Most Challenging Class/Moment

Nursing Students General Students

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Hello!

Just curious as to what you all have found as the most challenging or difficult class or moment in your nursing studies/career...

The most challenging moments for me are the emotional ones. Sometimes we do something in lab or talk about something in post-conference that given me a flashback of my mother's very bad hospital death when I was teenager. It is overwhelming sometimes. I get especially freaked out when I see patients struggle against some kind of care that has a low chance of success. (My mother had a lot of invasive procedures/treatments and died anyway-- suffering until the last moment.)

Or when patients are going through something that touches me more than usual, in clinical. For instance, I took care of a woman not long ago who had serious complications from a c-section (almost bled-out and died). Then I read her chart and found out the baby had a fatal chromosomal abnormality and had either died or death was imminent. And also that she had known and decided to go thoough the whole process as opposed to getting an abortion. My student brain was way overloaded that day trying to sort all this out! Especially the what ifs and whys of it all.

Specializes in ED, ICU, PACU.

Doing a presentation (public speaking) & skill assessments/practicals (performace anxiety). :sofahider Everything else was a breeze, except for the group projects :smiley_ab :smackingf :selfbonk: :argue: -I tended to be a 'solitary learner' and still am.

I agree with militaryspouse98 about the first semester. Just getting used to everything in the first semester was very challenging. I'm just entering my second year now (third semester) and it's still hard but now I'm used to the way we are tested, clinicals, the papers, what is expected of us, etc. Just getting into the groove of NS is the hardest part.

Specializes in PCU/Hospice/Oncology.

Just search my name and find the post about my "Day from hell in clinical." I think that says it all!

EKG strips:bluecry1:

For me it was the end of my first semester. My final was scheduled for 12/10...wife and I were expecting a new baby on 12/12...She went into labor on 12/8 at 12:30am had to take a make up exam on the same day at 9am....the hospital was about 40 miles from the school...the nurse told me she would probally deliver around 12 noon or later so I drove the 40 miles in about 20 minutes.to take the test..my instructor allow me to take the exam earlier about midway through the exam wife calls..."Oh honey she's coming where are you?" I wrote anything on those last few questions and I was out the door. I call my wife again and all I could here was the cries of my 6lb 12oz daughter....MISSED THE WHOLE THING. I had no time to study for the final because of the excitement of my baby girl. I took the test and passed...that was my moment.

Awwww...I'm sorry you had to miss the birth. I would have made the test up...again. Well, atleast you passed and your daughter was healthy. Congrats on both!

Specializes in Ortho, Neuro, Detox, Tele.

I think the moment that I had my first med error....whoops...didn't give, but just felt dumb...

Then, the entire first semester of clinicals in LTC, no idea really what to do with a patient, then how meds worked, how to write a careplan for them, how to fill the time when NOTHING is going on, etc.....

The hospital/off sites are a breeze....just tougher to get the LTC down....

Specializes in Case mgmt., rehab, (CRRN), LTC & psych.

My most challenging moment was being told by a clinical instructor, "Maybe you should find another career!"

After he said this to me, my challenge was to prove all of the naysayers wrong.

definitely pharm! patho was also tough, but pharm was the one that really got me

My most stressful moment was the day I showed up for clinical at 7am...only to find all the staff staring at me, wondering why was I there. I found that odd, as my group had been there all semester...how could they not know why I was there??? Finally, one of the nurses said "I don't think your group is here today...you're the only one here." My first thought was confusion...why didn't I know clinical was cancelled? My next thought was of relaxtion...an unexpected day off from clinical. I casually called the instructors cell phone...and sounded like I woke her up. She said "What do you mean you're at the hospital? We're meeting today to do presentations?" I said "Presentation? I thought that was next week?!?" She said "I can tell by your response that you're not prepared for your presentation and I don't want you showing up if you're not prepared." "I said "of course I'm prepared...I just got my days mixed up. I'll be there on time." I drove from the hospital to home...going about 100mph...my brain was going just as fast...trying to come up with a presentation that I hadn't even started working on. I ended up tearing apart my entire house...I created "The Game of Cirrhosis" (a board game similiar to the game of Life) with barbie dolls, a white board, dry erase markers...I thought not only am I going to bomb this, I'm going to make a complete fool of myself. I just kept throwing things together, not completely clear as to what direction I was going in with it. But I had no time to worry about, I had less than two hours to create it, and a 30 minute drive to even get there. When I left the house, after creating this thing, my house looked like a bomb went off. As I left to drive to this presentation, I now had to come up with all the rules, and what I was going to say. I got to my presentation, 10 minutes late...my instructor was convinced I was going to bomb this presentation. As I got up, I still was not 100% clear as to what I was going to say...but somehow playing a game and getting everyone involved as players took some of the pressure off me, and in the end my instructor said "hmmm, I would have bet a million dollars that when I hung up with you that you were going to come with nothing to present...good job." Then I looked down and realized that I showed up wearing a wrinkle shirt with a hole in it and jeans (the clothes I threw on and forgot to change out of after I got home and took off my uniform.) As I drove home on autopilot...shocked with what I had just pulled off, and walked into my house that looked like it had been ransacked...I thought to myself, that if I just pulled that off, I can do ANYTHING!!! I think about the feelings I had on that day, whenever something feels overwhelming at work...with a little thought, and creativity...and some luck...I can handle it.

Specializes in Case Management, Home Health, UM.

Definitely Advanced Med-Surg (Critical Care Nursing), which was the last nursing course I had to take before graduation. And I passed it by only three points. Thank GOD for little favors!

Specializes in Home Care, Psych, Education, Case Management.

Currently taking pharm.....it is the absolute WORST, hardest class I have ever taken!

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