Reason for becoming a LPN?

As far as I know in our area (Illinois) an LPN can do almost as much as an RN with an exception of giving certain drugs IVP--or hanging blood and writing the care plans. There's probably a few other things that we can't do, I guess it just depends on the state your living in. I'm sure the pay is alot different than that of an RN.;-)

LPN worked for me because I'm 35 and have 5 children. It was a 10 month course (full-time), and now I can work while I'm taking classes here and there for the RN. If for some reason I can't make it through the RN--I will always have the LPN to fall back on. Good luck with whatever you decide! Janet

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