Originally Posted by lillian83
Did you wait untill you had children and then to go school or was this something you had allready thought out? I want to be there for my children so im thinking this my be better for me. How tough was school? I really have a hard time in school and im afraid to get in over my head. Is this something I can take my time at? Do LPN's get respect? i have been hearing some coments that make me wonder. I guess in any field if there are people above you, sometimes they let you know it. I was thinking of taking some refresher classes first to get my mind ready and my confidence up.
No--I had my children starting very young, and didn't stop up until a couple of years ago.;-) My oldest is 17 and my youngest is 2. I just decided that it was time I did something--I'm not getting any younger and this was something that I had always thought about doing, so I just went for it. School was hard, life was hard, finances were very hard. We were paying $600 a month just for daycare while I was going to school. I did get some grants and loans. School was like a full-time job. Lecture/clincals all day, 5 days a week--and studying all night.
Our program was 10 months long and it was seperated into 4 quarters. Looking back now it does seem like it went by pretty fast--but at the time it didn't. It was a fast-paced programs and sometimes we'd have 3 tests a day in three different areas of study. There are different programs out there, this is just a description of the one I went through.
I don't think LPN's are disrespected (at least not in my experiences), although I haven't been in the workforce as an LPN for very long. There may be some people out there that would try and intimidate you or make you feel less worthy--but who cares? That's thier problem. As long as you take pride in your work, and know that what you're doing is respectful.
I'm working in the Emergency Department so I do work around alot of Rn's. The ones I've encountered so far have been very helpful. I talked to an RN in nursing orientation the other day and she said she loves working with LPN's that sometimes she wouldn't know what to do without them. Anyway I hope some of this helps.
Take care!
Janet
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