Today marks my official last day working as a certified nursing assistant in a nursing home. Over this past year and a half I've learned so much, and I've seen so much more. Being a CNA has been quite the experience to say the least. It was my first full time job, and my first time working in a job in healthcare. As I sit back and recount all of the crazy situations and hilarious moments, I know that I will never get any other job like one as a CNA. I went in not knowing what to expect, and I came out humbled and extremely appreciative of the nursing field, specifically of nursing assistants.To those of you who are not aware of CNAs and what they do, allow me to now educate you.

The twenties are a time of change. Graduating college, job searching, graduate school, traveling, etc. It's the decade where we are still young enough to do what we want and have the times of our lives, but old enough to understand we need to buckle down and really take a look at ourselves to see where our lives are heading. A lot of my friends and family are going through major life changes at the moment, each of which have struggles of their own, which is what inspired me to write this.

There’s something scary yet exciting about uprooting yourself and moving to a place where no one knows of your existence. Not one person knows your name. Slowly but surely, you make your world a little bit bigger and expand your horizons a bit more. No doubt it was terrifying when I first did it five years ago, but I’m so glad I did. I can’t wait until I can get the chance to do it again. 

I've cut back on my technology use. I think that our smartphones, and social media in general really consumes a lot of our time, and more of my time than I'd like it to. Smartphones have literally become attached to us like another limb. Many times I've watched people at restaurants have periods of silence with a table full of people because they're all busy on their devices.

 It's easy find out about someone's life happenings even when I'm not directly looking for it. It's all too much digital noise. I've stopped carrying around my phone at work for a few weeks now and I feel so much lighter without it. I unplugged a bit. Not completely, but enough so that I can breathe...and it feels great.


I dare you to look up from your phone.

It always seems to me that people are much better at adapting to different situations than I am. I've never been the most graceful in that department. I kind of just stumble through life; I trip and fall on every pebble and stone. But even though I'm still getting used to all these changes, I'm no longer surprised when a new curve ball is thrown at me. I'm getting more comfortable at being uncomfortable, which is what I believe is supposed to happen. Being comfortable means you stop growing and learning, so I like to think that I'm constantly learning something new. 

Every time I've worked on evenings she never wants to come out of her room. She came out in her wheelchair this one day, wearing only a shirt and a soaker pad to cover her bottom half and the brightest smile on her face.

While I take this time off from school, I know money's going to be tight for myself because I'm saving up for so much that I want to have in my life in the future and to lessen the load that my parents may have to help me out with. Although the route that I'm currently taking includes intensely back-breaking work, it's opening my eyes to a lot of things I'd understand, but not completely understand without fully experiencing it first hand. We see pictures on Facebook, Instagram, etc. about people going on vacations, getting luxury cars, and wearing expensive clothing but we never know the entire story behind it. We don't know whether that person has saved up for years for that vacation, or if they are going on vacation despite the fact that they can't pay off their credit card debt.

Happy first of September! For some reason I'm super excited for fall this year because it's always so beautiful around where I live when it comes fall time. I've certainly missed it while I've been away at college these past four years. I'm ready for the smell of pumpkin spiced lattes, the lovely colors of the leaves, and of course I get to pull out my boots and fall clothes! Summer's been lovely, but I'm looking forward to fall! :)

He's a soft spoken man, but since I've gotten to know him he's been a little more open talking. On my last day of clinical on the unit, he looks at me during breakfast and randomly says, "You remind me of my mother."
I laughed. "How so?"
"Because she used to feed me all the time when I was a child."
"Was your mother a good woman?" I ask.
He nods with a smile on his face. "She definitely was."

On the first day of clinicals I got to clean and paint an old lady's nails. When I asked if she wanted me to paint her nails she said "Oh I don't even know what that is," apprehensively as I pointed to the nail polishes. I smiled at her and told her to choose any color that she wanted so I could paint them, and she chose the brightest pink of the batch. Right after painting her first nail she kept saying how beautiful the color looked. Once I finished she excitedly asked me how long it would take for the nails to dry, and I told her about ten minutes. She nodded and kept her hands completely still so she would not mess them up while still admiring them.

Throughout my experiences and interactions with people, there is one conclusion that I've come to: People love talking about themselves. Many times, I let other people talk because they seem to enjoy having someone listen to them. I learn a lot about people simply by listening more and responding when appropriate. Some people will continue to talk about themselves as long as they have an audience. It's normal, we are all social beings that need interaction and need to be heard.

After almost two months of stress and constant disappointment, my life plans are finally about to be set in motion.
It's going to be a rough ride, but I'm ready. I'm so ready.

It's been a while since I've written very much on my blog, but it's all right. It's been about a month and a half since I've graduated, and I'm still job searching in my area since I'm pretty set on finding a job near home. Money is going to be tight for a while, and I'm not impulsive enough to move to a new city just because that's something people are "supposed" to do once they graduate college. I have big plans, but at the moment this is where I need to be.


I can see why everyone stresses about searching for jobs and the difficulty of it. It's the new obstacle in my life, and I can see why people can easily become depressed by it. I'm going to be brutally honest and say that being unemployed sucks, but even though I don't have a job yet I'm thankful that I still have a home to come back to. I'm keeping myself busy so I don't just mope around all day hoping that a job will come by. I know that once I do land that job, I'll wish that I had this much free time to do as I please right now. The main reason that I've been keeping my sanity during these days looking for work is that I've been going to the gym and staying active lately. Those endorphins definitely help relieve stress!

It's been tough, but I know I've gone through my share of obstacles. Staying positive!

I was probably about six years old and sitting in the backseat of the car while my mom was driving back home in the evening. I looked out the window as I was asking her a myriad of questions about how life works. I asked her why dad has to go to work, and what he needs money for, where the money comes from etc.- simple annoying questions that little kids like to ask. After trying to answer all of my questions, my mom said what she usually says when she doesn't feel like explaining: "You'll understand when you're older." I responded by saying that I wish I was a grown-up so I could understand what all of this stuff was that grown-ups apparently knew more than kids. She just chuckled and said, "When you get older you're going to wish you were a kid again, so don't rush growing up." It's the piece of advice that I've kept close to me to this day, because even at six years old I had a feeling she would be right.

And she was. 

Everyone knows that this day is used to let our significant other how much we care. Aside from that, I also like to think of it as a day that we show love to all of the people in our lives. I was reminded of this by my suitemates Cindy and Vivian, because although they have someone to spend Valentine's Day with, they still took the time to make me and my other friends chocolate strawberries! They literally spent the entire day working on them, no joke. They were trying to trick me by saying I couldn't have any when they finished, but in the end they ended up surprising me and the rest of my suitemates with chocolate covered strawberries in cute little boxes! They are such sweethearts.

Here's a little recap as to what happened on our snow day before Valentine's Day. Be prepared to get a craving for these afterwards!

I've had a case of wanderlust for quite some time now, and it's only gotten more extreme lately. I'm just itching to travel and go see new sights. My parents are probably getting tired of hearing what countries I want to visit in the future because it's been a main topic of discussion for me lately. My mom  finds it funny that I'm looking up costs and picking places that I want to visit when I don't have enough funds yet but hey, dreaming is the first step but making a plan is the next. One more semester to go before I start working to save up more money to explore the world. My list of countries to visit is extensive, so I have a bunch of saving to do!