How to become a labor and delivery nurse??

[eb9411]

I graduated high school last spring and just had my first child. Now that I have started my family I find it really important to get an education. I have always been interested in the medical field, just never knowing what I truly wanted. I think I have found my calling...I want to be a labor and delivery nurse! After going through labor myself i know that is where I belong. The only problem here is that I have no idea where to start. Do I go to community college or a nursing school? What is the difference between an RN, ASN(or ADN) , and BSN? Can you go to school for nursing part time?

Please help!!!!!

[eb9411]

I'm aware of the darker side of it too.. I would like nursing completely but I know there are some areas i cant stand being in at a hospital (i work in hospital room service right now. i like the idea of being a doula too though!

I would encourage you to explore the idea of doula certification. It's a much shorter path and it will allow you to support the emotional needs of the laboring woman without needing to worry about the medical needs. I was training to be a doula for awhile before I got into nursing school. It was extremely rewarding. I attended two home births and two hospital births and got to watch the midwife at work, as well as the nurses in the hospital births (one was a homebirth transfer).

I know two L&D nurses, and I think like nursing in general, you realize once you get into the career that it's more about medical needs and charting and patient safety than the warm fuzzy caring that I *wish* we had more time to do. My L&D nurses do a lot of c-sections, inductions, epidurals, and they are so busy managing the medical needs that they feel unfulfilled to spend as much time as they want to supporting the laboring mom with her emotional needs. They are often managing two patients at the same time, and sometimes they have to leave one in order to attend to the other one's c-section. They also will change shifts without seeing their patients' babies being born.

A doula stays with the same laboring mom through the entire labor and birth. The doula also can do follow-up care, breastfeeding support, and even visit the new mom at home and help with housework, meals preps if you sign up to be a postpartum doula as well as a birth doula.

[Dranger]

I'm aware of the darker side of it too.. I would like nursing completely but I know there are some areas i cant stand being in at a hospital (i work in hospital room service right now. i like the idea of being a doula too though!

Well those areas you can't stand are the areas you might have to work in. In any given nursing class I would say at least 50% of the students want OB or Peds. How many get that? Not many. Nursing isn't rainbows and unicorns that you felt in your happy delivery. Its a part of it but not even close to a majority. It's science, critical/quick thinking, time management, stress, healing, life and death....lots of death.

Getting in is competitive which means I hope you did well in high school, took AP classes and got a decent GPA or you are in for a uphill battle.

[luvaOBnurse]

Get your RN and try to get your foot in the door soon as u graduate. It took me a while to get a position, but I appreciate the experience along the way..it really help me with the medical conditions that some of the mother's have during and after pregnancy