Overcoming life's "foleys"

I was 18 years old, in my first semester of college, and each day after school, I would attend CNA course for 5 hours.  I was headed for nursing school (this was before I changed my major, as outlined in way too much detail in a previous post), and I was excited to learn how to be a CNA.  Several days worth of classes went by without incident until one day when we watched a movie on how to insert a catheter.  At this point, I had never bathed anyone.  I had never changed a brief.  I had never watched a movie full of such private things.  I was absolutely mortified.  During my dinner break, I went out to my car, drove to a nearby park, parked the car, and just cried.  I decided I did not want to be a CNA after all.  Of course I talked myself into going back to class and finished without incident.  Then I went to work as a CNA.  During my time doing that work, there were many firsts, lots of which were uncomfortable or embarrassing.  I remember giving my first shower in a CNA clinical, and the aide helping me was a boy.  I was standing there in the bathroom with a naked old lady and a boy about my age, and I just felt so awkward.  There are dozens of other such situations.  But none was as mortifying to me as that video.

I am now 22.  I have worked as a CNA for about 4 or so years.  I have overcome many of those feelings of apprehension, embarrassment, and awkwardness in such situations.  I knew when I started nursing school that I would have to learn how to do a catheter, nevertheless I dreaded it, remembering that CNA class those years ago.  I knew in my mind that it wouldn't really be as bad as I thought it would be when I watched that movie.  I have come a long way since then, and I hope I would be more mature about it in general, regardless of my CNA experience.  Still, it seemed like a major hurdle to me- a fear that I have not confronted since that day.  I have felt apprehensive, wondering what I would really think and feel when I finally confronted that situation again.

Today, it happened.  

I went to lab, and we learned how to do catheters.  We watched an instructor demonstrate, then we got to practice.  I won't say that I did it perfectly or anything (give me a break, it was my first try) and it will probably take a lot of practice to master the skill, but it went well.  I felt so much more comfortable than I thought I would.  Granted, we were only practicing on dummies, not real people, but I know that when the time comes for me to do this for real, I am going to be okay.  Now I feel relieved.  After all this time, I learned that I truly have made great strides in this area.  And I have to say that looking at my progression thus far is encouraging.  It reminds me that I will probably see things as a nursing student and as a new nurse that I am uncomfortable with.  I will be in awkward situations.  I will be confronted with situations and think there is no way I can do that thing. But I can.  A few years down the road, I will look back and realize that the thing that I feared, the thing that I doubted myself on has become comfortable, or at least not terrifying.  Sometimes, things in life just take practice, and time. Sometimes, you just gotta let the tears run out in that parking lot, then wipe your face and go back to CNA class.  Sometimes, it is only by experience that you can learn what you needed to learn, and progress.

And that's what I learned from a catheter.