Timeline jump!

I can't express how excited and terrified I am right now!

After applying to my four year university the admissions counselor for the nursing program told me that there is a more then good chance that I can start the BSN program this August instead of waiting until next year.

So since that day I have been scrambling to find a CNA program I can complete before the fall that will also leave my days this summer open so I can take Intro to professional nursing, and Health Assessment which they require you to have taken before you enter the program in the fall.

So I am so close to FINALLY starting that I'm anxious, nervous, and scared at the same time.

Burning Ring of Fire

I feel like I am never going to be finished with this two year college. Last semester I was unable to work a 4 hour science elective into my schedule so I could graduate the two year school. So instead of getting to start at my four year university where i'll be taking the nursing program, I get to take one single class.

That one single class, is.... Physical Geology. Yay. Can you tell how excited I am? I don't want to be at this school anymore, I drive 25 minutes to class, sit there for 50 minutes, and then drive 25 minutes home. My teacher that I wanted and signed up for took emergency leave for upper respiratory problems and will not be back this semester, so I'm stuck with an aging retired USGS employee that really has no idea how to teach a class, and completed his masters in geology in 1959.

On a positive note, I finally get to do something Major related this summer as I'll be taking my CNA course with an eye to have that finished before Fall.

Then, then I will finally be able to begin at my four year school. Wait, thats not it though! I get to take two full semesters of pre-req's at this four year school before I can enter into the nursing program. Granted, I could have forgone the two semesters of credits and attempted to work the 19 credits in while I am in nursing school, but I really didn't want to burden myself with unnecessary course load if I could simply wait a bit before starting nursing school.

It seems like my journey is never going to end, much less start, I'm hoping that I'm just feeling burnt out on my two year school because I know I'm so close to the end.

Fitness

I have not posted in a while and I could make all kinds of excuses for it but frankly the main reason is that I haven't been in front of the computer all that much.

October 17th was sort of a new beginning for me.

I'll start with a little bit of history. Eight years ago I weighed in at 420lbs, one snowy night I was unable to drive my car up my quarter mile long iced in steeply pitched driveway. My only choice was to walk, in the middle of the night up this slick patch of road. I just couldn't do it, I had the will and the desire to do it, but I physically could not make the climb. It was then and there that I decided something had to be done. I was 24 years old and weighed over 400 lbs.

So I did what I thought at the time was the best way to handle it, I went to my Dr., got prescribed phentermine and began working out while using slim fast shakes to replace two of my meals, I'd go to the gym every evening after work for an hour or more and then come home and eat a horribly unbalanced meal of rice and meat.

Every. Single. Day. for 7 months.

I lost 130lbs in that time. I was wonderfully happy, I was in the 200's for the first time in ages. As it happened, I ended up getting married shortly after that, my wife had two children, and here we are seven years after that day and every bit of that weight has crept back on, and then some.

This time around I kept getting inundated in all of my pre-req classes about the horrible things that were happening in my body, and how it was all fully in my control to change these things. Anatomy taught me the disease processes to an extent and Nutrition filled in the blanks left by Anatomy. Both of these classes combined with an injury that left me unable to walk for a weekend provided the eye opening catalyst I needed to change my life.

You see, I knew from the day I enrolled in school that I would need to get this weight off before I went into nursing school because I could not see myself having the energy level needed to be as successful as I wanted to be.

All of that led to October 17th.

That was the day that I started eating a realistically healthy diet, a diet that I actually had a scientific understanding about thanks to my nutrition and anatomy classes. I started a six day a week exercise routine that I have stuck to religiously since that day.

I feel like I finally "get" it, I don't feel like I'm dieting, I don't feel like I have to force myself to be active. I'm not going to kill myself to get this weight off, I'm just going to live a healthy, active lifestyle and forgo the huge helping of misery.

Since the 17th of October I've lost over 35lbs and with the level of activity I've committed to I'll likely have another 10-15 off by Christmas.

This post, while lengthy and meandering at best is indicative of my life over the last few months. Now whats on the agenda for this coming spring and summer?

Graduate 2 Year School

Enroll in 4 Year School

Complete CNA this coming Summer

Run/Walk/Complete a 5k before August '12

Be a better Husband, Father and Individual

Just one more thing that I want to leave you with that has really stuck with me over the past couple months.

Every good healthy choice you make in a day is a step in the right direction, don't allow one misstep to alter the course of your day, week or month. Simply commit to making the next choice, and the next after that a better one.

Pre-Req drudgery

It's been two months since my last post. Not much noteworthy has happened. I dislike chemistry with a passion born through my hate of math. Nutrition and Med term are boring nightmare. Nutrition is a repeat of select parts of anatomy, med term is a broad repeat of anatomy and it's all just getting to me. I think knowing I only have 4 credit hours left at this school next semester has me seriously ready to move on to my 4 year college where I'll be taking nursing.

Nursing school seems so far away at this point. So many classes left to take, CNA cert to do and weight to lose before I start.

/rambling

Origins

I've held many and varied jobs in my past. I've done everything from work production on a car parts line, video stores, cable companies, retail, to sales and distribution. I started working at the age of 16, right after my 16th birthday. Work, from my first job until I quit my last job to go back to school, for me, was always just something to do to make money.

I've spoken in the past what one of the deciding factors was behind my decision to become a nurse, and while that is the main reason I choose to pursue nursing, it wasn't the only deciding factor. As the sole breadwinner for our family of four, one of my chief concerns is always going to be income, I made a decent salary at my last job, but I lucked into that position, and if said position went away, so did my ability to find another job making that kind of money again. Having a college degree, especially a college degree in a field that can make decent money, was appealing to me.

Aside from a workable income, with nursing and hospital shift work I have the option to work fewer days a week and still pull in a decent income. Being home with my wife and kids is important to me. Four 12 hr shifts with 3 days off sounds splendid.

Taking a 180 degree turn on your professional path at 30 is a daunting task, no less so for me than anyone else. However, a bookmark I bought a few years ago (right around the time I embarked on this journey) recently found it's way back onto my desk downstairs. It's metal, and has a quote engraved upon it's surface that reads:

"It is never too late to be what you might have been."

And so, with that message brought back to the fore, I'll get back to studying for my chemistry test on Monday.

Online Classes

Typically I do not take online classes. I find the seated classes to be, obviously, more interactive than their online counterparts. However, this semester I could not get two of my classes in a seated format, Med Term I, and Developmental Psych. I consider myself to be extremely computer literate. I may not be as up on all the latest tech as I used to be, but I can still navigate most pieces of software without any problems.

This is NOT the case for my online classes. This blackboard version they are using this semester looks as if it was written by a Grad student with a D average. The location of assignment due dates is not consistent between the classes, nor is the method for submitting assignments the same.

Since this semester started I've been constantly worried I was going to miss a due date for something because none of my assignment due dates are posted in an obvious intuitive manner.

Aside from the online classes mentioned above I've got nutrition and chemistry. Chemistry, as I figured was going to be the only "hard" class this semester. Nutrition on the other hand is an absolute joke. So far the format of this class has lent itself more to a "wellness" class than a nutrition class. What, exactly, does my spiritual wellness have to do with nutrition. Not a darn thing!

We had to do a "Wellness Assessment" as a homework assignment. This assessment was broken down into 6 categories, the final category being nutritional wellness, the other five? Nothing to do with nutrition.

I understand this is the first year they have offered this course, and I expected there to be some hurdles and growing pains to endure while the teacher settles into a stride with the new material, but we're in the second week of class and we have not even TALKED about, you know, nutrition.

/endrant

Pathophysiology

As it's going to be a little while longer before I actually start nursing school at the University I decided to pickup a Patho book to read since I won't be exposed to Anatomy any longer after having passed A&P II this summer. After reading about Pathophysiology made easy over at Zazzy's Blog, which was via another blogger that I read, Christine.

I am throughly engrossed with this book. I've read several of the sections, and have been dorking it up pulling up secondary resources to fill in the details when I don't fully understand something.

I don't figure it will hurt me to familiarize myself with the topics the book covers but I do have a slight fear that I'll learn something incorrectly and then have a hard time unlearning the incorrect information. Heh