No sick adults please.....can I still be a nurse?

yuzzamatuzz · Aug 10, 2011

When I started nursing school, one of our teachers asked us who wanted to go into which specialties. About 75% of my class wanted peds. Flash forward 3 years, only 5 people out of my hundred person class chose to do their senior practicum in peds. I ended up loving peds, even though I went through my first years of nursing school wanting to work in an adult burn ICU. If you do stick to peds/ob, you will need the skills you learned in med/surg. What if you get a high risk ob patient in labor with a cardiac problem or diabetes? You will need to know both ob and med/surg.

My best advice would be to go into nursing school with an open mind. During school I was an NA on an alzheimer's unit. I thought I was going to hate it, but ended up loving it! I learned so much on that floor. Alternatively, many people end up not liking peds because although you may love children, you may not love taking care of sick and even dying children. Similarly, OB may seem exciting but the nursing care involved may not be for you (I loved the thought of OB but ended up not liking it nearly as much as I thought I would). Med/surg is such a broad term, you may end up loving something else that you have never even thought of: maybe you'd really enjoy spinal cord injuries, oncology, cardiology, or some other specialty. While you may leave nursing school still loving peds/ob, limiting yourself before you start may only close doors that you didn't even know existed.

xtxrn, ASN, RN · Aug 10, 2011

Here is my dilemma. I have a HUGE passion for labor/delivery and pediatrics (having had 4 children myself). However, I do NOT want to deal with sick adults. I understand that NS is mostly about sick adults and we will only spend 8 to 10 weeks total on mother/child and peds. Is it possible for someone like me to make it through nursing school (as a means to an end)? I keep thinking as soon as we start clinicals in a nursing home I will run the other way. Does anyone else feel this way and if so, how do you get through it?

I went to nursing school for the sole purpose of working NICU or peds. I hated geriatrics and cardiac. (I still hate cardiac- LOL). I got through nursing school in 4 semesters ( plus one for 5 of the co-requisites) and microbiology in the summer between 1st and 2nd year. In school, you're looking more at the trees, and not the forest....I had procedures to learn, meds to figure out, those bloody care plans to write, etc.... the size of the patient didn't make much difference.... Also- if you end up in L&D, you will have a LOT of patients with other medical problems...you will have to know how to deal with HTN, diabetes, MS, heart problems, asthma/COPD, kidney failure, trauma, ortho, etc.... pregnant folks don't get well when they get pregnant- they get more complicated :) Look at all of it as how it will help you be a better overall nurse who wants to do L/D... not as a waste of time, or pain in the butt

NCRNMDM, ASN, RN · Aug 11, 2011

Knowing that you want to work OB or pediatrics is great, but as a nursing student, and a nurse, you have to be flexible enough to deal with whatever comes your way. First and foremost, you are going to work with sick adults quite a bit while you are in nursing school, and, second, you may not be able to find a job in OB or pediatrics right after you graduate. You may be forced to work with sick adults while you gain nursing experience before you can find a job in OB or peds.

babyNP., APRN · Aug 14, 2011

It's possible to get what you'd like, but you have to be top of your game, making contacts, and be willing to move to different places...

I thought I would like adult ICU nursing, but the majority of them are obese, self-entitled, lots more poop (not to mention c-diff!!). I hate adults, dislike peds and OB. My true and only love is NICU. I thought I would like to branch out to the other ICUs and try some new things, but as soon as I stepped foot in a PICU, I knew it was not for me with half-gorked out kids and half-traumas, some of them crying for their mamas and all of them having teeth and restraints and more poop and ga;skeo;llakdfovn. No way. I would probably quit nursing altogether now if I couldn't do NICU. Or go back to school to do research.

So, yes you'll have to do the clinicals, yes you may not get your first pick of jobs, but if it leads to something you truly love...go for it.

BeenThereDoneThat74, MSN, RN · Aug 15, 2011

I thought I would like adult ICU nursing, but the majority of them are obese, self-entitled, lots more poop (not to mention c-diff!!). I hate adults, dislike peds and OB. My true and only love is NICU. I thought I would like to branch out to the other ICUs and try some new things, but as soon as I stepped foot in a PICU, I knew it was not for me with half-gorked out kids and half-traumas, some of them crying for their mamas and all of them having teeth and restraints and more poop and ga;skeo;llakdfovn. No way. I would probably quit nursing altogether now if I couldn't do NICU. Or go back to school to do research.
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It's great that you love your specialty. But wow, could you be any more insensitive? Especially since some of the half-gorked out kids started out as the NICU babies you adore so much? Or that the adults that you hate could be your mom or dad?

**RosesrReder, BSN, MSN, RN** · Aug 15, 2011

It's possible to get what you'd like, but you have to be top of your game, making contacts, and be willing to move to different places...
I thought I would like adult ICU nursing, but the majority of them are obese, self-entitled, lots more poop (not to mention c-diff!!). I hate adults, dislike peds and OB. My true and only love is NICU. I thought I would like to branch out to the other ICUs and try some new things, but as soon as I stepped foot in a PICU, I knew it was not for me with half-gorked out kids and half-traumas, some of them crying for their mamas and all of them having teeth and restraints and more poop and ga;skeo;llakdfovn. No way. I would probably quit nursing altogether now if I couldn't do NICU. Or go back to school to do research.
So, yes you'll have to do the clinicals, yes you may not get your first pick of jobs, but if it leads to something you truly love...go for it.

I am a NICU mom to a preemie (possibly half gorked to you) and also a NICU, PICU nurse. While I truly understand where you are coming from, something about your post makes you sound very insensitive. I hope I am the one with the problem.

ashleyisawesome, BSN, RN · Aug 15, 2011

It's possible to get what you'd like, but you have to be top of your game, making contacts, and be willing to move to different places...
I thought I would like adult ICU nursing, but the majority of them are obese, self-entitled, lots more poop (not to mention c-diff!!). I hate adults, dislike peds and OB. My true and only love is NICU. I thought I would like to branch out to the other ICUs and try some new things, but as soon as I stepped foot in a PICU, I knew it was not for me with half-gorked out kids and half-traumas, some of them crying for their mamas and all of them having teeth and restraints and more poop and ga;skeo;llakdfovn. No way. I would probably quit nursing altogether now if I couldn't do NICU. Or go back to school to do research.
So, yes you'll have to do the clinicals, yes you may not get your first pick of jobs, but if it leads to something you truly love...go for it.

what might you mean by "half-gorked out kids"?

ErinRN2B · Aug 15, 2011

Gorked-out = over-medicated?

**RosesrReder, BSN, MSN, RN** · Aug 15, 2011

Gorked-out = over-medicated?

Perhaps I missunderstood. I have only heard that term in a derogatory meaning, as in disabled.