In nursing school, I learned that there are different phases of becoming a nurse. Right now, I'm still in the honeymoon phase, where I'm really just excited that I've made it this far. I'm on orientation, and I still feel like I know very little--my RN badge feels more like an accessory, but I'm excited to learn and I'm very excited to have a paycheck and free time to enjoy some of that paycheck.
The next phase is the shock phase, where we'll start to feel the heaviness of our responsibilities and experience "disillusionment" with the profession. I wish we could skip past this phase and go straight to the third one. Most nurses go through this phase, and I'm sure I will too (definitely not looking forward to it). This is where it will come in handy to have a mentor who we can vent to and confide in.
The third phase is the recovery phase, where we'll feel like we finally have both feet on the ground. We'll feel more comfortable with routine nursing tasks and with our patient populations. We'll feel like we don't have to spend 10 minutes thinking about how to prioritize care for one patient. We'll know we're reaching this phase when we can laugh after a stressful situation, or perhaps when we don't feel like we're having a panic attack on the drive to work.
I thought maybe we could all use this thread to share our excitement, our fears, to vent, to encourage each other. Let's tell each other what phase we're in, or how we got through the different phases. Let's share our healthy coping mechanisms, what we're learning, and what we're most nervous about.
Like I said, I'm pretty sure I'm still in the honeymoon phase. Nursing seems exciting and I don't have much responsibility at this point. The healthy habits that I'm implementing right now are healthy eating, cutting out all soda and limiting caffeine. I'll shift to nights pretty soon, and my goal is to work out after my shifts, even though I'll probably feel like sleeping right away. I have a health buddy to keep me accountable.
Please feel free to share anything you would like (while maintaining HIPAA), whether it be something silly, something frustrating, something depressing...anything.
Best of luck to everyone!
ETA: This is of course open to all nurses, not just those in their first year. I just thought this was the most appropriate place for this thread.
