Okay, first of all, let me say I am amazed that I was able to register the username "Weirdo" to AllNurses.com, a website that has been in existence, what, 15 years at least? That's crazy! I am the only weirdo here? That's basically how I feel at school and in my career.
Anyway, I'm a student, who will be graduating in December with two associates degrees—one in Nursing and one in History. This whole time I've been in school, I've been doing freelance writing work for various print and web sources around town (not about nursing, but about events around town and such), and I've also been working as an aide on a surgical cardiac split advanced care/med-surg unit. I'll be enrolling in an RN to BSN program upon graduation.
Anyway, I don't really get off on trauma, nor do I find excitement in the grind of a 12-hour shift with 6 patients all high acuities or any of that. I'm more of a "path of least resistance" kind of guy.
I'm wondering if anybody here, or anybody in the world, has a similar skillset. Anyone study Nursing AND History... I mean, I know a lot of people go into nursing after studying history because there's no money in history, but does anybody DO anything with both of these fields of study? I'm thinking with my background in writing there may be something I can do. Every nursing textbook has, like, that chapter about Florence Nightengale... who writes that? A quick google of "Nurse Historian" comes up with nothing. So what can I do? Also, I want to make a lot of money, and I'm not opposed to going to graduate school after getting my BSN or anything like that.
So, is there anyone else out there similar to me? Or am I seriously the only weirdo out there?
I think there might be a niche for you somewhere. What about combing the history of nursing with the history of labour laws? What have working conditions been like for nurses in the past? How do they compare now? What gains have we made in quality of work life?
I would be very interested to read a well-researched book that spells out how it was and how it is. I think there are currently very few books of nursing history that aren't dry as dust. Good luck to you.
This might be a good topic for an article on AN. Weirdo, AN has article contests and the winner receives money.
The employment opportunities for someone with a history degree is zilch. Work on your writing skills and use nursing to pay the bills. If you are a good writer it won't matter what degree you have.
From ow on, please no one reply to this thread unless they are a fellow Weirdo like me. That is, a nursing history nerd who makes money doing something with the combination of nursing and history, or a writer who either has a side hustle writing about nursing,or for whom nurse writing is their main gig. I'm looking for my people! I know they're out there somewhere! I have dreams of sitting on my couch, making a modest but reasonable living writing in my underwear all day.
it's good to have dreams and yours are nice but i'm sure by now you know that they are unrealistic. or maybe you don't? Nurses who have no experience with which to get themselves into good stay at home jobs with insurance companies aren't sitting on their couches in their underwear making a reasonable living. Nurses with your background who do that are unemployed.
A two-year degree in history is nothing more than a launching pad to a Bachelor's degree in history, and that's employable with a teaching degree tacked on. Do you want to teach history to school aged kids? If you do then forget the nursing part, it's useless for that. Likewise forget the history part if you want to make a decent living as a nurse.
People who have left floor nursing for the stressless life of home health are sometimes shocked at how stressful it is. Without a solid knowledge base you have no business even thinking about home health care, you'd be in over your head. You describe wanting to take the lazy way out of nursing work and have it pay off for you but it's just a fantasy.
Want to be a nurse? work as a nurse, gain experience, and parlay that into a cushier job some years down the road. you aren't qualified for that yet. Want to be a historian? continue your education so that it means something to someone who hires people to teach history. An Associate's degree is meaningless in that arena.
I'm toying with the idea of continuing on with a Bachelor's in history while working on my bank. Forgot to mention that in my original post.
Also I was hoping to hear from people who've done something similar to what I'm talking about. Not interested in hearing from a bunch of nurses who just want to tell me I can't do it.
Got the degree later in life because I knew that with the History degree, I would need to go onto education, law or library science. Or continue on to obtain and MA.
I digress, I have had some very interesting discussions with patients over the last few years on the history of disease, LTC, and the labour movemeyin my province.
Being able to earn a living as a nurse historian? Very specialized niche market. Buy a lottery ticket instead.
Either focus on history and where it might take you or become a nurse with a passion for history in your downtime.
I'm toying with the idea of continuing on with a Bachelor's in history while working on my bank. Forgot to mention that in my original post.
Also I was hoping to hear from people who've done something similar to what I'm talking about. Not interested in hearing from a bunch of nurses who just want to tell me I can't do it.
You're just not likely to find a lot of people on a nursing forum who have done this because a nurse forum is mainly going to attract people who are practicing nurses-not necessarily bedside nurses, but practicing some form of nursing vs writing. That doesn't mean it can't be done, simply that your sample size of people who have done it who also post on this web site will be very small.
You're just not likely to find a lot of people on a nursing forum who have done this because a nurse forum is mainly going to attract people are practicing nurses-not necessarily bedside nurses, but practicing some form of nursing vs writing. That doesn't mean it can't be done, simply that your sample size of people who have done it who also post on this web site will be very small.
Agreed. I'm more in this for the long game.... Years from now someone might be googling "nurse history" and have this come up.
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Weirdo
17 Posts
Some great ideas! Thank you so much. I definitely will be looking into the AAHN. I didn't realize that organization existed.