My boyfriend's Graduation!!

Hi all, 

So last week on Thursday my boyfriend had his graduation for his Higher National Diploma in Film Making. As you can imagine I was mega excited, I couldn't wait to see him graduate and of course to dress up! It was a lovely day, the weather was beautiful and the cathedral was lovely. After the graduation Brett wanted to go back to his house, lounge around in the garden and order a pizza. So that's what we did. His sister and her Husband and 2 children came over and also Brett's brothers girlfriend and her son came over too. It was so much fun spending time in the garden with them all as I had been at university of 2 months prior without going home. So the day was very special for me, as it was for Brett. There may be some photo overload, but I just love all the photos! Enjoy! 

This was taken just before we got in the car to go to the graduation, before the hair was all frizzed from the humidity! 

Me and Brett being our silly selves!! 

We do love each other, I promise! 

After all these photo's were taken we went into the cathedral and sat down ready to watch him graduate! The ceremony went on for quite a while, about 2 hours. It was a lot to sit through just to watch him be called, go get his certificate and then sit back down. But it was worth it! Although, I must admit I did get a bit bored! 

I was much happier after the ceremony with my FREE, yes free, glass of wine.

The always funny trying the cap on! Suits me I think, can't wait for my graduation!

The throwing of the caps had to be done! 

This might be my favourite photo of the whole day!

All chilled back in his garden. Brett's mum bought him a graduation balloon, shaped like a guitar because Brett used to play the guitar all the time. 

Hopefully those photo's aren't too boring!! It was overall a brilliant day, I had such a nice time. Looking forward to doing it all again next year since he is staying on an extra year to complete the course to turn it into a degree!! 

Not enjoying placement?

At the moment I am doing my last placement of my second year, health visiting. This is quite an odd placement for me as I am training to be an adult nurse. I went into the placement thinking that it would be a good opportunity to learn how to support parents, as I have met many patients who are parents that need supporting and I have been at a loss at what to do. 

I feel as though I was completely wrong. Although health visitors do support parents and families, it is more child centred. The health visitors I am working with are highly involved with post-natal depression and child protection issues. Supporting mothers with post-natal depression really interests me, as this is something I may come across, however it is not always appropriate for me to attend these visits, meaning I miss out on some crucial learning. 

More so, child protection is something I need to be aware of, however I also cannot always be involved in that. So my question was then, what on earth can I get out of this placement? 

At first thought, I was really disheartened and I was thinking that the next 4 weeks were going to be a waste of my training. But then I got to thinking hard and I thought of a few things that I might get out of this placement. And I thought these may be useful to others who might be going through the same thing.

1. Communication. I feel as though this is the perfect opportunity to really focus on my communication skills, with both adults and children. Children can come onto adults wards to visit family members and it would be important as a nurse to be able to communicate with these children, in the hopes of making them feel more comfortable in the strange setting such as a hospital. Also, if I end up working in the community as a district nurse I may visit someone with a child and it would be useful to be able to communicate with the child as well as the patient I am visiting. 

2. Confidence. I used to be a very shy person, and at times I still can be shy. My last placement in the intensive care unit really brought me out of my shell and I feel as though I am 100% more confident than I was when I first started that placement. I really have come a long way, but since this placement is so much out of my comfort zone I feel as though this is a good time for me to really really push myself, talk to patients when I feel scared and really put myself out there. 

3. Visits. By visits I mean exploring what else is out there in the community. I have planned visits with the district nurses, community midwife, GP's, Nursery nurse practitioners, pharmacy and to a children's centre. I feel as though by doing this I can gain more of an insight into what's out there for people who are in the community, giving myself more of an advantage when I am asked for advice and when I meet people who need a service but didn't know it is out there. 

That's all I have planned as it's such a short placement. But I am going to try so hard to get the best out of it. I'll report back in 4 weeks!! 

Weekend in London

So this weekend I went up to London to see my dad. It was soo lovely! I don't see my dad and little brother very often so I had a brilliant time spending time with them!
We had a lovely lunch in a lovely little pub, which is forgot to take a photo of :(, went for a lovely walk around a park and just chilled! It was lovely!

The next day we then went to the Herne Hill Market and it was lovely, we got some nice things for lunch and a nice coffee and then walked around Dulwich Park with my dad and brother. It was nice, the sun was shining and it lifted my spirits!!

Hopefully the weather stays nice for a while, I'm definitely more of a summer person! I really love the sun and the summer and the warmer months!

x