Totally Discombobulated

The past few days have been a complete blur. Last week, I put in a lot of longer days early in the week, so I left work early (about 2pm) to make a total of about 46 hours in for the week. Before I left, I called to verify that the agency I scheduled to staff that evening still had my nurse on their schedule and I was ASSURED that she would be there for the 6-6 shift. ASSURED. Had a nice afternoon with Mike running around town, then hopped on the spinner for a nice long workout. About 2 minutes after I got going, the phone rang - the 6-6 night nurse didn't show up. Choice. As usual, no one was available or answering their phones to cover the shift. One of my pool nurses did agree to cover the shift until midnight, then I went in at midnight to finish out the shift. I would like to thank this SUCKY agency who I will respectfully not name (Staff One Staffing Network - OK I lied) for the most tired I have been in a while. It made for a long day - got up at 4am Friday, worked, worked out, worked again, then finally got to go to bed about 730 Saturday morning. Major Suckage, I wont lie. I actually walked the unit halls from 0330-0430 because I was afraid if I sat down I might go to sleep. I was whooped by the time I got my crack into the sack and slept for a few hours until about 1230. The thing with working nights is I never know what to do for sleep. I'm not used to them so I don't sleep well, and I don't want to sleep a full 8 or I wont get to sleep that night and get back to normal. The I walk around in a giddy daze until its bedtime again.

Saturday was really a wash. I slept til 1230, then got up tried to shake the fog off, dinked around the house and then we watched movies for awhile, then went to bed. I was scheduled for a 10 mile run according to plan, but just couldn't do it - it was freezing-brrr cold out and I felt like a limp dishrag.

Sunday I was feeling back to normal again finally. Got in 99 minutes on the elliptical as hard as I could go (that's the highest it will let me go - apparently the machine is anti-triple digits). Not quite my 10 miler, but punishment enough.

Monday, I was off to make up for the night shift and the 53 hour work week last week. Yahoo! I slept in, puttered around the house a while, then climbed on the spinner. Mike and I were planing to go run at the Y that night for the 2 hours Lucas had drivers ed, so was going to get in some good solid activity hours. No sooner did I climb on the spinner, the phone rang. It was my boss. The NOC nurse had called in sick. Might want to prepare to work tonight, its not looking promising for a replacement. Crap. Crappity crap crap. Since there was really nothing I could do, I got back on the bike and did spinning drills for the next 2+ hours. I got in to work at 6pm to report for a 12 hours shift. I was having a really hard time keeping track of timelines. Mrs so-and-so has a procedure on Wednesday - tomorrow right? Well in a couple hours tomorrow will be Wednesday, but for right now tomorrow is Tuesday. I had several conversations like that during that shift. That's where NOC shift gets weird. Tomorrow is tomorrow except when it really is another day forward and yesterday is subjective too. Totally confusing. Did I mention the night shift I worked Monday was also a full moon? That's never good - makes for a crazy night. Anyone that says the full moon stuff isn't true has never worked one with patients, its all true, every last word.

Got home at 7am and instead of going to bed, I had to wait up a little bit since school was delayed an hour due to getting 8 inches of snow (blech). Got the kids up at 0730, asked them to please let the dogs out of my room when they came home for lunch (so they wouldn't wake me up) and headed to the nest. Slept. like. crap. They were plowing the parking lot behind us (that one no one uses. ever. ) for hours. Once I finally got sleeping good, the boys were home for lunch, With their friends. The loud boys slammed things around the kitchen. They talked in their loudest outside voices. NO ONE came to let the dogs out of my room as planned. Pretty soon I hear someone yell "Hey - isn't your mom trying to sleep?!?!?!" Uh yeah, I was. Not so much anymore. So after a whopping 3 hours in bed I staggered downstairs to the kitchen where food was flying out of the cupboard faster than I even thought possible. The microwave was going, the pizza oven was cooking, the quesadilla grill was oozing cheese out the side. I let the dogs out and waited for the loud boys to leave so I could try to go back to sleep. I tried to go back to bed for an hour or so, without any luck. So I got up and plopped my tired butt onto the sofa and caught up with my bloggie buddies everywhere.

When Mike got home, he wanted to go to the Y to run. I wanted to curl up in a ball and go to bed. He won. We ran an easy 4 at the indoor track and I am glad I did. It was the first time for the Garmin footpod, and I was pleased with not having to count out 15 laps to the mile. It makes the time just fly by not having to be painfully aware of each and every lap. What I like about running indoors there is that there are usually a few people running or walking the track when we get there. We run. Some people leave. We keep running. More people show up, walk a couple laps or run them. We keep running. It feel good to see them all leave while we keep going, until they are all gone and we are the only ones left. I might be slow, but I can outlast them all when the distance gets long.

Today I am off work again, the last of my time to make up for the extra night shift before heading back tomorrow. I finally feel like my head is on straight again. I am fixing to get on the spinner for a couple of hours, but I am little scared. The pattern the past week has been climb on, spin for 5, pick up the phone and get called in to work NOCS. Send me good vibes people - I can't take another one right now!