As I am about to write this I am sitting on an empty train, waiting for it to depart so I can get to work on what I think is going to be a beautiful morning (I feel that today is going to be a sunny day). As I am sitting here I saw a train pass through the station i Mödling where I stay at my mothers house. I often say that my mind is like a child and my patients have thought me that you never loose that child inside of you, no matter how old or sick you are or get. So I did what I always do when seeing a industrial-train: I count the waggons. This time: 36 empty car-waggons.
A week ago my supervisor said there is going to be big congress for hospital-staff, especially for intensive-care staff. He had three tickets for the staff in his hand and said “Oh, look at her, I can see how your eyes just sparkled!” Yes, of course they did! My brain is constantly telling me to want more information and knowledge, it is like a sponge that just won’t fill up till the end! I can only explain this phenomena for myself through the fact I was told when I was little: the human will never use it’s brains full potential, the human brain can just be used partly in life. By writing about that I am thinking about how science has found out that people who use their brain more in their life, e.g. through reading, learning and brain-excercises, tend to have a lower risk of getting dementia. So I can always say that this is my way of preventing dementia in the future.
Well, Wednesday came and the first day of the big convention started. The congress planned 2 Rookie-seminars: one for doctors, one for nurses. So I thought I go to that Rookie-seminar for nurses working in intensive-care. I went to the congress that morning but they told me at the counter that this seminar was not included in the ticket I got from my unit, it was an extra seminar that would coast an extra fee and besides of that it was sold out, the lady told me. At first I was sad and thought, why? I wanted to go to that seminar so badly! So I went up to the unit, sad and disappointed. There I thought about it and how in Vienna the way of thinking is more soft than in Sweden and Germany. So I asked a co-worker if I should try to sneek in instead – he agreed. So I went back. Now with my confidence in my pocket that I would get in as a paying member. It worked! Noone asked about an extra ticket or a booking-confirmation. Besides of that the lady must have meant that the Rookie-seminar for the doctors was sold out, because when I got to the seminar of the nurses, the room was only filled with about 75% of the people who would fit in.
About the seminar: There where especially 2 presentations that cought my interest. The first was about aromatherapy – something they use here at the ICU for their patients. This can be by putting essential oils (in a really small amount) into the rooms of the patiens or by massaging or washing/bathing the patient with a small amount of oil mixed with water. These eessential oils are acutally not used for therapy in the hospital, but they are used for nursing. It is important to know that diffrent oils are used for diffrent purposes. E.g. is peppermint used for cooling, while lavender is for warming but still, calming. It also depends on how you use the oil. E.g. in massage or to smell in the room. Did you know tthat smell is the only sense that goes right up to the brain without talking “extra sidetracks”? That means that the smell is the first sense the brain realizes. And did you know that the airport in Frankfurt, Germany uses lavender in tiny amounts in the air for calming and preventing flight-axienty? At least they told me that at the seminar. The amount of lavender used in the air is so small you can’t smell it, but the brain still can. This is acctually sientifically proven, the woman told us at the seminar. For me this information is especially interessting because I am studying a course about complementary and alternative medicin, or integrative medicin during my time in Vienna at Linneaus university, over the internet. In Sweden we learned a lot about diffrent integrative methods, but I didn’t hear about aromatherapy before that. So I am really going to take that with me as a future nurse and maybe I can be one of the nurses to start using aromatherapy at the hospitals in Sweden one day. Here in Austria this woman was one of the first to use it at her hospital and now they use aromatherapy at many different hospitals in Austria, even at the ICU where I had my praktikum.
The second seminar that cout my attention was about humor within nursing, means keeeping up the spirit at your workingplace with the other co-workers and with your patients. The semminar was so good so the audience laught the 60 minutes he was holding his lecturing. The man told us about how he often found empty boxes in the medicin-cabin, wondering who would ever put an empty box in it! That meant that he got angry about his collegues and this made his day negative. He told us then that he changed HIS attitude by thinking “where is the empty box”, “where are you?”, expecting it to come out and when he found it he got happy. I am acctually thinking right know that there is something I have had hard times to handle in my life. That one thing is everytime someone askes me where I am from. Especially in that small part of Sweden where I live now people tend often to ask me about my heritage. I am actually angry everytime they ask me, because I feel that they judge me asking about this. I don’t want to be “the german” or “the austrian”. The main problem is, though I have multiculture background people always seem to get it wrong where I am from. So maybe this is the time where I have to change that feeling into something good, to think and act like noone else expects me to. Wow, this was accutally a wonderful and fun seminar! He also told us about that there is laughing-yoga you can practise for more fun and happiness in life. And did you know that there is a laughing-institute in Germanny? The work with sientific research there. I find this so funny and I am thrilled to implement more humor and fun in my life. I am acctually already trying my best to be more fun and saying things people don’t exepct me to. Of course, I am not that fast of a thinker when it comes to humor, but I hope I soon will be able to live my life in a more positive and funny way!
När man läser till sjuksköterska på Linnéuniversitetet kan man göra en del av sin utbildning i ett annat land. De studenter som har valt att göra det delar med sig sina erfarenheter i den här bloggen.