Please, Your thoughts: Should I become a nurse ?

Ruby Vee, BSN · Dec 31, 2013

Only you can know if you should be a nurse or not. Have you thought about what your family will live on while you're in school? Will your wife work?

I think you're over emphasizing the dangers of contracting an infectious disease through nursing. I've known very few people who came up HIV positive or Hepatitis positive from nursing -- and of the ones I do know, most of them were careless about personal protective equipment. I suspect that once you've had a microbiology class (one of the pre-requisites for nursing) you'll worry a lot less about that.

Yes, there are Nursing Jobs where you don't have to shower people or clean up poop, but you have to get through nursing school and probably a few years in a first job before you'd be qualified for those jobs. If you really want to be a nurse, poop is part of the process. Deal with it. Or don't. I really think you're making too big of a deal of that, too, though.

Blood isn't the worst body fluid you'll encounter. It's actually rather clean compared to purulent wound drainage, for example. Or sputum. (Sputum is my personal bugaboo, but I've learned to deal.) As for seeing internal operations, unless you choose to work in the OR, that isn't a part of most nurses' job.

Again, only you can know what you want to do. No one can answer your fourth issue but you.

Starting over from scratch is intimidating. Again, YOU have to decide if it's worth it.

Hope this helps.

llg, PhD, RN · Dec 31, 2013

I agree with Ruby Vee.

Also, it seems to me that you like the "idea" of being a nurse but are not attracted to the things nurses actually have to do. Many people are attracted to the idea of helping others, having a fairly secure job, etc. However, those same people might not want to actually do nursing work. If that is the case, then nursing is probably not a good choice for you. There are many different ways to help people -- and if you don't actually want to do the work of nursing, choose another way to help people.

I have 2 recommendations for you to consider.

1. Before you quit your current job and make a huge investment in nursing school, do some volunteer work in a hospital or nursing home. Find out how you react to working in an environment where you will see, hear, and smell health care up close. Actually interact with sick people and see how you like it.

2. Explore options related to ... or that build upon you previous education and work. Build on that background to find a different job (in a related field) that will revive your career. For example, would it be easier to get a degree in bio-medical engineering than nursing? Could you work for a health care equipment manufacturer? Could you use your skills (with having to take only a few additional courses) to work for a non-profit organization? That would keep your family's financial security without having to invest so much in a whole new career that might not work out for you. Then ... you could do some volunteer work that would help satisfy your dersire to help others.

If you read the threads here on allnurses, you'll see that nurses get burned out, too. Nursing is not all "sweetness and light" -- it can be hard, back-breaking work that involves annoying people, stuff that smells, germs, viruses, and complicated interpersonal relationships. If you really want to do the work of nursing -- by all means, become a nurse. But don't look at it as an escape from a job that you have grown tired of. You would be investing/risking a lot to jump from 1 stressful situation to another.

Good luck with whatever you decide.

itsmejuli · Dec 31, 2013

Instead of nursing you could look at other health related occupations that you could integrate your education and experience into.

Take a look at careers and training in medical devices.

Biffbradford · Dec 31, 2013

I agree with the above and go into bio-medical engineering. That's where the docs are making the BIG bux. There are so many of us trying to get OUT of nursing, why would anyone want to get IN? :rolleyes:

BTW, the worst is cleaning up GI bleed poo. After almost 15 years I can take any smell but that ... makes me retch.