A little scared - would appreciate your thoughts!

You will know what to do! Don't worry.

You learn it in school, no worries.

You see, the problem is that you haven't started your classes yet so you don't really have a good understanding of what people are discussing. When you get into your classes "all will become clear". You will be given directions and information. Till then, just enjoy the reading and pick up some pointers. I recommend that you go through the sticky threads and explore some of the weblinks. Start organizing and bookmarking websites. I would, in particular, look at what is in the stickys on the Nursing Student Assistance Forum. Since you are worried about care plans and I answer a lot of care plan questions check out:

• http://allnurses.com/forums/f205/health-assessment-resources-techniques-forms-145091.html - Health Assessment Resources, Techniques, and Forms (in Nursing Student Assistance Forum)
• http://allnurses.com/forums/f205/desperately-need-help-careplans-170689.html - Desperately need help with careplans (in Nursing Student Assistance Forum)
• http://allnurses.com/forums/f50/careplans-help-please-r-t-aeb-121128-7.html - CAREPLANS HELP PLEASE! (with the R\T and AEB) (in General Nursing Student Discussion Forum)
• http://allnurses.com/forums/f205/care-maps-225330.html - Care Maps (in Nursing Student Assistance Forum)

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Excellent idea to bookmark those sites!

Once you're sitting in a classroom with your textbooks, and have done the reading and the classroom discussions, this entire Nursing Process will become very clear. It will become a part of you and who you are and what you do as a professional nurse. Right now, you're reading information that has no relativity to anything about you. It's bound to look and feel intimidating and scary. Please don't let it do that! When the time comes, you'll learn it, own it, use it! Promise!

Thank you guys so much, I was having this same exact problem as lmm1019. I'm starting an accelerated program on the 1st of October and I've been reading things on this site for a few months now and I've been slowly but surely freaking out that I don't know what in the world you guys are talking about. Thanks for taking the time to point out the obvious, its greatly appreciated.

You will learn it all in school. Don't worry! As far as careplans go, even now in my 3rd semester of 4, they are a little difficult, but most of the difficulty is wording things properly and making them thorough enough.

I have to say in a weird way its a comfort to know that these things seem like a lot to someone on the outside- because the more I learn the more I feel like I don't know, and this reminds me of how much I truly have learned in the past year or so!

Don't worry... once you start just take it one piece at a time, it will all eventually start coming together and making sense for you.

That's why your going to school; to learn these things that you know nothing about! Don't worry - at the end of your first year you will be amazed at everything you have learned. I remember looking at my new textbooks the summer before I started NS and wondering what the heck a nursing diagnosis was. Now I find myself mentally assigning nursing diagnoses on almost everyone I meet! A few tips I've found helpful - if you have no medical experience, get a job as a CNA during your summer vacation. Also, what Daytonite suggested about bookmarking nursing websites is so helpful - I have almost two pages of great websites on everything from theraputic communication to reading a ecg strip. (Most of them have come from her!)
So don't get yourself all freaked out about things that haven't happened yet - put that energy into getting really organized - decide what kind of note-taking system you are going to use, get a digital recorder (a must), get a big calender to jot down test dates and other important stuff - in other words, get all your "ducks in a row" before school starts.
Good Luck!