Happy Birthday!

I know this might become very routine, and I might not be excited about it in a few. There are some moments ...
Al through third year of medical school, you follow the residents/nurses around, hoping to get to do something - set an IV line, close the skin incision in a surgery, check a patient's cervixor whatever it takes.
Specifically on OB/Gyn rotation, you hope that there's a delivery so you can deliver the placenta or someone actually lets you assist while delivering a patient.
I've had my fair share of placental delivery, and delivered a baby or two with assistance (you have to find the resident who'll allow you or the nurse that's not too cranky {the nurses deserve a whole post of their own!}).
So today, I was on the Labor and Delivery floor, the residents had class, so it was the students working with the attending. I had a patient come in in active labor, and I was excited about the opportunity of a vaginal delivery. When it was time to push, I was all gowned up and standing there. The nurse that had the patient is well known as a particularly cranky nurse who is not too pleased about students "messing with" her patient. As I put my hand to the vagina, she shooed me off and beckoned to the attending.
The attending then came to stand there, and I put my hand back there while she was pushing. The attending didnt say anything, so I proceeded to deliver the head, freed the anterior shoulder, and posterior shoulder, and baby was out!
The attending was pretty much assisting me in suctioning the baby, cutting the cord, and I managed to hand off the baby to the pediatricians....without dropping the baby! Lol!

This was my first unassisted delivery, and I guess what made the difference was:
1. Confidence: with confidence you can do almost anything- or bs your way through anything (not like Im saying I bs'ed my way, but if you're being pimped and you guess an answer with confidence, usually most people dont challenge you). Anyways, I think because I moved with purpose, the attending felt comfortable letting me deliver the baby.
I also delivered the placenta...and she had no tears!
2. Talk to the hand nurses!: sorry to my RN readers, but nurses, especially L&D nurses are notorious for having a funky attitude! They wont let you do anything with a patient, but when you come back 6 months later as an intern, they start expecting you to do/know stuff! like how am I supposed to know how to check a patient if I never did it before? schhheeew!

...ok, so I've lost my train of thoughts now, I'm on call and its 12:50am!