Harder to have a new baby in school, or as a new nurse?

caliRN2112 · May 31, 2014

I was pregnant when I graduated in 2012, passed NCLEX in September, had my baby in October. Perfect timing!! I had a great non-healthcare job since before ns school that I kept even after having the baby while applying everywhere for RN positions. Two months ago I finally got a job offer as new grad in a Med-Surg unit( eventhou it's been almost 2 years). That came up during the interview, and honestly, having a baby right after graduation shows you're good planning and prioritizing.

RunBabyRN · May 31, 2014

Nursing school with a new baby would have made it that much harder. No way, if I could avoid it. At least when you're working, when you're off work, you're not trying to write about your patients, read, study for an exam, and coordinate a group paper at the same time. We decided to wait until I graduated, and we're debating whether or not to have more kids at this point (I just graduated). I think it would definitely be easier now that I've graduated than it would have been in school.

You also don't know how your pregnancy will be. What if you have hyperemesis gravidarum? What if it ends up being a high risk pregnancy? I wouldn't chance it.

LL143KnB, BSN, RN · May 31, 2014

I would personally wait until you're all done with school. I'm recently engaged, also just got accepted into nursing school and one of my worst fears is getting pregnant during school. We already have a 6 year old and she'll probably be 9 or 10 before we have another. My advice is to wait.

springchick1, ADN, RN · May 31, 2014

What happens if you get but on bed rest while in school? You can't go to class which may not be too bad if you can self study at home but what about clinicals? You won't be able to go clinicals so you will more than likely end up having to withdraw. Just something to think about.

richardgecko · May 31, 2014

Can't speak on having a baby as a new nurse because I'm avoiding another pregnancy like the plague....BUT

I had a 6 month old when I started clinicals and it was gut wrenchingly hard. I breastfed and pumped during my first rotation and it was difficult having to keep up in school and stop to pump. I missed my baby until it hurt. I had to send him to day care and we'd never spend any time together because I had to study and complete care plans as soon as I got home.

LoriRNCM, ADN, ASN, RN · May 31, 2014

Life happens in NS, BUT..... as your advisors will tell you (or have told you) at orientation, you should avoid any life changing events while in NS, including becoming pregnant, getting married, moving...... Sometimes things can't be avoided. For me, I lost three of my five dogs the first year, and it was devastating. Very difficult to even garner the motivation to get up everyday and go to class/clinical. How I did it, I don't know. If I had a choice, I would want my pets and family to remain healthy and drama free while I am in NS so I could get through it without distraction. But I have elderly parents, a sick mother, and a year to go, so that probably isn't gonna happen.

caliRN2112 · May 31, 2014

AVOID EXTRA DRAMA DURING NRSING SCHOOL! Men are fertile up until 70 and you are young, school will take the best of you and I don't think you can fully enjoy pregnancy and motherhood while dealing with the stress of test and clinicals.

Episteme · May 31, 2014

Don't do it. Unless you have a live-in nanny. Then maybe. But as another person mentioned, there is no reason to just assume you'll have an uncomplicated pregnancy. You're 24 weeks along and begin to spot. You begin to spill lots of protein in your urine. You're near the end of the pregnancy and you're blood pressure gets crazy and your platelet count starts to drop drastically.

Obviously, it's been done. But you are taking a risk with the baby, your health and your potential graduation date.

OrganizedChaos, LVN · May 31, 2014

Wait until after nursing school. I had a surprise pregnancy & it hasn't been easy. I've been to the ER close to 10 times & admitted once. I got accepted into a bridge program & it starts June 4th & ends July 18th, my baby is due July 5th. I accepted but then had to decline the spot because of how busy the summer semester would be & my health is not so great right now. So I'm waiting to apply for fall 2015. Plus that will give me all that time to bond with my son. You never know how your pregnancy will go. Every pregnancy is different. I would just wait until after you graduate & have a job.

Here.I.Stand, BSN, RN · May 31, 2014

I had my first while I was in nursing school, and then had 4 more while working as an RN. HANDS DOWN, easier to do while working.

You may not qualify for FMLA...well you won't if you haven't been there a year, but some managers will work with you. I got pregnant w/ my youngest in between my interview and my job offer; my manager approved me for 6 weeks STD and 6 weeks personal leave. So even thought it wasn't official FMLA, I got 12 weeks.

Anyway, to get this tangent back onto the circle, worst case you'd go back to work after a 6 week STD leave. In nursing school, you don't get 6 weeks. Unless you're in a traditional university BSN program and get summers off...I went to a vo-tech and did school through the summers.

This is what it looked like. I had patho that semester. We had an exam every week. I had my daughter at the beginning of spring break. So I had that 1 week of break, and then I stayed home from class for 1 week. The week that I came back, I took my make-up exam on respiratory, and my scheduled exam on renal/fluid-electrolyte'n'acid-base balance. I spent my two weeks off NOT sleeping when the baby slept, but studying like a mad woman.

Oh, and I forgot to add, she was a colicky baby. Cried for hours on end, which makes studying impossible unless your husband is the type to encourage you to go to the library while he and baby pace the hall.

And then there were clinicals. I was able to work it out that most of my clinical rotations were scheduled before delivery (they tried to tell me they couldn't give me preferential treatment, but I reminded them that the proper term is reasonable accommodations bwa haha!) But then the following semester in clinicals and trying to pump...I did it, but it was a pain because I wasn't just coordinating a break w/ my colleague. I was waiting for my instructor to become available to watch me pass meds so that I could leave the floor, plus being available for my pt's treatments and all that jazz that I was supposed to be learning from.

Do I regret anything? Absolutely not--I wouldn't trade her for the world! But it was really, REALLY hard, and I even had my mother-in-law to help me. When you have a real maternity leave, you can stare at the baby as long as you want to, you can take a nap whenever he naps, you can sleep in if the baby kept you up all night, you can read him Goodnight Moon instead of Mama's PATHO NOTES :roflmao: (Yes, I did read her my patho notes hehe!). Is it doable, yes, but difficult.

Here.I.Stand, BSN, RN · May 31, 2014

^^^ To be clear, my class didn't all have clinicals the same week. We went in groups throughout the semester. So I wasn't asking that they reschedule the clinicals themselves but to put me in the group that went before my due date.