Where I Have Been

I've been totally MIA from the internet lately :(. I miss it! I wrote one blog post in all of April. ONE! Pathetic.

E went through this really, really, REALLY fussy/clingy time, which was where I was at first. I had to hold him, rock him, bounce him literally ALL DAY and he wouldn't sleep anywhere but in my arms. Turns out he had silent reflux (we realized it because he kept getting a hoarse voice, the poor thing!) and now that he's being medicated for that, most days are much better.

But now finals are upon me, and I'm doing the normal end of semester spazzing. I'm not sure how my grades are going to be. I thought I was totally set for A's in all my classes, but I'm feeling less confident now. I've done really well on all the major stuff - I've gotten A's on all my English papers and my test average for biology was 98% - but now at the end of the semester I've been noticing that I missed a few little things like online quizzes that were supposed to be worth hardly anything, but have now been inflated to a significant portion of our grade. It would be nice if instructors would give an accurate grade breakdown in their syllabus, but whatev. What's done is done, and I'm at least confident that I *passed* everything, lol. I'm a perfectionist though, so I'll definitely have a good cry over anything less than a 4.0. I'm pathetic like that.

As a result, I'm feeling less confident that I'm going to get into the nursing program on my first try. The program here is very competitive (generally 150+ applicants for 40 spots) and they do it on a point system. 50%  of the points come from your GPA calculated from your prerequisite classes only, 25% from the TEAS entrance exam, and 25% from a proctored essay. I ordered a study guide for the TEAS which should be here any day, and I won't be taking it until later in the summer (July or August), so I think I can do well on that. I'm good at essays so I'm not worried about that either. The prereq GPA though... see, I took pre-calculus ages ago. I got a B in it. If I apply for the program this fall, the only classes that will be calculated will be that pre-cal class, English, and the CNA and anatomy courses I'm taking over the summer. If I got an A in everything else, that still only puts my GPA at like a 3.6 or 3.7. If I don't get an A in English... that brings it way down too. A 3.0 is required to apply, but at least a 3.5 is needed to be competitive. Anyway, this is getting boring and I'm basically just typing my thoughts now. The point is, I HAVE to get A's in everything, and if I don't, I probably won't get into the program when I want to. And that just plain sucks because that's one more semester living at home, one more semester of loans. So I'm feeling lots of pressure and stress. I know I can only do the best I can, and actually, I've been kind of a rock star considering 1) I started the semester late, 2) I have such a *young* baby, 3) I've been pumping this whole time in addition to everything else, 4) and I'm a SINGLE MOM! There were three other moms in my bio class - one older than me with a 16 year old, one with two youngish kids (one still breastfeeding), and one with two youngish kids as well (but none breastfeeding), and they all are expecting lower grades in that class than I am. Significantly lower. And all three of them have husbands! So I know I'm being too hard on myself, but... I *have* to do this. I have to do it to be able to support E. Besides, I'm so tired of living at home. I'm so grateful that I'm able to, don't get me wrong, but it's very difficult being an adult child living at home. It just is. I am so looking forward to the day when I have my own place.

Anyway, that's where I've been. I promise I'll be back after this week when all my finals are over and I have two seconds to breathe!!