Officially a RD

This describes me lately.

I am officially a Registered Dietitian (RD).  I passed the exam on Oct. 19th & received my certificate in the mail yesterday.  I'm super excited, happy, & relieved!! 

The whole process of becoming a dietitian has been a very long road.  I remember specifically when I declared this major & why I did.  There were many people in my major that graduated & never became a RD.  The LORD told me I would complete this degree & become Registered. I just didn't know it would be this long after college (I graduated college Dec 2006).  God led many in different directions and all things have happened within his timing.  I even tried to move in other directions, like becoming a teacher, however he kept bringing me back to nutrition.  

The acceptance of my Internship was a glorious day in the Rhorer household.  I was on my way to completing the task of becoming RD.  However, I didn't know that one whole year of my life would be consumed by this program.  It was a very tough, hard year, but I persevered and finished the race strong.  

Then came the finale, the registration exam.  Ugh, this was the last task to being finished. After graduating from the Internship in June, I signed up to take the exam in August.  I studied for 3-4 hours a day during the month of July.  I was set to take the exam in August. At that time, I thought I was ready & was extremely confident in myself.  I was forgetting one thing. God. I thought I could do ths test without him. That I could conquer this with all the time I studied. For goodness sakes, it was just a stupid test. Guess what, I FAILED.  I was humiliated, mad, bitter, & just furious that I failed.  I couldn't believe it. I had studied so much & felt there was not much more I could study to pass.

I took a month off. Then I scheduled again to take the exam in October. BAM back to the grind, studying.  This time though I realized that I had to submit myself to GOD and just pray. That's exactly what I did.  I have to be honest though.  I was very discouraged during this time, hurt, & broken.  I spent many nights crying and sobbing to GOD.  I didn't want to study. The past year of my life had been such Hell & I was just mad that I was not finished.  Studying again was rough.  I felt that I was not understanding what I was studying, & I was so afraid of failing again.  I emotionally could not do this anymore. Also, the fact that I had a job that depended on the passing of this exam hanging over my head. & that every other intern in my class had passed the exam on the 1st try.

Oct 19th came. I slept two hours that night. I was so scared, so afraid of failing. I had faith, but seriously my faith was literally that of a mustard seed.     

Matthew 17:20 (NIV) ²⁰ He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”  

I'm not kidding. This verse was my song during this rough time.  I don't remember much of the test except the fact that I was shaking tremendously & that I was purely exhausted. I remember that many of the test questions resembled a lot of my study questions & my math questions were also very similar.  I remember seeing You Passed & all I could think was THANK YOU LORD. Seriously, it was not me taking this exam. I was very out of character that day.

Finally I have completed the task of becoming a Registered Dietitian.  I am officially Erica Rhorer, RD. Praise the LORD from whom all blessings flow.

Since the passing of the test, I feel like I have not come out of this, what I would call, depression.  I'm in recovery.  :)  My current job is going well.  It is a bit overwhelming, but I am encouraged daily by the other RD's that confidence will come with time & soon my days will be less stressful.  Work has been extremely busy because we are short many dietitians. Plus, I have had to work two weekends, pretty much in a roll, & that was exhausting.

On another note, my mother was diagnosed with renal cell adenocarcinoma (kidney cancer) back in March.  It has been a long past few months with treatment, planning surgery, & so forth.   Last week she had major surgery in which they removed a 4.5 pound tumor from her abdomen. She was a trooper & came out of surgery like a champ.  I am so proud of her.  She is doing very well since the surgery & is healing well.  I have been traveling home much more than usual to be of help & just to visit. Justin has not been able to travel with me much, which has made it harder & more tiring, but it has been very good to be with my family. I love them.  We recently received the BEST news, Mom's cancer is now in remission.  Praise the LORD. 

I'm not sure when this season will pass, but I'm hoping it is soon. I'm ready to be refreshed and renewed.