Advice for Nursing Student?

obri · Jul 4, 2018

@peachtreednurse thank you so much for your kind words! I truly do value experience nurses giving me advice and telling me that my personality/interests align with my current intended career goal. Additionally, thank you for saying it seems like I have a sense of self because after reading one of the responder's response (I'm sure you can guess which one), I was doubting myself thinking if I was too spoiled to have such a long list of preferences. I haven't thought about psych/behavioral nursing! I do have one whole semester, not just one day :), of psych clinical. The only thing I've heard about it from previous cohorts is that the class itself is difficult, but the clinical is boring. Someone told me most of the students just sat around and played cards because it was too dangerous for the students to interact with the patients. Of course, I'm not going to take this knowledge with me to the floor because I want to go in with an open mind.

As to all of you who asked me to keep you posted, I sure will try to! As a small update, I really enjoyed my clinical today. I had a nurse who didn't have too many high acuity patients and the one assigned to me was such a sweet man. He was healing and soon to be discharged. We had such a great conversation. I was smiling the entire time. I know not everyday will be like this, but it's a nice and positive change to what I was used to which mostly consisted of patients who were at end of life or needed further treatment. Obviously, since I'm only there once a week, I never got to see what happened to most of these patients, so I felt like all I saw was sadness with no closure. Today, was different and it gave me confidence that I can do this :). If anyone else reads this post, please feel free to add your thoughts because I always love to read motivational words/advice even if you think I already read something like it!

virgogirl · Jul 6, 2018

There are lots of things about nursing that can be a turn off...in my junior year my clinical professor told me she thought I should leave the program and get a masters in psych. I told her NO! I was hesitant at times in all my clinicals and her back ground was as a retired ER nurse and she looked at me and all her students through that lense...in that moment I realized one person could stop me in my tracks and ruin everything I'd worked so hard for! I told her eventually I would find a place and fit in and I did. Thankfully she didn't flunk me but it was close! Nursing affords options, there is a place for you out there somewhere! I'm currently a psych nurse. I would never work in the regular hospital. I tried the OR and they chewed me up and spit me out! There is always occupational therapy, speech therapy or social work...I thought of these while in school but I was to old to change majors and needed to get a job ASAP...best of luck on your journey!

Froggybelly · Jul 6, 2018

All is not lost. Nursing school is a time where you are exposed to a lot of new knowledge with the end goal of being licensed as a new Nurse who knows enough to hopefully keep from killing someone. Nursing school doesn't usually do more than touch on a multitude of specialties you may really enjoy, such as dialysis, fertility clinic nursing, public health, pediatric office nursing, dermatology, surgery center nursing, or endoscopy. All of those ones I just mentioned can be day-staffing and don't necessarily have super sick patients. Many, many nurses never work med-surg, and they are still real nurses. Hang in there and put in the work to pass your NCLEX. You'll be fine.

Froggybelly · Jul 6, 2018

I tried the OR and they chewed me up and spit me out!

There are some areas where nurses have a reputation of being more vicious toward other nurses, or hardened in general, such as the OR, ED, or ICU. OP may want to steer clear of these areas. I am in the OR, but when I was a student, I really, really liked my adult inpatient psych rotation.

There's something for every nurse. It's just a matter of finding what works.

obri · Jul 7, 2018

@virgogirl good for you for standing up to your instructor and having more belief in yourself! If my instructor did that to me, I wouldn't know what to do. I am in sort of a similar boat in that nursing is my second degree, so I don't want to choose something else now. I worked so hard to get in. Thank you for your encouragement!

@Froggybelly Thank you so much for providing that list! I think I have one clinical that will allow me to observe community nursing (if this is the same thing as clinic nursing). My instructors have told me that our school trains us to be in the hospital, and she wishes they would show us more than the hospital. What made you choose the OR if you really liked your psych rotation? Another question I have for you is if I prefer not to work nights, should I stay away from hospital OR, due to call, and look at a surgery center instead? Additionally, this may be a dumb question, but have you seen shy/timid nurses succeed in the OR/surgery center? As in, do they eventually grow a tough skin and learn how to have a stronger personality? I ask because I really want to succeed in this area; I think surgeries are so interesting but I am more soft spoken. I once had a co worker who was very abrasive, and I was terrified of speaking up to her. I just avoided her as much as possible. I could still work with her but only interacted with her when necessary.

KrCmommy522, BSN, RN · Jul 7, 2018

You're in your first semester. I HATED nursing school.

Honestly, I HATED clinicals. I was a busy single mom of 2. I had to work hard to work my schedule, so I could get my older kid to school and find someone to watch my younger kid while I was in class or at clinical. I definitely didn't have time to make many friends. It seemed like everyone loved clinical so much and had so much fun. But I HATED it! I could NOT wait for it to be over and to get out of there and go home!! Part of what seemed to make it so unbearable was the fact that I constantly felt overwhelmed and stupid. But the other part was that I felt so alone. Everyone in my clinical groups always seemed to know each other and be friends and I always seemed to be on the outside. It made me feel really self-conscious and really alone. But, I was there to learn, so that's what I did. I just focused on my patient's and got through the day. For the most part. But, there were times that it really got to me. There was one clinical I hated so much, I called my mom and told her I was dropping out. There was no doubt about it I was done! Luckily, she talked me down. Then, another clinical, I hated it so much, when it came time for lunch, I went to the bathroom and just started balling. I called my mom and said "this time I'm for real. I'm seriously dropping out. This is NOT for me. And you can NOT talk me out of it!" But...she did...she talked me out of it! And I am soooo glad she did! I just always felt so incompetent at clinical. I was always so good in class, got great grades on tests and in class, aced my care plans. But I just felt so stupid, incompetent, and useless in clinicals. But, other than those 2 clinicals, for the most part it was okay. Of course, feeling incompetent was horrible, but feeling alone made it even worse. I felt like I was the ONLY one who felt so useless and incompetent, but I was NOT. I did have a few people I talked to at school and would swap study guides with and talk to between classes. When I got a clinical rotation with some of them, the clinical was so much different. It was actually, dare I say it? FUN!! So, making friends and sharing that experience with them definitely helps!

When I was in school, our first clinical was in a nursing home (as another poster said). We didn't do anything. We were only there a few hours, and we were assigned to follow a guy around that just picked up the patient's rooms and helped them get up and down. We didn't get to do anything but follow that guy around. We felt that we learned nothing and had no idea what the point of us being there was. But, one thing we did learn was how to communicate with the patient's. The paperwork they had us do at the time required us to talk to the patient's. It really helped me become more comfortable going up to the patient's and talking with them.

EVERY nursing student feels overwhelmed - especially NEW nursing students. Once I got home, I plopped down and didn't even think about clinical again until the night before I had to go again, and then I would DREAD it. Like I said, feeling incompetent makes it bad enough. But, feeling alone makes it even worse. So, if you make some friends in each clinical group, it makes it more bearable and you will see that you aren't alone in how you feel.

Don't think about patient's dying. I didn't have any patient's die while I was in clinical until I was doing my practicum. I can't even think of any students I was in school with that had a patient die while they were in clinical. Wait...when I was doing my practicum, there were students there, and one of the student's patients coded. She watched the code team work on the patient and went down to the cath lab with the patient once they got him back again. He ended up coding again and died. She cried (with good reason!), the patient's nurse and the instructor took her into the break room, kept her in there for a little bit talking to her, and then they all came out. The student looked okay and seemed to go about the rest of the day fine. I'm sure if you are there and one of your patient's dies, your instructor will know what to do to help you get through it! But honestly, that should just be something that you just put out of your mind until it happens.

As for sick people, that's just a part of nursing and a part of being in clinical. As another poster said, the instructor assigns you the sickest patients because that's how you'll learn. Don't look at it so much as you are seeing this poor sick patient and how horrible he/she must feel and how horrible it must be for him/her. Think about how you can make it better for that patient. Talk with the patient, make the patient smile, offer the patient some comforts that might make them smile or make the day a little more bearable. You would be surprised what little things you can do for a patient that make a huge difference. Whenever I got a patient to smile in clinical, I felt like I accomplished something that day. In practicum, I had a patient, my preceptor said not to even worry about her because she had a bad attitude and was always yelling at the nurses, so to not let her get to me. She said not to take it personally. I went into the room, kind of scared at what would happen, she complained about "how uncomfortable this place was" and how it made her back so itchy, so I offered to scratch her back. She kind of grumbled and said how that's not what I was here for and she couldn't use up my time that way. I said I'm here for you, it's really no problem. She got a big smile and said okay. I scratched her back for about 2 mins and she was in a great mood the rest of the day. All the nurses kept asking me what I did to change her attitude. I proudly said, "Scratched her back!" ðŸ˜Š The next day, when I got there, she was so happy to see me and it made me so happy that I made such a difference for her! It made me happy to see that with all of my patients. So, just think about it in terms of what you can do for them to make being sick a little easier or brighten their day.

EVERY student nurse is afraid to touch any patient because they think they will hurt them. You won't. And, if you do something that is uncomfortable for them, they'll say so, and you just stop! ðŸ˜Š If you are giving them a bath, and you go to move a leg or an arm or something and they say ow, just stop and say sorry!

EVERY student nurse feels like they've forgotten everything about the skills they've learned. I learned to do a skills check-off, but wouldn't get an actual chance to do one on a patient until what seemed like forever after. For example, I got checked-off on a urinary catheter, but it wasn't until forever after that I got a chance to actually put one in a patient. My instructor asked if I did one before. I said just on the mannequin forever ago when I did my check-off, she simply said okay, let's go over the steps. She went over the steps with me and was there every step of the way while I did it. It's not unusual to forget when you haven't done it before. It's also not unusual to need to do it many times before having it down! I'm sure your classmates seem like they pick it up quickly, but they too feel the same as you do. They either have been to the skills lab numerous times to practice in order to get the steps down or have had more chances to do the skill on an actual patient. Make time to go to the skills lab as often as you can, and just PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE. Then, one day when you get the chance to do the skill on a real patient, just be honest that you've practiced it in the skills lab but have never done it on a real patient before. You're instructor will be there to help you. That's why they are there!!

EVERY nursing student feels overwhelmed and stupid constantly!! I NEVER felt smart, comfortable, confident, etc. at clinicals! NEVER!! Not once!! I didn't feel remotely confident and comfortable until I was halfway done with my practicum, and even then, I still would question myself sometimes and had no problem going to my preceptor if I was unsure about ANYTHING!

As for where you will fit best. Lots of people have an idea of where they think they will be best at or where they feel they definitely do not want to go! Most of the time, that changes once they've gone through school or once they've been working for a bit. I thought for sure I would hate peds. I LOVE children, but I did NOT like the idea of seeing sick kids, or having to give them shots, etc. But, it ended up being my FAVORITE clinical!! The reason I enjoyed it so much was (1) I had a great group of students in the clinical rotation with me and (2) thanks to a WONDERFUL RN!! She was the best RN I had ever worked with during clinical. Instead of picking patients based on a disease or health issue I was learning in class and wanted hands on experience with, I chose patients based on the fact that they had that RN assigned to them! She was so wonderful, so helpful, and never made me feel incompetent or stupid.

There isn't a lot that nursing students get to do, and what you are able to do, most feel completely incompetent. IMO, nursing school is mostly getting you used to the environment and introducing you to skills and what being a nurse involves. All you can do is do your best, try to make the best of every situation, and practice when you can. I don't think the incompetent feeling ever really leaves you while you're a nursing student, and really, not for a bit after nursing school either. But, you just have to try your best and have your eyes and ears open to learn!!

Good luck!

TheDudeWithTheBigDog, ADN, RN · Jul 9, 2018

I've never had anyone close to me die before, so I'm terrified of death and seeing patients so sick. I guess it doesn't help that my instructor assigns us the sickest patients so that's all I really see. I'm afraid to try simple things like giving baths and ambulating patients because I'm afraid I'll hurt them or I don't know how even though I was already taught. I seem to forget or don't understand a lot of the simple skills until I try it hands on multiple times.

I'm not a nurse, but:

You kind of get numb to people dying the more it happens, but outside of an ICU or OR, it's not really that common. They'll typically get sent to another unit, because these things rarely come without some kind of warning, and since they're monitored 24/7, it's a lot easier to catch. It does happen, though. But when it does, and it's up to someone's life, you forget about your fears and get pretty focused. But more times than not, you're going to help those insanely sick patients get better and go home (long as you're not on a palliative unit). People do die, but unless you're at the most incompetent hospital in the world, it's not going to be an everyday thing. It'll be more common in an ICU, but more will typically get saved. Death happens, it's a part of life, and any direct healthcare job is the best way to get over the fear of seeing it.

For being afraid to do easy things and needing to try things a few times before you get it, that's just confidence. The more you get comfortable doing, the easier learning new things will become. It's a lot harder to accidentally hurt someone than you'd think. Then the harder stuff will come way easier. Practice with other students whenever you get a chance, use your labs, whatever you can to get some extra practice in.

You just have to trust yourself. As long as you have common sense, you're not going to hurt someone.