Dr. Kassandra Stfleur

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The place I will be writing about is a place where you can find happiness and sadness. This environment is very sterile and clean. Free of any bacteria or any type of infections. In fact, they clean it practically every day. It can get really messy too. Blood is slapper all over the floors and sometimes the walls depending on what’s going on. Every mother has been here, almost all women been here and I will be in here too eventually. It has a table, multiple of them. Each of them was covered with blue sheets. It has silver instruments that variety in different shapes and sizes used to cut things. The room is highly light, so bright it might blind you and in the back it’s a small incubator with a duckie blanket inside. It’s really warm there. Almost 80 degree Fahrenheit. I am in fact describing a labor and delivery room that is in every hospital. I choose this place because it is the place where I decided what I would want to do for the rest of my life. It is a place where I had made decision to dedicate myself into medicine.

 

1st Scenario

• The people that was there was three nurses, a physician assistant, a pregnant woman that looks about her late 20’s, an OB/GYN, and myself.

• What was said was what the doctor and the physician assistant teaching me a surgery being performed. They explained the procedure step by step

• A woman had a caesarean section also known as a C-section.

• I seen the uterus of a woman, a baby, and lots of blood. I heard sounds of instruments, doctors, and a crying baby. I was nervous, excited, and eager.

• I was 16.

 

2nd Scenario

• The people that was there was two nurses, an OB/GYN, a woman that looked like she was in her early 30’s, myself and one of my classmates.

• What was said was what the doctor and the physician assistant teaching me a surgery being performed. They explained the procedure step by step

• A woman was having a tubal ligation also known as tying the tubes.

• I seen the fallopian tubes, uterus, and of course blood. I was mainly excited. I wasn’t as nervous as the first time. I felt more comfortable. I heard a baby’s cry and conversions amongst all the adults.

• I was 17

3rd Scenario

• The people that was there was two nurses, a woman that was around my age (19) she looked Hispanic. An OB/GYN, a physician assistant, myself, and a classmate.

• What was said was what the doctor and the physician assistant teaching me a surgery being performed. They explained the procedure step by step

• A woman was giving birth. A live birth.

• I seen a mother’s vaginal area, a baby, and enormous amount of blood. I heard a lot of screaming from the mother, and at the end a crying baby. I was I mainly shocked. I’ve never seen so much blood before.

• I was 17.

• Draft One

Ki sa ou vle fe nan lavi ou? This was a question my mother always proposed to me. She started asking this specific question when I was 13, when I first started middle school. Of course, I wasn’t sure of a career at the age of 13 but I knew my parents had high hopes and expectations for me and I couldn’t let them down. My parents were born and raised in a small city of Au Cap, Haiti. They didn’t come to the United States until they were in their late 20’s. When they arrived in the U.S, legally, they spoke no English and had nowhere to go. My mom never really told me how they are got settled in specifically, but I knew it wasn’t easy. It wasn’t till my mother turned the age of 50 she became a citizen. She worked hard for it. I remembered how she would let me quiz her about American history. “Who wrote the Star Spangled Banner?” and she would always say with her thick accent “Francis Scott Bunny.” Her answer would always make me giggle and I would constantly remind her the correct answer, “Mommy it’s Francis Scott Key”. I guess you can say that her study habits are what I picked up. To study for exams, I would always ask someone to quiz me. Her determination to get something that she wants rubbed off on me. My mother was very strict when it came to education. She never tolerated anything lower than a C. That’s why I work really hard in school. Haitians always dreamed of their kids being someone important. For example, doctors, lawyers, and nurses is highly looked upon on. It wasn’t till I was in the 8th grade, about to graduate from middle school, that I knew I wanted to purse the medical field. That is when I found my purpose of life at the age of 16, when I stepped foot into the Labor and Delivery Surgical Room.

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I attended Blanche Ely High School that is located in the sunny area of down south Florida. I went into the nursing program that was accredited by the school. This nursing program allowed students like myself, receive their license to work as a Practical Nurse when they graduate. This program was very difficult to get into, and it took a lot of work. As a nursing student, I didn’t have a life. It was all about studying for exams, learning concepts, and managing other classes beside nursing. I guess you can say I was working as hard as a college student would as a 9th grader. The best part of the nursing class is that I got the chance to shadow doctors and perform procedures that the nurses did. They called this “clinicals”. Clinicals were held on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Each of those days we would go to hospitals and shadow doctors or nurses from varying professions of medical-surgical, trauma, pediatrics, and obstetrics. One day in the month of January, my nursing instructor, assigned me and a classmate, Latayne, to shadow an Obstetrician. I would always remember his name because he was the reason why I wanted to enter this profession, his name was Dr. McKcrean. He was an African-American, tall in stature, he looked about in his late 40’s and he wore this blue paper scrubs and wore this pink and blue scrub hat. “Follow me ladies” he said waving his hand at me and Latayne. We walked into a room where we put on these blue scrub hats, blue paper scrubs, and blue paper shoes. We resembled the same outfit the doctor had. After getting dressed, he leads us to this vast surgical room. Before we walked in, he showed us the way to wash our hands in a sink. He recommended to us that the best way to wash our hands is to repeat the Happy birthday song three times. He said this was important to do because we had to be sterile and prevent the patient from getting any infections. He handed us a mask that I could barely breathe in. I would constantly move the mask around for oxygen to reach inside my nose.

Draft 2

I attended Blanche Ely High School that is located in the sunny area of down south Florida. I went into the nursing program that was accredited by the school. This nursing program allowed students like myself, receive their license to work as a Practical Nurse when they graduate. This program was very difficult to get into, and it took a lot of work. As a nursing student, I didn’t have a life. It was all about studying for exams, learning concepts, and managing other classes beside nursing. I guess you can say I was working as hard as a college student would as a 9th grader. The best part of the nursing class is that I got the chance to shadow doctors and perform procedures that the nurses did. They called this “clinicals”. Clinicals were held on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Each of those days we would go to hospitals and shadow doctors or nurses from varying professions of medical-surgical, trauma, pediatrics, and obstetrics. One day in the month of January, my nursing instructor, assigned me and a classmate, Latayne, to shadow an Obstetrician. I would always remember his name because he was the reason why I wanted to enter this profession, his name was Dr. McKcrean. He was an African-American, tall in stature, he looked about in his late 40’s and he wore this blue paper scrubs and wore this pink and blue scrub hat. “Follow me ladies” he said waving his hand at me and Latayne. We walked into a room where we put on these blue scrub hats, blue paper scrubs, and blue paper shoes. We resembled the same outfit the doctor had. After getting dressed, he leads us to this vast surgical room. Before we walked in, he showed us the way to wash our hands in a sink. He recommended to us that the best way to wash our hands is to repeat the Happy birthday song three times. He said this was important to do because we had to be sterile and prevent the patient from getting any infections. He handed us a mask that I could barely breathe in. I would constantly move the mask around for oxygen to reach inside my nose. As I walk into the cold surgical room, I asked myself, “Why am I here?”

 

“Ki sa ou vle fe nan lavi ou? This was a question my mother always proposed to me. She started asking this specific question when I was 13, when I first started middle school. Of course, I wasn’t sure of a career at the age of 13 but I knew my parents had high hopes and expectations for me and I couldn’t let them down. My parents were born and raised in a small city of Au Cap, Haiti. They didn’t come to the United States until they were in their late 20’s. When they arrived in the U.S, legally, they spoke no English and had nowhere to go. My mom never really told me how they are got settled in specifically, but I knew it wasn’t easy. It wasn’t till my mother turned the age of 50 she became a citizen. She worked hard for it. I remembered how she would let me quiz her about American history. “Who wrote the Star Spangled Banner?” and she would always say with her thick accent “Francis Scott Bunny.” Her answer would always make me giggle and I would constantly remind her the correct answer, “Mommy it’s Francis Scott Key”. I guess you can say that her study habits are what I picked up. To study for exams, I would always ask someone to quiz me. Her determination to get something that she wants rubbed off on me. My mother was very strict when it came to education. She never tolerated anything lower than a C. That’s why I work really hard in school. Haitians always dreamed of their kids being someone important. For example, doctors, lawyers, and nurses is highly looked upon on. It wasn’t till I was in the 8th grade, about to graduate from middle school, that I knew I wanted to purse the medical field. That is when I found my purpose of life at the age of 16, when I stepped foot into the surgical room.  

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As I gathered my thoughts, I shifted it back to reality. I now starred to a well light room. A room that was as a classroom. Maybe even bigger. On the right side of me, there was two tables filled with surgical instruments. Scalpel, retractors, suction, tweezers, curette, anything you can name, it was there. In the far back, there was a baby incubator. It must have been at least 75 degrees in there. It was covered with a blanket with baby ducks on it and a blue nasal aspirator. I never know what that purpose of that blue thing was. On the left of me it was a board with pockets on it. It was at least 25 pockets on there. It was used for keeping track of the towels they have used during surgery. As I continue to scan the room, there comes the patient on a hospital bed. She was light skinned, with long black curly hair, and she looked about in her late 20’s.

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Things To Consider

Things to Consider for Narrative Paper

1. The place I am describing has a lot of descriptions that can be sued to describe it. The characteristic of the place can appeal to the eyes, nose, feelings, and ears. The place has a particular smell, it is very observational, in other words it has many objects. The place can make you feel some type of way and you can hear numerous o things from conversations and sounds of instruments being used.

2. I can establish myself credible by providing uniqueness in my narrative. I plan on using only my experiences and not others who experienced with me nor who had similar experiences as me. I am going to be as personal as I can be.

3. I can move the discussion of the place to a new and unique area because it is the same place but something new is happening. Each procedure was different, the doctors were different, the patient is different, and the people working around the doctor is different. It is all performed in one room, but each story would be different.

4. I can say that anybody interested in the medical field may be the intended audience because I will be talking about a specific room in a hospital, a place where medical terminology comes into place and a place where surgery occurs. Also, people of the Caribbean decent(Haitian) may appeal to the audience as well because I do plan on incorporating my background and language into the narrative.

5. The values I assume my reader’s have is kind of “finding your calling”. Students like myself are sometimes not quite sure about their purpose in life or what they would like to do for the rest of their lives. My narrative would provide the reader a way that I found my calling. How I found what I liked and how I turned it into a career.

 

Character Development

 

Character: Latayne

Full Name: Latayne Wilmot

Gender: Female

Age and Date of Birth (as your story does not need to have a contemporary

setting): 18 Years Old

Birth City: Jamaica

Parent’s Names:

Siblings: The only child.

Ethnicity: Jamaican

Pets: No pets

Education: Attends University of South Florida

Favorite Movie:

Favorite TV Show:

Favorite Book:

Favorite Food:

Favorite Day of the Week:

Favorite Hobby:

Favorite Drink:

Favorite Band:

Favorite Song:

Favorite Halloween Costume (if s/he celebrated Halloween):

Religious affiliation:

Political affiliation:

Love interest(s):

Physical Description

Eye Color: Dark Brown

Hair Color and Style: Natural Black hair. Up in a big puff/bun. Sometimes she rocks different hair styles.

Height:

Weight:

Skin Tone: Dark skin

Facial Description (does s/he have a unique nose, forehead, eyes, ears, lips,

ect.?): She wears braces, has a long face, small eyes, nose and mouth. Ears pierced in two ways. One at the cartilage and the other is a regular ear piercing.

Clothes (what s/he is wearing or usually wears): Purple medical scrubs and white shoes. Sometimes black shoes. Depending on where we are.

Other Physical Characteristics (booty, busty, muscular, corpulent, scrawny,

disproportioned, ect.): Very tall. Very skinny. Walks really fast.

Defining Moments

The one childhood instance—good or bad—that indelibly affects who this

character is now:

The character’s proudest moment:

The character’s most embarrassing moment:

The character’s career goals of future aspirations/ambitions: She wants to become a doctor. I am not sure what type of doctor she would like to be. But she is planning on going to med school.

Whom the character would most like to have dinner with (past or present)

and why:

Three adjectives the character would use to describe him/herself: Beautiful, intelligent, and very outspoken (tells it how it is).

Final Draft

I attended Blanche Ely High School that is located in the sunny area of down south Florida. I went into the nursing program that was accredited by the school. This nursing program allowed students like myself, receive their license to work as a Practical Nurse when they graduate. This program was very difficult to get into, and it took a lot of work. As a nursing student, I didn’t have a life. It was all about studying for exams, learning concepts, and managing other classes beside nursing. I guess you can say I was working as hard as a college student would as a 9th grader. The best part of the nursing class is that I got the chance to shadow doctors and perform procedures that the nurses did. They called this “clinicals”. Clinicals were held on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Each of those days we would go to hospitals and shadow doctors or nurses from varying professions of medical-surgical, trauma, pediatrics, and obstetrics. One day in the month of January, my nursing instructor, assigned me and a classmate, Latayne, to shadow an Obstetrician. I would always remember his name because he was the reason why I wanted to enter this profession, his name was Dr. McKcrean. He was an African-American, tall in stature, he looked about in his late forties and he wore this blue paper scrubs and wore this pink and blue scrub hat.

“Follow me ladies” he said.

 Waving his hand at me and Latayne. We walked into a room where we put on these blue scrub hats, blue paper scrubs, and blue paper shoes. We resembled the same outfit the doctor had. After getting dressed, he leads us to this vast surgical room. Before we walked in, he showed us the way to wash our hands in a sink. He recommended to us that the best way to wash our hands is to repeat the Happy birthday song three times. He said this was important to do because we had to be sterile and prevent the patient from getting any infections. He handed us a mask that I could barely breathe in. I would constantly move the mask around for oxygen to reach inside my nose. As I walk into the cold surgical room, I asked myself, “Why am I here?”

“Ki sa ou vle fe nan lavi ou? My mother said.

This was a question my mother always proposed to me. She started asking this specific question when I was thirteen, when I first started middle school. Of course, I wasn’t sure of a career at the age of thirteen but I knew my parents had high hopes and expectations for me and I couldn’t let them down. My parents were born and raised in a small city of Au Cap, Haiti. They didn’t come to the United States until they were in their late 20’s. When they arrived in the U.S, legally, they spoke no English and had nowhere to go. My mom never really told me how they are got settled in specifically, but I knew it wasn’t easy. It wasn’t till my mother turned the age of fifty she became a citizen. She worked hard for it. I remembered how she would let me quiz her about American history.

 “Who wrote the Star Spangled Banner?” I questioned.

She would always say with her thick accent

 “Francis Scott Bunny.”

Her answer would always make me giggle and I would constantly remind her the correct answer,

 “Mommy it’s Francis Scott Key”.

 I guess you can say that her study habits are what I picked up. To study for exams, I would always ask someone to quiz me. Her determination to get something that she wants rubbed off on me. My mother was very strict when it came to education. She never tolerated anything lower than a C. That’s why I work really hard in school. Haitians always dreamed of their kids being someone important. For example, doctors, lawyers, and nurses is highly looked upon on. It wasn’t till I was in the 8th grade, about to graduate from middle school, that I knew I wanted to purse the medical field. That is when I found my purpose of life at the age of sixteen, when I stepped foot into the surgical room.  

As I gathered my thoughts, I shifted it back to reality. I now starred to a well light room. A room that was as a classroom. Maybe even bigger. On the right side of me, there was two tables filled with surgical instruments. Scalpel, retractors, suction, tweezers, curette, anything you can name, it was there. In the far back, there was a baby incubator. It must have been at least seventy-five degrees in there. It was covered with a blanket with baby ducks on it and a blue nasal aspirator. I never know what that purpose of that blue thing was. On the left of me it was a board with pockets on it. It was at least twenty-five pockets on there. It was used for keeping track of the towels they have used during surgery. As I continue to scan the room, there comes the patient on a hospital bed. She was light skinned, with long black curly hair, and she looked about in her late twenties. She wore this blue hospital gown that every patient wears and surprisingly she wasn’t in pain. Maybe this isn’t a regular vaginal labor, I thought to myself. Latayne and I watched as they rolled her to a sliver table draped with blue sheets and they lifted her up from the bed to the table. She was awake the whole time. She seemed to be alone too. She didn’t have a male figure there to hold her hand through this whole process. I wanted to hold her hand because I knew this must be scary for her, but, Dr. McKcrean said we couldn’t pass the yellow line. The yellow line I stood right on top off. I took a big deep breathe and took one step back. As they prepared the patient for surgery, I watched while they covered her face with anesthesia.

“Count back for 10 for me please” one of the nurses said. “ten, nine, eight, seven...”

her speech became slurred and uncomprehensive,

“six, five, four…” she was unconscious now.

“Enjoy the show”, Dr. McKcrean said with a smile.

I gave him a thumb up. He might have seen a grin on my face through my mask, but in reality I’m nervous. My heart is racing, my hands are hot and sweaty, and my body vibrated.

“Why I am I so nervous, when I’m not the one operating…” I said to myself as my mind drifted to a time where my mother questioned me on this type of behavior.

“Why you keep do that?” my mother said.

Her broken English have gotten way better than it was when she first came to the United States. Her thick accent startled me as I paced back and forth in the living room biting on my fingernails. I had a big oral exam for my debate class and I was extremely nervous. I had panic attacks before each one and my mother thought it was such a bad habit.

“Because I’m nervous mommy. You know I don’t like talking in front of people.”

She explained to me that there was nothing to be so worried about. She told me a story when she was Haiti when she was my age and she had oral exams. She told me the best way to overcoming panic attacks is to use a form of distraction. She told me to stare at people noses are look at the wall to distract me from looking at people’s faces. She also told me that I shouldn’t care about how people would think of me. If I felt like I was prepared, I should act like it.

Taking my mother’s advice, my panic attack slowly began to fade away. One of the scrub nurses passed him a scalpel and I watched him make a horizontal incision below the umbilicus. A rush of bright red blood started to flow out. The nurse then passed him a bovie to cut away the fat that separated the baby to the outside world. You can smell the scent of burning flesh filling up the room. As Dr. McKcrean cut the last piece of yellow fat, there you see a hand. Following the hand, out came the arm, the head, and then the whole body. The baby was silent until, Dr. McKcrean suctioned the babies mouth and nose. Then the room filled with a baby’s cry. A rush of adrenaline went through my body. I was joyful, relieved, and humored because I knew that baby was going to be a headache to the mother. The baby was taken to the incubator to be warmed up and cleaned off from blood and vernix caseosa. The baby boy was six pounds and 3 ounces and was born exactly at 11:53 am. As they gave the baby boy his first shots, Dr. McKcrean aligned a perfect stich by stich on the horizontal incision.

“And that ladies, is how you perform a cesarean section.”

I rushed home that day, excited to tell my mom about the day I had. This time I knew I had the answer to her question. The question she had been asking me ever since middle school. As she walked outside her bedroom door, she asked me,

“Ki sa ou vle fe nan lavi ou?

“I want to be a Doctor, mommy.” I said as a grin creped upon my face.

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