUST Know Before Nursing School

February 16, 2018February 24, 2018

Whether you’ve been accepted into nursing school or are thinking about nursing as a career, nursing school usually places most students in a shock state pretty quickly. I knew I wanted to work in the medical field throughout high school and had heard nursing school was pretty intense. You have no idea how difficult – until reality smacks you in the face and you have your first meltdown day one. Completely normal I might add.

Here’s what you should know before you start your journey to placing that RN after your name.

1. You will have no life. Let’s just start with the truth. Your life will 100% revolve around everything that is nursing school. Whether it’s studying for nursing school, crying about nursing school, failing a test in nursing school, not sleeping in nursing school, going to clinical (in nursing school), and maybe actually enjoying nursing school. Your days are packed with classes. Even more so if you’re taking other gen-eds. Then after class you’re studying or doing your write-up for clinicals the next day. Relationships will be challenged, your social life will decline. Accept this and you’ll be okay.

2. Study groups can help or hurt you. Some study groups are awesome. If you stay engaged and focused, you can learn a lot from other people. Stuff that you maybe zoned out on in class or missed reading yourself. Make sure you demonstrate some contribution to the group. You don’t want people to think you’re mooching off their notes/knowledge. Other groups can encourage distraction and negative talk. If you find yourself in one of these groups, slip away and start studying yourself. You’re just wasting precious time and sleep hours.

3. Suck up to your professors. You need these people on your side. Whether it’s for clinical assignments, your grade on a paper, or writing you a letter of rec. Some of them might even work part time in a hospital you’re interested in.

4. Get organized. You will have so many things going on at once, your organizational skills have to be top notch. Get yourself a nice planner, colored pens/highlighters. Try your best to schedule in some down time. Whether it’s going out to dinner with friends or having a hobby, you really do need the balance during these stressful years.

5. Be okay with a bad grade. High school may have been easy for you, but nursing school is a whole separate world. You WILL get a bad grade and you WILL be okay. Use it to motivate you to do better next time. Your GPA really doesn’t matter as much in nursing school. As long as you pass your classes, you’ll most likely have a job after school. Hospitals are more interested in your experience and extracurricular involvement than GPA.

Nursing school books and laptop

6. You will be up early and stay up late. All the time. Classes and clinical start early. Like 5am clinical early. Sleep when you can, and fill yourself up with nutrition. Know the time when sleep is more helpful than studying more. There were nights where I knew I wouldn’t retain anything past 2am and times where I had enough energy to study more. Listen to your body.

7. Get a job in the hospital. If you can handle a job throughout nursing school, I highly recommend working or volunteering on a unit you’re interested in. This is for a number of reasons. First, you get to know the staff/management and they can see your work ethic. Second, nursing school barely brushes on your clinical skills. You really do learn mostly everything on the job, so this gives you a head start on learning the nurse’s role, as well as the coordination of care between the interdisciplinary team. And third, some hospitals only hire internal applicants, so this would already put you in the hospital system. The hospital I work at now has started to only hire internal applicants.

8.Build your resume throughout school. Volunteer, join clubs, etc. Hospitals want students that go above and beyond the basic requirements to graduate. You can read more about how to build your resume on my blog post here.

9. There is a lot of poop. And vomit. And bile and mucus and blood. Maybe you’ll have some shmegma action? (HA look that one up). Now of course after you graduate this may vary depending on what unit you’re hired into, but during school you will have lots of experience with the above. Oh yes indeed. When an RN has a student for the day they’ll be sure to give you that “learning experience.” Nursing is not a clean job. You’ll have to be okay dealing with the bodily fluids of complete strangers with infections, with scabies, with someone trying to punch you while you’re cleaning them up. Nursing is so rewarding sometimes.

10. Connect with everyone you meet. You really do get hired based off of people you know. That’s just the reality in most cases. Introduce yourself to the manager at clinical, befriend your preceptors. You never know if one of those connections will help get you a job after you graduate. As lame as this sounds, I had business cards made with basic contact info for people I wanted to stay connected with.

 And lastly,

I hate to say this but, not every RN you work with in clinical is going to be nice to you. They might very obviously make you aware that they don’t like having students. This is unfortunately common and something that makes nursing school not so fun. Regardless of who you work with in clinical, just try and make the most of your hospital time. Some days the RN may let you do a lot of things hands-on, other days you may just be more of a shadow. Learn as much as you can with both scenarios, don’t be afraid to ask questions, and write down everything you don’t understand – so you can refer back to it when you have time to look things up. You retain so much more if you have a mental picture of a patient associated with a diagnosis/medication.

I hope I didn’t scare you away from starting nursing school because it really is worth it in the end. I just wanted to give you a touch of realism to counteract what most people hear about being a nurse (money, working 3 days a week, being ridiculously sexy in scrubs…etc). Please, do not go into this profession for those reasons. It’s not easy work! You truly have to have the passion to care for people, the drive to work hard for long hours at a time, and the confidence to advocate for your patients and yourself when challenged.

Any questions about my nursing school experience or anything at all? Leave them below!

10 Things to know before starting nursing school

TAGGED WITH: critical care, icu, intensive care, medicine, nurse, Nursing, nursing school, registered nurse
6 Comments on 10 Things You MUST Know Before Nursing School

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6 comments on “10 Things You MUST Know Before Nursing School”

  1. Anonymous
    September 24, 2019 at 2:56 pm

    To be a pediatrician nurse. Do I have to go to a SPecial course or school for it?

    Reply
    • lipstickandlifesaving
      September 24, 2019 at 6:24 pm

      To be a pediatric nurse you don’t need any more schooling in addition to your nursing degree, but hospitals prefer if you have lots of pediatric experience during nursing school.

      Reply
  2. elsa
    December 16, 2018 at 1:12 pm

    I just finished my first semester of the *actual* nursing program, and my first year of being an aide on a hospital floor. Working as an aide prior to nursing school has made my first semester SO much easier. I feel like I am much more comfortable and confident on the unit than my fellow nursing students; however, I can see bad habits that I developed unknowingly as an aide slipping over into my work as a nursing student. I also did not anticipate how different the two roles would be. Nursing is *so* different than aide work. I’m not sure what the point of this comment is exactly, but I just wanted to agree that working in the hospital before school is very helpful, but please be intentional about not developing bad habits!! It will make your clinical experience go so much more smoothly 🙂

    Reply
  3. Holly Harris
    February 24, 2018 at 1:40 pm

    I am currently working in an office environment and taking my prerequisites for nursing school. When I start actual nursing school, I’d theoretically like to work part time in a hospital environment to get clinical experience, but I’m not sure what kind of jobs I could do without any type of nursing license. I’d love to hear some ideas in a future post! Thanks for the blog!

    Reply
    • lipstickandlifesaving
      February 25, 2018 at 3:00 am

      Hey Holly! You could definitely be a volunteer to start. Or once you’re in nursing school, that qualifies you to be a nurse’s aide in most hospitals. That’s what I would suggest doing! Good luck!

      Reply
    • Nichole Cupo
      March 1, 2019 at 2:14 pm

      Patient care assistant, Certified nurse assistant. Its a three to six week course. google in your area!

      Reply

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author

Hi, I'm Marissa.

I'm an ICU Nurse on the nightshift. Here you can find some education & motivation, along with a touch of sarcasm to keep you sane in a difficult but rewarding career. Thank you for stopping by!
signature

instagram


Instagram post 2185954718529320955_6816277
And as you become more successful,⠀
The amount of haters will grow. ⠀
There is a direct correlation⠀
As you check off more boxes⠀
Smiling as you go⠀
They are watching⠀
But do not forget⠀
You were not born to please other people. ⠀
Getting their approval ⠀
Was not part of your bucket list.⠀
Keep your head up 
And
Eyes fixed on your daydreams⠀
Because soon⠀
They will no longer be daydreams⠀
It will be your reality⠀
If you keep this mentality. ⠀
So⠀
Envision your future self often. ⠀
Set your intention daily.⠀
And get to work.⠀
-⠀
Sincerely,⠀
My exhausted jotted-down thoughts post nightshift 3 in a row. 😂 .
💾 Save this post for motivation 👍🏼

Instagram post 2184325088189709002_6816277
Y’all asked for ECMO education...I’m gonna break it down real simple. 👌🏼 ECMO stands for ExtraCorporeal Membrane Oxygenation. “Extra” = outside, “corporeal” = body so, outside of the body. Membrane oxygenation = oxygenation by a membrane. Outside of the body. Ya?

There are two types of ECMO. VA or VV ECMO. Veno-arterial or Veno-venous. First letter is where you’re pulling from and the second is where you’re returning blood. VA ECMO provides heart and lung support. VV is solely lung support. Blood is pulled from the body via cannulas and travels through an oxygenator to be oxygenated and for CO2 to be removed. We control the amount of CO2 removed via something called “sweep.” Then it is returned back to the body. ⠀
⠀
This treatment is a last resort for patients when other conventional therapies don’t work (max ventilator support, max pressors/inotropes, end stage heart failure etc) and there are contraindications of course. But it does work and use of ECMO is growing. ⠀
⠀
Examples of patients who may require ECMO include but are not limited to: septic shock, aspiration pneumonia, ARDS, pulmonary embolism, cardiomyopathies, myocarditis, cardiac arrest. The list goes on.⠀
⠀
These patients are SICKY SICK. K like not well. The ECMO specialist cannot leave the bedside, we are constantly monitoring these patient’s vitals, intake & output/fluid balance and also typically manage the CRRT machine along with it. We are responsible for maintaining therapeutic anticoagulation to maintain circuit integrity, checking pre and post oxygenator ABGs as well as patient ABGs, serial electrolytes, hourly pulse checks to make sure the big cannula doesn’t occlude perfusion to the lower extremities..managing sedation for patient and circuit safety, and sometimes paralytics for ventilator compliance or to decrease oxygen demand. ⠀
⠀
There is also another nurse doing patient cares, medications, possibly managing another device in addition. Who here does ECMO and who wants to?! Doesn’t want to? 😂😝 .

Save this for reference later 📋

Instagram post 2182341693549085563_6816277
TONIGHT AT MIDNIGHT. ⠀
⠀
Wow. If you would have told me a year ago that I would be designing and opening an online shop I would have laughed 😂. I have been working very hard over months and months to design some #nursemerch with a sassy and trendy flair to it. Over the years I’ve had numerous situations where I wanted to buy a nurse a graduation gift, thank you gift, etc, and I was so disappointed in the tacky stuff that’s out there today! (ive seen enough incorrect EKG clip art designs, thanks) Next thing you know I’m designing my own products... that I’m actually excited to gift to my friends and family that are nurses or in school! 🏩📝⠀
⠀
I feel like I have no idea what I’m doing combined with excitement combined with extreme gratitude FOR YOU. You guys that have followed along my nursing journey... YOU have made an amateur blog that was created to get through personal trauma, into a community that gets me excited to keep going, move past my struggles, and continue to spread positivity in nursing. So thank you, THANK YOU 💖⠀
⠀
Shop link will be posted tonight at midnight MST in stories. 💋
@lipstickandlifesaving

Instagram post 2180256768918308180_6816277
Rest In Peace Nonna ❤️
.
My sweet grandmother passed away this weekend surrounded by family. It was very unexpected and sudden, and I am so fortunate to have gotten to Canada in time to be with her when she passed. Also feeling so grateful she was able to make it to my wedding in Arizona just last month.

This was my first family member being cared for in the ICU. I always wondered over the years how this would go for me, and I am so wowed by the hospital staff who were so accommodating to me and my giant loud Italian family that took over the entire waiting room with people, pizza, and biscotti 😂
.
Not only that, our family included 5 nurses, 2 RTs, 1 medical student, and a million questions. You can only imagine how annoying we would be for that night nurse...but wow. She pulled up every CT, ABG, CBC we asked for, without a single roll of the eyes. This was closure for us. She also made EACH of us one of these EKG strips that she hand cut, and placed a heart bead with her favorite color. THIS is nursing. Don’t ever forget the little things you can do as a nurse in these situations. This meant the world to us.

Nonna you were a light in all of our lives. Always so happy, and had a social life I could only dream about. Heaven gained a beautiful angel this week 💖


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