Grant me some wisedom

I finally got my earning statements today!!My daughter birth certificate came through too so they were sent away to the grant people and fingers crossed I will hear within the next couple of weeks.

It is the last thing really that I have to get sorted out now before going to Uni and it is the big one. I really hope they don't need anything else from me and that it doesn't take them forever to process it.

I rang the doctors yesterday about my blood results and I have to have the MMR vaccine!! Grr. I was kind of expecting it as I knew I hadn't had mumps or been vaccinated, but what was annoying was the fact that the measles and mumps blood test came back as untested. Apparently they have trouble testing for that and couldn't do it?? It basically means that the blood test was a waste of time as now I have to have the full vaccine anyway.

The car is again being a pain in the arse. More major work has to be done it now before I head away on holiday which is going to cost me a small fortune. Less drinking spending money to take away with us and more to be pumped into that worth piece of junk outside. I can't complain I suppose. The amount we paid for it was minimal and a few things needing doing here and there are expected.

It will probably blow up on me now, I am not allowed to be optimistic.

I found out loads info about the course this week regarding uniforms and placements. I know exactly what our uniform is going to look like (not too minging) and I also found out a rough timetable for next year.

Placements start in January and then apart from 4 weeks off in February for uni, a week off in March and two weeks for exams in May it is all placements.

I am so excited but I know how tough it is going to be be. I expected far more placements than normal as I am doing the two qualifications combined into one, and to be honest I am glad. The more time spent in actual hospitals the better as far as I am concerned.

This time in 7 weeks I will be preparing for my first day.

Eleph XxX

Pushing that big red button

I have had one of those, OMG is this really going to be me moments and it has freaked me out a little bit.
Life has been crap to be honest. I have wasted the last 10 years of my life trying to be a good partner and supporting someone that didn't deserve me. Yes, I am a mother and have bought up three wonderful children, but on a personal level it has been the biggest waste of a decade and I am devastated at losing so much time needlessly.

So here I am standing on the brink of a whole new world. In the past year I have done so much. I have moved away from my old life, put the past as far behind me as is possible. I have found a new home, a new lifestyle so different to the old one, a new man who is miles away from anything I am used to, and now I am on the edge of becoming a student working towards a professional qualification that will map out my future career.......me, scared?..........HELL YES!!!!

I really don't think it has fully sunk in yet. I keep having to remind myself that it is no longer just an idea in my head, that I write about online or talk about with words. It is actually happening and come September I am going to be leaving my boring little comfort bubble and heading off into the big wide world. There will be new people, new places, new knowledge, new challenges, new hardship, new failures, new successes, new dangers, new low points, new high points, new everything.

I have thought about university, I have thought about walking in and meeting people and sitting in lectures taking in the information that is thrown at me and hopefully making sense of it all. I have thought about the essays and learning outcome and the new skills and practices that I will have to master and perform. I had even thought about placements, about uniforms and timetables and travelling to hospitals.

But I had never thought about me; little old me, walking in on my first ever placement and actually becoming a nurse.

I will be there, I may not do much to start with; I may just be blended into the background to observe, take note and to experience the whole situation. But I will be there. In the environment I have long dreamed and wished for.

Little old me.

My heart skipped a bit, the blood rushed to my head and for a second I went cold.

This is finally real.

Eleph XxX

Creeping along

I am slowly but surely making progress in getting everything done in time for the start of school and university.

This week has been productive and I have managed to get my medical done, which included bloods being sent off to be tested for immunity to all the diseases i am at risk of catching. My new doctor was lovely and made sure I had everything sorted and filled in. I have to wait a week for the blood results to come back and hopefully I won't need any jabs done and then I can get all the health forms sent back.

I discovered from my mum that I only had a measles injection done as a child. She said the MMR wasn't around when I was a baby (how old does that make me feel) and she thinks I had my rubella done in school. I definitely had my BCG done and have the scar to prove it. So that means I have never been vaccinated against mumps. It came as quite a shock to me considering that my two youngest elephants have both been ill with it recently and I could of caught it off them and been sick at any time!!

Hopefully I have developed immunity off them and not shown any symptoms.....well can always live in hope right?

The only other vaccine I will need then is the Hep C one. The occy health department of my placement hospital should provide that so I won't have to pay silly money at the doctors to get it done. Luckily my doctor only charged me the regular fee for a consultation so I wasn't too out of pocket for the day.

I have finally sent off my grant application today though it is still incomplete. I still haven't received the statements I need through and I am raging about it. Everyone who is applying seems to be having particular trouble with this department when it comes to giving out statements. I just cannot see what takes so long. I couldn't wait any longer though before putting the forms in.

In a few weeks time all the traditional route offers will be out and then every local authority grant office will be flooded with applications. I need mine sorted straight away as I cannot afford the student registration fees that need to be paid in September. We need proof of our grant to be able to register with the university and not have to pay that money out of our own pocket. If we don't have proof we have to cough up and then get it reimbursed to us whenever the local authority see fit. Usually months after the fact!!

I also got my cheque for the little elephants school stuff so we went out today and got all their uniforms and school books sorted. They still need shoes but that is pretty easy to do. I say that but in all honestly shoes are usually the biggest problem when it comes to back to school. Especially in my eldest daughters case. They have to be exactly to her specifications or else there is a sulk. She doesn't always know what these specifications are though before we head to the shops, so as you can imagine things turn ugly.

I just hope these stupid statements come before I have to go away in August. We won't be back till towards the end of August and I just cannot leave it till then to get them sent in. My grant will be very late then and god knows what will happen.

Arrrrggggh so frustrating!!

Eleph XxX

The Butterfly Effect...(No not the movie!)

I have come to the conclusion that for every good bit of luck we have in this life something crappy has to happen to counterbalance. Well this seems to apply to me anyway. I know a few very jammy individuals who always get it good and don't deserve it either. I am hoping  (deep down) that the universe is saving up all their bad luck to take them out in one big catastrophe. I can live in hope anyway.

On Friday when I collected the post I was amazed to find an A5 brown envelope addressed to me from the university I got into. I could not believe I had received stuff from them already considering I only got my offer two days before. Inside was a load of info from the nursing department regarding the start of the university term, when I will have to be in for orientation and hospital choices.

I will mainly be training in the big city children's hospital. But as my degree is an integrated one I have to general adult placements too. I had a choice of two hospitals in the city. The one I chose I did so purely because of travelling distance.

I am having to commute into the big city everyday to university from my rural countryside home. It will involve a car drive to the train station, an hour long train journey and then a bus to university. Although this seems drastic and a lot of hassle there is no way I can move. I am what is classed as a non traditional mature student (i.e I am old) and I have baby elephants too and I am not prepared to uproot them. Yes is going to be difficult, but I have found a fabulous childminder, have a wonderful partner willing to support me all the way, and with the kids all being in school most of the day they will only really miss out on 4 hours, maybe less, a day with me. The benefits of finally getting a qualification and being able to go out to work far outweighs the barriers I could put up.

Anyway, back to the hospital choices. When I am on placement I am going to have to drive to the big city as no trains run that early. I plan on parking my car in the tram car park avoiding having to drive into the city centre, and then get the tram into the city. It will then only be a short walk to either the children's hospital or to the general one I have chosen. The other general one on offer is near the university. Although I will be doing that journey everyday usually, it will involve another bus journey from the uni or a long walk and I would just prefer to make it easier on myself when I am going to be up at about 4am those mornings!!

So I chose which hospital I wanted and got the form back in the post to the uni straight away. The places are on a first come, first served basis, but because I am a mature student who got their offer earlier than the traditional route applicants I am hopeful I will get my first choice.

Also in the envelope was an occupational health form from the children's hospital. I have to go to my GP and get a basic medical. I also have to fill out a self declaration regarding my health and my GP has to sign it. Pretty straight forward really. I do however have to prove I have had the MMR vaccination. Now I got onto my mum about this one. I of course was a kid when I had this done and have no record of it, and I don't fancy having to go to my GP so she can rob me blind do a blood test to prove I am immune. Fingers crossed mum comes up with the proof.

So that was all good. It made it all very real, especially as the occupational health forms had pre-employment declaration written on them and I have to send them back to the hospital personnell department. I think it finally sunk in....I am going to be a nurse!!  I am still waiting on my proof of earnings to come through so I can apply for my grant. If it is not here by Monday I am calling again to get narky about it. 

But then came the bad luck.

Firstly my youngest elephant got sick. A horrible childhood illness that means he is in pain, cannot eat, is vomiting and generally feeling rubbish. He is very rarely sick and doesn't handle it well poor lad. I have been up the past two nights with him and I now resemble a tramp who has been in the same dressing gown and pyjamas for two days with hair that looks like I have had a nasty electric shock.This has now meant that trips  I had planned to do not being able to go ahead, which means the other elephants have been bored out of their minds and complaining.

To top the bad luck off nicely my car decided to give up the ghost. I took a quick trip to the shop and on my way back there was a bang and lots of grinding. I am hoping to god it is just a clutch problem. Although this will mean having to pay out stupid money to fix it at least it within my budget. If it is the gearbox I may as well forget it. I could buy a much newer car for what they would be looking for to fix it. I cannot be without a car and have no money to get a new one.

I feel a disaster waiting to happen

Eleph XxX

By George she did it!!

Cue much running around, flailing arms in the arms in the air and making noises like an over stimulated monkey...

I GOT IN TO UNIVERSITY!!


There, I have now announced it in big bold letters across the Internet so it must be true, it has to sink in, it is now part of history.

Yikes I'm going to be sick.

5.30am did not look attractive, but I know it is a sight I have to get used to. I didn't need my alarm to wake me up, my body naturally wrenched itself out of the deep sleep I was, surprising, in and after that there was no going back. I wandered down the the kitchen and got a huge glass of water to wake myself up (yes I drank it and refrained from throwing it in my face) and then trudged up to the computer. I so wished I had stayed in bed longer. The half hour wait I had till 6am was a killer.

But finally it came and when I managed to get my hands to stop shaking for long enough to type in my log in details, there in small letters,  but with rapturous volume, was my offer. At first I was confused, stupid me hadn't learnt my choice codes off by heart and it showed the code of the course I had been offered rather than it being written in plain English, so I had to trawl through to check which course I had applied for to see which one is actually was.

So this is it, I got in, as of September I will officially be a student nurse. I am thrilled. I cannot believe I made it through this awful, long, drawn out process of application and came out the other end without needing psychotic drugs  successful.

Eleph XxX

Prayer to the god of technology...

Dear O' Great One,

Please let my incompetent ISP be having a uncharacteristically good day and allow my internet to work. So that when I drag my bum out of bed at 5.55am, and fumble to turn on my trusty computer while filled with nerves and anxiety about whether I have actually managed to secure a place at university, I am not met with the server not found screen which will lead to my head exploding, the fires of hell being shot from my nose and me subsequently murdering anybody that is unlucky enough to be in local vicinity....


Thank you :-)

Eleph XxX

Where art thou Mr Postman??

One of the biggest downfalls of becoming a student definitely has to be the paper work that comes along with it.

Now after years of working in admin I have a kind of unhealthy obsession with form filling and the like. I enjoy knowing exactly how processes work and making sure all the right boxes are ticked and the procedures followed.

During this entire process I have made sure I am one step ahead in knowing what is going on and that I am ready to go the next step fully prepared and armed to the hilt with all the right info. I have even passed all this onto others on various forums where other wannabee students (who don't know how to use google) ask the same questions over and over again, and I provide this with glee and satisfaction.

The biggest annoyance though is having to rely on the competence of other administrators who are clearly getting paid far too well to take enormous breaks and sit on their hands (and arses) all day and not do their jobs before leaving way to early!!

All I need is a simple piece of paper stating how much money I earned in a certain period. A statement showing my name, address and a figure of yearly income with a breakdown of what this figure is made up of.

Simple huh?

Apparently not so. Why oh why would it take over 3 weeks for this piece of information to be sent out? How much time does it take to bring up my file, put the dates into the drop down box and press print???!!!!

It must be beyond the scope of a regular civil servant and they are obviously waiting on a highly skilled, professional trained, MI5 agent to come crack the code needed to produce this document!!!

The longer I wait for this the closer I get to having to wait months for my grant application the then be processed. It is already a well known fact that grant applications disappear into the local authority black hole for months at a time only to emerge worse for wear at the other end. The quicker I get this application in before the masses decide to do the same the better. 

I have everything else sorted but this one bloody piece of paper and there is nothing I can do to make it come any faster.

Sigh...

Eleph XxX