Counting My Blessings

Remember that old hymn, "Count Your Blessings"? For some reason it randomly popped into my head this morning, and I decided to dedicate a post to all the wonderful things happening in my life right now. Actually, I'm just going to focus on my job for right now. I am SO so blessed to have such a wonderful job, and I am amazed and thank God for the wonderful timing of everything and how it all fell into place for me.

Let me start at the beginning. In the summer of 2005 I took a 3 week course and got my CNA license (certified nursing assistant). I then worked for Banner Desert for 1 year as a CNA which provided me with the "1 year mandatory experience" necessary to get the CNA job at Mercy Gilbert in August of 2006. Mercy was a new hospital, just opening in June of '06, so I was one of the first CNA's on the Postpartum unit. I went from night shift at Desert to day shift at Mercy with a pay RAISE. That's how bad Banner pays their employees. Anyway, it was such a blessing to switch to day shift 2 months before our wedding so I could be on the same schedule as Scott. Then a year later during my first semester of nursing school I applied for and received the CHW nursing scholarship--which paid for ALL of my tuition for my 2 years of nursing school and ALL of my books AND I got paid for 40 hours each week but I only actually physically worked 20 hours--that was part of he scholarsip--in essence they were paying me 20hrs per week to study. And thank God I got that, because working 36 hours a week after my first semester in nursing school would have been near impossible (my head hurts just thinking about what that would have been like!). Half way through nursing school I found out that Banner had fired all their CNA's in Labor and Delivery (where I had been working) and gotten rid of the LPN (Licensed Practical Nurse) recovery positions. This had been my plan while working at Banner (before the job at Mercy came up). I was going to work as a CNA until half way through nursing school, then get my LPN license and work as a recovery nurse in L&D for the last year of nursing school until I had my RN license. Well, had I still been at Banner, that wouldn't have happened...they got rid of that position entirely just at the time when I would have been qualified to take it...I would have been jobless! Then in December '08 I started externing at Mercy, which was a pay increase as well as an incredible learning experience. So then I had the externship on top of the scholarship. New graduate nursing positions are few and far between in this economy. I have class mates who graduated with me who are still looking for jobs. If you don't have any sort of medical background or an externship, it is very VERY difficult to find a new-grad position right now. But I was "grand-fathered" into an RN position on my unit. I was fortunate enough that they had a position available for me when I graduated. I would have had a guaranteed job somewhere in my hospital due to the scholarship (I owe them 3 years of full time service), but I was NOT guaranteed a job in Postpartum. I only got it because it was available at the right time.

I'm working night shift, which is an extra $5/hour. That is pretty much all savings for us right now. SO worth it. And I love night shift. I love the people, I love the "flow" on nights, I love the work. The opportunity came up to possibly switch to days the past couple weeks, and I didn't want to...not even a little bit. I really am loving nights.

The economy is bad, but I still get a raise this year. My annual review was this past week (due in Aug, but the DO give retro pay so that's awesome!), and I wasn't expecting a raise because I just switched positions and had a big pay increase, but I still got my annual raise...almost $1/hr!! So I'm a new-grad, and already making more than new-grad wages!

I also got a bonus this week. Everyone on my unit got a bonus. It wasn't huge...$200 ($80 went to taxes!!!!!!)...but in this economy, who gets bonuses??? I was not expecting it at all...

Scott's car broke down last week and we spent almost $600 to fix it. We put it on the credit card because our cruise is next week and we want some "fun" money left in our checking account for the cruise. So guess what happened this week? I was asked if I wanted to work an extra shift on Tuesday. I jumped at the chance. You know how much I make in one extra shift (extra shifts are double pay)? Just enough to cover the car repair. Thank you Lord for providing for us right when we needed it!! Then I was asked if I wanted to work extra Saturday night as well (last night)...of course I did!! Two extra shifts in one week? Awesome! Not only did He provide for us, he provided extra and now our vacation will not be as tight financially...we can pay all our bills for the month before vacation and still have money to have fun.

And to top it off, the hospital will pay for my student loan from before nursing school. The loan is from all the nursing prerequisites and other classes I took in my first 3 years of college. I just have to get all my paperwork together and actually submit the application. But they will pay just over $5,000 a year towards my student loan, so it should be paid off in less than 3 years.

I could not have asked for a better job. And it was all orchestrated from the beginning. The whole way through, everything I needed both schedule related, hours related, pay related, school related...whatever it was, it was there and God provided at just the right time. And He still is providing.

This has been my dream job since I was 7 years old and told I couldn't go see the babies in the nursery because I wasn't 12 years old. Well, for my 12th birthday guess what I did? Yep, I went to Banner Desert and looked at the babies through the nursery window. The nurse in the nursery even gave me one of the new parent diaper bag kits...which was SO awesome! I looked through that Parent magazine so many times and kept that diaper bag for the longest time. I have never changed what I wanted to do "when I grew up" since that point when I was 7 years old. I was going to be a "baby nurse", and nothing was going to stop me!

Working in postpartum is a bitter-sweet job for me right now, for obvious reasons. I am approaching what would have been my first due date (October 12th) and have started seeing and taking care of moms and babies with that due date and close to it, and it's sometimes hard not to imagine that we should be having a baby any day now too. I don't mean "should" in a should-have-been-way, because obviously it was never meant to be that way, God had other plans. But anyway. I am glad I will be on vacation over the week of October 12th.

Even though it is emotionally difficult right now, I do have my dream job...and I love it. I could not be more blessed, and I thank God daily for everything He has so graciously provided along the way.

I am counting my blessings, and I am so so thankful for each and every one of them. :-)

~Abigail~