runswithneedles Posted May 3, 2012 Posted May 3, 2012 (edited) I missed an online final exam for my assessment based management class. Before that exam I held a 86%. Now since I missed it I will receive a failing grade on my college transcript and than I have to take it over again. Between my other final exams and a unit exam I have had to study i'm getting burnt out just from the sheer school work involved.I spoke to my instructor about it because I finally remembered it 2 days later. I couldn't even pull it up on exam day so I didn't even worry to call anyone. Shes pissed and knows its my fault. So I have a feeling im going to be getting the axe. We have a platinum EMS testing bank that makes me look like I know absolutely nothing and i'm coming back with grades the lowest they've been since i started my medic. When I thought I knew my stuff these questions shoot me in the ass. And with my mother luckily recovering well from her 3rd or 4th surgery to repair what the docs from surgery one, two, and three (ive lost count). With the second to last surgery almost killing her because the surgeon clamped a bile duct. I got see her just last weekend since she drove down to see my younger sisters high school athletics I was shocked at what I saw. She looked like a ghost. She looked like she aged 20 years in a matter of months because she had lost so much weight. I take the unit exam tomorrow and I have to use a lunch break from the last clinical I need to complete my clinical hours for this semester. So much is going on at this point that I cant even remember where I put my keys to my car 30 seconds after I put them down and I have to go look for them for five minutes. Only to find they are right in front of my face. Hell I pace back in fourth in my dorm now trying to figure out why I got up in the first place. My mind is mush. Im three months out from the paramedic brotherhood and i'm just running out of steam. I just need someone that has been through this to tell me i'm not alone. I hate this feeling of disheartenment and isolation. (pardon my spelling paramedicmike but my web browser is being useless in the autocorrect department) Edited May 3, 2012 by runswithneedles
chbare Posted May 3, 2012 Posted May 3, 2012 Yeah brother, it sucks. I am having a particularly rough semester due to health issues and work issues. I've even said as much to my instructors. I even had a massive bomb dropped on me yesterday. I worked a week of straight night shifts in the ICU unpaid as part of a community health clinical rotation. My course mentor just shot down my entire project and rejected every minute of my clinical rotations because the experience did not focus enough on primary prevention. Unfortunately, they have heard it all before and my personal situation is no more or less important than any other student in the eyes of my instructors. Results are all that matters. It's a tough deal for sure, but life isn't for wimps. Do what you need to do and best of luck.
DwayneEMTP Posted May 3, 2012 Posted May 3, 2012 Man...I feel you Brother. My last 7 months of medic school I was just completely done. I couldn't think, I couldn't focus, I'd started having anxiety attacks. Should you ever decide to be completely and thoroughly humiliated try being an old fat guy and having an anxiety attack, which was of course assumed to be a heart attack, in the middle a paramedic class. I came here and said something like, "I can't do it. I'm not smart enough. I wanted to be able to call you guys peers but after all of this effort I know now that I can't do it." If they would just halt class for two or three weeks, so I had nothing to do but study I was sure I could catch up. But instead when I'd almost gotten a grasp on about 30% of the material, we moved on...it was too much. Then Asysin2leads told me, and this is truly what kept me from quitting, "I know it seems to much. That your mind is just a big pile of mush that makes no sense. But one day soon it's all going to come together. It will all make sense. And when it does, it's a beautiful thing." Something very close to that. And it friggin' did! It seems that one day I felt stoned, and completely lost, and then the next there were all of these little compartments in my brain that would all speak to each other. When I wanted information, it came to me. When I didn't know an answer I just had to keep asking questions until the answer 'presented itself', which is how it still feels to me today. I got to where I knew that I couldn't do it any more, so I would make deals with myself. "I'll go to class tonight, and say goodbye to everyone, but this is my last night. I'm not doing this any more." I'd then find that I didn't have the balls to tell anyone that I was quitting, so would go through class, and then do the same thing the next night, the next clinical, for the next test. If you're meant to do this, then you will. You'll go to class, one day at a time. You'll make sure that you don't miss any more friggin' tests. You'll study when you're too tired to breathe. And then one day, and you're almost there! You'll walk out of class....and have nothing to do. Nowhere to be. And your new life will have begun. Keep the faith Brother.
island emt Posted May 3, 2012 Posted May 3, 2012 Okay : you've had your vent. NOW GET YOUR ASS back to the books ! The military version of this was SERE school. Pushed to the limits of endurance for 2 weeks straight ,22 hrs / day evading capture. It puts your mind in a different place and allows your body to find reserves that you didn't know existed. Similar to the Navy seal teams hell week
paramedicmike Posted May 3, 2012 Posted May 3, 2012 But yet, according to your other thread, you want to start picking up a lot of available overtime. Do you really think that's going to help you avoid further burn out? Yes. It will all come together. It happened for Dwayne. It happened for me. It has happened for a good number of other people who frequently post here. You're getting close to the point when that starts to happen for many students. As hard as it is, as mush as your brain may be, you need to focus on what you're doing and power through to reach that point and beyond. Get used to this feeling, too. There will be times in life where the stress and mind-mush you feel right now will pale in comparison to what you're facing. Keep your chin up, your head down and power through. If you want this as badly as you say you want it, then do it. That's really all there is to it. Only because you mentioned it: (pardon my spelling paramedicmike but my web browser is being useless in the autocorrect department) Are you seriously blaming technology for something that you can't be bothered to do correctly yourself? Seriously? You have reached the point where you are doing nothing more than making excuses. For being lazy? For something else? I don't know. What it pretty much guaranteed, however, is that making excuses won't fly when you're out in the working world. How do you think your medical director would reply if you said, "Sorry doc. I couldn't tell if the tube was in place because the end-tidal didn't seem to be working right"? Is blaming technology for you being lazy going to make it ok? Or, if the technology isn't working properly, are you going to go to back up methods (e.g. lung sounds, capnography etc...) to verify, as best as possible, the accuracy of your work? The examples of airway management and spelling accuracy may be on different ends of the spectrum but the habit of making excuses for whatever shortcoming is being demonstrated (laziness, ignorance or whatever) will not win you any points or get you anywhere. Every company for whom I have ever worked, in my entire working life, both EMS and non-EMS, has required employees to take a test to evaluate their spelling, punctuation and basic grammar skills. People who did not perform well were not hired. They did not have the advantage of "autocorrect in their browser" as it was a paper and pencil test. Yes, it was paper and pencil even in the age of computers. This stuff *is* important. Why is taking the time to do it right from the beginning important? Your run sheets, as I'm sure you're aware, are legal documents. How well do you think it's going to go trying to explain to your boss, your medical director, the billing people, or worse than all of those, a lawyer, just what exactly you're talking about when you have misspelled words, words left out and missing punctuation? How well is it going to go when your autocorrect changes "conjugate gaze" in your head injured patient to "conjugal gaze"? (I have seen this before in real life.) It won't go well. Autocorrect and spell check are valuable tools. Everyone makes mistakes. I make mistakes. These tools can help catch some of them especially when one is involved with a lot of text. They are not, however, a substitute for a critically thinking mind that is capable of functioning without technological assistance. This is the same critically thinking mind that will be demanded of you while working as a paramedic. There is no time like the present to start demonstrating that you have one. Hang in there, grasshopper. This will all come together. You just need to keep pushing through until it does. 2
triemal04 Posted May 5, 2012 Posted May 5, 2012 Jesus...what happened to this place? When did emtcity begin to coddle aggorance, stupidity, immaturity (and in a seperate poster, insanity)? When did these much desired traits start to be met with hugs and kisses instead of honesty? Mike Ellis...I'd say that you were just venting in this post except that I've seen many other's that you've written, so this is probably a good representation of how you are, at least online, and possibly in real life. In all honesty child, (I say child not because of any age difference which isn't that great in any case, but because that is very much what you come across as), shutup. Cut out the bitching, whining, holier-than-thou statements, pretend superiority and general immaturity and childishness. You may only be 20, but by your own choices you are attempting to enter into adulthood. Guess what...this is it. It's not always easy, it's not always fun, and nobody is going to constantly hold your hand and lead you through life. Like the profession you are trying to become part of. Let's break down this most recent post. I missed an online final exam for my assessment based management class. Before that exam I held a 86%. Now since I missed it I will receive a failing grade on my college transcript and than I have to take it over again. Between my other final exams and a unit exam I have had to study i'm getting burnt out just from the sheer school work involved.I spoke to my instructor about it because I finally remembered it 2 days later. I couldn't even pull it up on exam day so I didn't even worry to call anyone. Shes pissed and knows its my fault. Translation: This is completely my fault. I screwed something up in trying to access the exam, didn't take any immediate steps to correct that, and then waited 2 days before attempting to correct the problem. Not a good character sign, but it does speak volumes about your personality. We have a platinum EMS testing bank that makes me look like I know absolutely nothing and i'm coming back with grades the lowest they've been since i started my medic. When I thought I knew my stuff these questions shoot me in the ass. Perhaps you don't know things as well as you thought. Maybe since your class is almost over the expectations are higher and you aren't able to reach them. Maybe if arrogance wasn't an issue you'd recognize this, recognize that you have deficiences and that they need to be corrected and start on it. So much is going on at this point that I cant even remember where I put my keys to my car 30 seconds after I put them down and I have to go look for them for five minutes. Only to find they are right in front of my face. Hell I pace back in fourth in my dorm now trying to figure out why I got up in the first place. My mind is mush. Im three months out from the paramedic brotherhood and i'm just running out of steam. I just need someone that has been through this to tell me i'm not alone. I hate this feeling of disheartenment and isolation. Woe is me. Quit your whining and act like an adult. For better or worse, that is the course you are currently on. Plenty of people have been in your situation and much worse situations and gotten through it just fine. And without half the drama and general silliness that you show here. I'm not even going to touch the "paramedic brotherhood" comment. Of course, if the above statement is actually true, and not just more kiddy drama, then you are done. Paramedic school, and by association being a paramedic, is not for you. While the time constraints may be better when working as a paramedic (or worse given your job prospects) the stress level will be much worse, at least initially for you. If you cannot mentality cope with what you are dealing with as a student, then this is not the profession for you. You will crack up and end up doing yourself a lot of harm. You are a very young kid trying to progress into a job where you have very limited experience and where immaturity is not (should not anyway) be tolerated. And yet you act like nothing more than the average 20 year old. On a good day. Maybe you need to take a good solid look at what is happening, how much of it is directly due to your actions, how much of what is happening is blown way out of proportion, and what should really be done to resolve the problems. And I don't mean done by a child, but by an adult. Stop thinking that you are better than anyone and that you are the only person in your situation. Stop getting pissy about any percieved slight (in a fucking anonymous internet forum of all places) and acting like you are a "been there done that" and know so much. You ain't even close. Maybe start realizing that you don't know much at all and have very little experience and first-hand knowledge. Realize that you have a long way to go before you can truly start to think of yourself as a well rounded professional and anything more than a wet behind the ears green kid. In the grand scheme of things, paramedic school is easy. I can look back on that and realize now that how difficult it actually was, and how difficult I thought it was were two very different things. Seriously, if you can't make it through school without having a breakdown, this isn't for you. I do have to ask though; in all of this, and with all the troubles you've been having, where are your classmates? Are you using them to help you study? To lend a hand when you need it? To decompress? To just go out and have some fun with? If you aren't using them for any of that, I'd have to ask why, though I can guess the answer. If you are, then good, you've made one smart choice. Was any of that coherent? Did any of that make an impression? 1
DFIB Posted May 6, 2012 Posted May 6, 2012 PS.. Brotherhood is insulting..... I would join your sisterhood except I would screw up the girls night out. It is always a pleasure to hear from you, my friend.
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