I know the last two blogs have been more serious, and for those of you who have sent encouraging notes, thank you, it really means a lot.
Enough about that, this blog post is going to focus more on what life is like on the ship.
Now that I've been here for 3 weeks I feel like I've started to adjust. The routine is pretty simple with a few variations. My days this week have been spent by working, eating, and sleeping. Some days there is more sleeping than anything else.
Yes at first I was beginning to think that something was wrong with me, but I came to the conclusion that I'm still okay, but the first couple weeks were early mornings, late nights, and information overload every day!!! So now that it's into the 3rd week and I'm no longer receiving such large amounts of info it's time to rest and process which for me equals sleeping.
I think the other side to that is there are always people around!!! It's almost impossible to find a place alone on the ship. That may be fine for some people, but I like my space. My cabin-mates are all cool and laid back so that is helpful.
I'm living in a 6 birth cabin with 4 other people at this present moment. In the first 2 bed section one is the French teacher for the academy here on the ship and the other is an older woman (in her 60's) who works with hospitality. The hospitality department seems to do anything general ship related, giving tours to new crew members, making the bed before a new crew member arrives and I don't know what else.
The second 2 bunk section is where I am currently alone, until tomorrow...then there will be a nurse from Canada living with me...I'm hoping we get alone and can survive living in close quarters. If I'm completely honest I would say that's been my place to be alone. I can go to me cabin and pull the curtain and no one comes in to bother me...that's changing.
In the last section of the cabin a writer and another nurse share that section. The nurse that lives there works in admissions and with that does more Monday through Friday type of work. Basically, she works on admitting the patients on the day they are suppose to arrive before there surgery.
Needless to say it's an interesting mix in my cabin, but I must say that I kinda like it. It means that not everyone is talking about what is going on in the hospital.
That's my "room." For those of you who like dimensions, The bed is 6 ft long and maybe three feet wide, it's pretty small. As you can see the head of my bed is one wall, and the foot of the bed is the opposite wall. The closet is against the wall on the right and there is maybe 6 inches between the closet and the bed, then another six inches between the curtain and the other side of the closet. It's a good thing that I didn't bring much!!! I'm not sure where else I could put anything.
There are times that we do get to have lots of fun. Earlier this week we had a hospital open house for people who don't work in the hospital to come down and see what we do. One of the wards was empty and so we had 5 nurses dress up as patients and then people could pretend/be a nurse for a shift. There was much laughter to be had. Since I was a patient I didn't get to see all the other stations that were set up, but here's what it looked like in the "ward."
Now that you gotten a little peek into life on the ship I must wrap this post up. Lunch is being served in the dinning room right now, and if I would like something to eat I need to head there soon...
Breakfast: Monday - Friday 6:30-7:30
Lunch: Monday - Friday 11:30 - 1:00
Dinner: Monday - Friday 5:00 - 6:30
On the weekend or Saturday and Sunday:
Breakfast is from 7:30 - 9:00 and you must pack a lunch, because lunch isn't served on the weekends
Dinner is at the same time as the rest of the week: 5-6:30
I'm not use to eating at those times, so it's been interesting. The food is good, but after awhile, it starts to taste like cafeteria food and you don't get to choose what you eat, except from the options of what they have.
There is always the option of getting a group of friends together and going out to eat at a local restaurant. Apparently, there is a decent Chinese place around here that I haven't tried yet...but I plan on checking it out sometime!!!
Enough about that, this blog post is going to focus more on what life is like on the ship.
Now that I've been here for 3 weeks I feel like I've started to adjust. The routine is pretty simple with a few variations. My days this week have been spent by working, eating, and sleeping. Some days there is more sleeping than anything else.
Yes at first I was beginning to think that something was wrong with me, but I came to the conclusion that I'm still okay, but the first couple weeks were early mornings, late nights, and information overload every day!!! So now that it's into the 3rd week and I'm no longer receiving such large amounts of info it's time to rest and process which for me equals sleeping.
I think the other side to that is there are always people around!!! It's almost impossible to find a place alone on the ship. That may be fine for some people, but I like my space. My cabin-mates are all cool and laid back so that is helpful.
I'm living in a 6 birth cabin with 4 other people at this present moment. In the first 2 bed section one is the French teacher for the academy here on the ship and the other is an older woman (in her 60's) who works with hospitality. The hospitality department seems to do anything general ship related, giving tours to new crew members, making the bed before a new crew member arrives and I don't know what else.
The second 2 bunk section is where I am currently alone, until tomorrow...then there will be a nurse from Canada living with me...I'm hoping we get alone and can survive living in close quarters. If I'm completely honest I would say that's been my place to be alone. I can go to me cabin and pull the curtain and no one comes in to bother me...that's changing.
In the last section of the cabin a writer and another nurse share that section. The nurse that lives there works in admissions and with that does more Monday through Friday type of work. Basically, she works on admitting the patients on the day they are suppose to arrive before there surgery.
Needless to say it's an interesting mix in my cabin, but I must say that I kinda like it. It means that not everyone is talking about what is going on in the hospital.
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| I claimed the top bunk! |
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| Storage space :) |
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| My half/side of the closet |
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| This picture I found here in the ship shop for sale and loved it, so I got it to hang on my wall so it's not so empty! |
There are times that we do get to have lots of fun. Earlier this week we had a hospital open house for people who don't work in the hospital to come down and see what we do. One of the wards was empty and so we had 5 nurses dress up as patients and then people could pretend/be a nurse for a shift. There was much laughter to be had. Since I was a patient I didn't get to see all the other stations that were set up, but here's what it looked like in the "ward."
 |
| There are no 'private' rooms, the ward is a row of beds with patients as you can see here, and if the patient is under the age of 18 they must have a caregiver stay with them...which means, there is a mattress under the bed where the caregiver sleeps. In other words, it's just a little different from the hospitals at home. |
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| As you can see I had surgery done on my face...now to make it realistic for if people wanted to change my dressing, there was mustard and ketchup underneath the dressing to make it look like blood and pus...apparently, no one was excited about doing a dressing change, because it stayed there until the end of the open house (for and hour and a half). By the end, I was ready to have it off because it was starting to feel gross and then I wondered if that's what my patients feel like with a saturated dressing...doesn't feel pleasant!!!! |
Now that you gotten a little peek into life on the ship I must wrap this post up. Lunch is being served in the dinning room right now, and if I would like something to eat I need to head there soon...
Breakfast: Monday - Friday 6:30-7:30
Lunch: Monday - Friday 11:30 - 1:00
Dinner: Monday - Friday 5:00 - 6:30
On the weekend or Saturday and Sunday:
Breakfast is from 7:30 - 9:00 and you must pack a lunch, because lunch isn't served on the weekends
Dinner is at the same time as the rest of the week: 5-6:30
I'm not use to eating at those times, so it's been interesting. The food is good, but after awhile, it starts to taste like cafeteria food and you don't get to choose what you eat, except from the options of what they have.
There is always the option of getting a group of friends together and going out to eat at a local restaurant. Apparently, there is a decent Chinese place around here that I haven't tried yet...but I plan on checking it out sometime!!!
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