Test Taking Anxiety

Last week our class put on a health fair. We all had to do a poster on a "Healthy People 2010" related subject. Our group chose Test Taking Anxiety. Since this is a subject that is so very near and dear to many of our hearts I am including some of the information gathered for you here...

Useful websites for general study information:
http://www.studygs.net
http://sas.calpoly.edu/asc/ssl.html
http://www.howtostudy.org/
http://www.d.umn.edu/student/loon/acad/strat/
http://appserv.pace.edu/execute/page.cfm?doc_id=5114

Test Taking Anxiety:
http://www.counsel.ufl.edu/selfHelp/testAnxiety.asp
http://www.couns.uiuc.edu/brochures/testanx.htm
http://www.testtakingtips.com/anxiety/
http://www.studentlife.villanova.edu
http://www.wright.edu/cps/studentsuccess/testanxiety.htm

General college stress information:
http://www.campusblues.com/
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~acskills/success/stress.html
http://appserv.pace.edu/execute/page.cfm?doc_id=5105
http://ub-counseling.buffalo.edu/vpc.html

Reflections on Thanks.

Just a little Thanksgiving video post. I have been reflecting on how very lucky I am to have been given the opportuntity to start over and try something to new. Wishing all of you the best in your lives!

With love,

Monika

Exam Cram

Papers, exams, projects... It's just that time of the semester - until I get my act together (sorry!) and start posting regularly again ... check out these VIDEO blogger nurses:

the miscellaneous mischievous misadventures of missbhavens * VIDEO

Jan's Video Blog * VIDEO!

They are real videoblogs, not just blogs with video thrown in. Great stuff!

I wanna be a videoblogger when I grow up.... (Oh, and a nurse, of course!!)

This sums it up!

This quote describes, quite simply and eloquently, exactly how I feel at this point in my life and why I am becoming a nurse:

"Basically, in my very flawed and human way, I want to be a force for love in the world.
I want to let go of and grow beyond everything that constrains me from that intention"

- Nina Rothschild Utne, Chair and CEO, Utne Reader.

He gave the BEST hugs

Today is Uncle Jerry's birthday. It would have been his 59th year if he had not died almost five years ago. There are an infinite number of things that I miss about Jerry, or Jurgen, as we in his family affectionately knew him. One very simple thing has been on my mind today. Hugs. Jurgen was the best hugger I ever knew. Jerry would greet you, or say goodbye or comfort with a hug. If he was saying hello he would have a big smile, a warm laugh, and a hearty hello (with his amazing German accent) and he would fold you up into this big hug. This was no quick hit and run hug. He would linger and rub your back and say something like "I am so glad to see you!". It was a hug that made you feel like the most important person in the world, completely safe, accepted and loved. His hugs felt like a ray of sunshine or a breath of fresh air. You could not help but hug back.

I miss his hugs deeply, yet I am grateful that he was in my life to show me how it should be. My hug guru.

About three weeks after he died, I had this amazing dream. In my dream I was hugging Jerry. It was so incredibly vivid that it felt absolutely real to me, like he was really there. It was a strange feeling because in my dream he didn't exactly have form, but he was absolutely real. The hug had a physical and psychic quality to it. I do not know how to articulate what is was like. In my dream, Jerry told me everything was ok and to me did not seem to know he was dead. I said "But you are dead, don't you know you are dead?" He just smiled at me, his warm, gentle smile, like it was some incredibly funny joke that I did not understand, but that I would get sooner or later. That was the end of the dream. I never dreamed of him again, but it was the most vivid dream I have ever had and I have never forgotten it.

And I never will.

Gay Men's Health Crisis
Callen-Lorde Community Health Center
The Body
Day One
ACT-UP
NYAC

We Are Not Alone

You know, the blogosphere, specifically the little corner of it that belongs to nurses, is a pretty cool place. When I started this endevour, I felt like I was pretty weird. Throwing away a successful career, starting over at my age... I must be nuts. Well I have discovered that I am merely a single cashew in this great mix! I want to highlight the blogs of a couple of folks who have made similar leaps of faith. I enjoy it so much to be able to read their stories and have that feeling that I am one of many adventurers on this journey. So here is a selection of blogs from intrepid souls for whom nursing is a second or even a third career:


third degree nurse
student nurse, prn
dog food sugar
Coffee and Conversation in a Smoky Room
Critical Pathways
Uni_student

Surf's Up!!!