So, *BREATHE*. I’ve not been this stressed for a while.
The 3000 word literature review I’m deeply unhappy with. The underlying research is…not appropriate. I should have spotted it when I started reviewing it, but honestly, I reviewed it in between shifts and on trains and didn’t quite twig that it was such utter shite and that I should extend my review to find more primary research. I kept finding papers and going ‘oh, that doesn’t quite fit’ and discarding Randomised Controlled Trials or Cohort studies and didn’t realise that all I had left was reviews and meta-analyses. It’s a bit of an all round disaster, really, but I’ll attempt to make it as good as I can and we’ll see if I can scrape a pass.
Kathryn’s kindly read through it and given me lots of cuddles to try and help me find my calm centre* as opposed to my beating the crap out of myself for moronicism** centre, which I find startlingly easy to locate.
My dissertation proposal is progressing somewhat better. This is the 10 minute break between sitting down and ‘appraising’ all the papers I’ve got (I’m still short two, but I can’t really help that) and actually writing the review of them. I usually like a few days for it to slosh around in my brain and allow my subconscious to connect dots (it works surprisingly well). However, I’ve not got that freedom, so I’m having ten minutes, a cup of tea, and attempting to put some of the stress I’m feeling far away.
It’s not really working. I’d forgotten how stress feels. No, really. I mean, stress that’s not job*** related. Job related stress I can deal with with a motorbike, or a run down the river, or a chat with my beloved. This stress lurks in the pit of my stomach and runs around inside my head screaming unhelpfully. It makes me clean the kitchen, do laundry, have an urge to do anything to distract me from it. It brings out my worst prevaracatory tendencies, and then shouts at me internally for not working.
Anyhow. Wish me luck, I’ve an essay to write and then a 16 day stretch of shifts****.
* Ha. Like I have one. :)
** moronisism? Meh.
*** Not as in ‘sick patients make me stressed’ because they don’t. I get an adrenaline hit when I’m preparing to look after someone sick, and run round inside my head mentally trying to collect all the things I should be doing, but the actual work, no. What makes me stressed is not being able to do my job properly (when it’s uber busy) or staff-relation stuff. That makes me quite stressy.
**** Well, I finish at 7:45am from a night shift then start my induction the next day, so I’ve kind of got a day off, ish, at day 8. I don’t really count it as a day off though.
