Update

My oh my how a lot of things have happened this past quarter. Spring qtr must have been one of the worst ones I have ever had. My course load was rough, I took Psych theory/clinical (easy) along with Nursing Research (horrible!!). Psych was a piece of cake, thank god, but research was killer. The main problem was that it was online. What a horrible class to teach online!! I understand it was done that way because of budget, but honestly, I think it made learning incredibly more difficult than it had to be. Research is not the kind of course that you can essentially "teach yourself". The instructor was the our department chair, and was very enthusiastic about the subject, however, she did not have the time to devote to it that was necessary.

In the end, I ended up with an A-... Not quite sure how I pulled that off, but I did. My GPA is climbing ever since I got in nursing school. It's a shame I never cared about it before. In other news, I have been finally diagnosed with my hormone imbalance. It ended up me demanding to go to a specialist down at Cedar Sinai and many drives down there for testing. I've officially been diagnosed with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (a mouthful right?). Basically I have a genetic defect that causes a problem with adrenal synthesis of certain andorgens. So my adrenal glands are trying to make cortisol, but can't very well. So they try harder, and end up putting out more of all the other hormones (testosterone, DHEA, 17-OHP). This leads to excess hormones and they are essentially killing my ovaries. The main problem is going to be having children (if I will ever be able to because my ovaries are pretty damaged from all the excess hormones) but we will cross that boat when it comes. Right now I have to take birth control to protect my ovaries (weird right?). And when I want to have children I'll have to be on corticosteroids to suppress my adrenal glands. At least I have a plan. Many kudos go out to my primary care provider, who is a PA & NP, because if it wern't for him, well when I tried to have kids they would either be deformed, or not be possible.

What else? Well, this past quarter I got offered a position to work in the department as a student assistant to the director. It was quite an honor, the position only makes 9.50/hr but it's extremely easy! I just help her with random assignments. I love it. The most recent thing is organizing her office. She is new to the chair position and the past 2 chairs have basically left all the paperwork in a royal mess. So thats where i come in. I have been making endless file tabs and organizing everything. I'm ALMOST done.

Also, I worked on an article with 2 other nursing professors. My name will even be on the byline!! We submitted it to ADVANCE for nurse practitioners for publication. If it gets published I will be stoked! Other than that, not much has been going on. I'm basically working like a mad woman trying to stay busy.

That's it for now...