Article Contest: How is the Covid 19 Affecting Your Life?
It's been a while since we had an Article Contest. With the Coronavirus Pandemic, we thought this would be a perfect time to hear from you, our readers on the front line, how you are coping with the many ongoing challenges of today.
This article contest will be different than the others we've had in the past. Instead of cash, we are going to give away gift cards to restaurants to the top 3 winners so you can have a break from cooking by picking up food instead. Some of these articles may be featured in our upcoming magazine. Get your article in today for a chance to be featured in the magazine.
The top 3 winners will split the $300 prize.
We want to encourage you to share your story of what is going on in your life now...how you are coping with the constantly changing protocols that COVID-19 is creating. We know you are having to deal with many shortages and are risking your own safety to care for patients.
We thank you!!
The topics for your article can be about anything as long as it is about COVID-19... how this is altering your life - emotionally, educational, physically, etc. Here are a few suggestions for topics:
Fear
Anxiety
Paranoia
Financial worries
Graduation delayed
Clinicals canceled
NCLEX delayed
Nursing programs closed
Have you tested positive for and become ill with the COVID-19?
Are you in a high-risk group?
School closings/children at home
Lack of childcare
Social isolation
Who Can Enter
This contest is open to all. You don't have to be an experienced writer. This is open to nurses and students. We all have our own Coronavirus stories to tell... Please share yours with us.
Rules of Submission
We are so glad you wish to submit an article. Here are the rules of submission:
Article tone and content must comply with our rules and Terms of Service. No solicitation.
Articles must have a minimum of 600 words.
No plagiarism - Your article must be written in your own words and cannot be posted on other websites, blogs, etc. prior to posting on allnurses.
Articles will be reviewed and approved by staff for consideration before displaying publicly.
Articles must be unique and should not be listed on other websites, blogs, article sites, etc. prior to posting on allnurses. Once your articles have been published on allnurses.com, you are welcome and encouraged to share them on your other sites and social channels.
You may submit multiple articles.
You grant permission to allnurses.com rights to publish in magazines, books, etc. You will be notified and credited if published.
Keep personal formatting choices such as font choice and size to a minimum - use only for headings.
Check grammar, punctuation, and spelling before clicking SUBMIT.
How to Submit Your Article
To submit your Covid Article, go to the COVID-19 Forum and click the green tab on the right: ADD NEW TOPIC
When that loads, click, "Article?". Then, click the dropdown menu that reads: "Yes I'm Submitting An Article".
Follow the instructions to complete all required fields (TITLE, ARTICLE SUMMARY, and CONTENT), scroll and click SUBMIT TOPIC.
Once you have submitted the Article, it will be reviewed and approved by Administration. If Administrators have questions, they will contact you for additional information.
Only Articles containing 600 words or more will qualify for the contest.
**CONTEST ENDS: Monday, April 27, 2020, at m/n EST!**
If you have questions about Article submissions, please contact the Admin Help Desk
Good luck to everyone! We are looking forward to reading your articles.
Panera's Chilis Home Depot Olive Garden LongHorn Cheddars Yard House Bahama Breeze ...and more
I am in a very unique situation. I am just entering nursing school and unfortunately due to the spread of the virus, all of my plans have been changed/moved around. To start this complicated story we have to look back a few years ago as I was a high school student trying to figure out what schools I wanted to apply to for undergrad. I have always had a passion for medicine and science. I have had the goal of going to medical school for years, so after many hours of decision making, I choose to go to a college in Boston (Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences - MCPHS University). I entered as a pre-med student in 2018 and up until recently, I have continued my plan to go to medical school. This past fall I worked as an EMT for a very short period of time for a private company (I barely made it through my full orientation - around 3 months) and found that I really did not love the prehospital setting of medicine. There were a lot of physical demands, and I was not really able to meet up with them nor was able to meet the mental demands of the job AND continue to be full-time student at my university. From this, I decided after a lot of worrying and almost identity crisis that I was not cut out for being an EMT then how was medical school going to go for me? I knew that if I really wanted to I could get through medical school, but for my own personal priorities and ideals of work-life balance I started to realize that although I told myself I'd be okay working 80+ hours a week, I began to realize that if I wanted to keep my own personal ideals and compete for the two most difficult subspecialties (pediatrics and surgery) - not putting in my A game and working even more hours beyond the 80+ workload that these individuals work, is just an injustice to patients and to my coworkers. So after lots and lots of self-discovery, I started to turn to alternatives. For a long time, people have asked me why I don't consider nursing. For the most part of my life, I have been deadset on that goal of becoming a pediatric surgeon. However now that I am becoming older and I am able to understand my own personal values more, understand my success as an undergraduate candidate (my GPA isn't too hot right now as I've taken competitive advanced science courses designed for medical school admissions) and understand the WIDE scope of practice nursing has, I've turned around to the idea.
So now here I am, (currently, a 2nd-year biology undergraduate student trying to transition into my school's nursing program. I will "lose a year" of my education, by entering this fall as a 2nd-year student, however, I actually graduate on my anticipated graduation date due to my school having an accelerated nursing program. But now with this virus in full force, it has caused a significant impact on my life. I planned on completing the TEAS exam, finishing my nursing program interview and meeting with many advisors of mine to confirm the track I've decided to change to.... however COVID decided we would do this differently. I was on my Spring break the week of March 9th. I have family in San Diego (now remember I'm from Boston (close to a 7-hour flight). It's always been a tradition for me to spend my Spring break out here in San Diego... At this point I was aware of the impacts the virus was having on the country, however I was not ready for my university to entirely shut down and enforce students to move out of the dorms. My residence life at my university isn't the best and very few students actually live on campus (as on-campus housing is sporifice). The premise was the university wanted us out in the next 5 days, and by the time all the information was given to us about the university switching to online classes and that my dorm was closing (and requiring move out) the residence life decided to immediately leave the office right after they sent the email. Likely to avoid having a swarm of messages, however that did not work for me. I had no information about the status of my stuff in my on-campus apartment. Two individuals of my family are considered high-risk individuals for Covid19 so we needed to make decisions quickly. After so long discussion on the status of domestic travel, my risk for flying to and from Boston to San Diego we ultimately decided that it was best to have me fly out as soon as possible and to pack up my entire apartment and then turn around and fly back to San Diego to finish this semester online with my family here. So here I found myself booking a flight on the way to the airport. I managed to get a seat on that ongoing red-eye flying back to Boston that night (weds march 11th). I landed in Boston very early in the morning. Made it home to my apartment (had many difficult discussions with public safety on why I was back early and residency life was not good at communicating with them so it was a difficult process), either way, I got access to my apartment because I had left my keys in my rush to fly out to Boston (of course I did...) luckily my roommate had stayed home during Spring break! So we chatted for a bit, and then I was too hyped to back to sleep so I started packing my ENTIRE apartment. I got a few hours of sleep later on that morning as the adrenaline left me. I could only afford 3 hours of sleep as I needed to continue to plan out my move, meaning I needed to get a storage unit for my stuff, figure out what residence life was doing and arrange for a close friend of mine to come pick up all my stuff that I would pack as my parents wanted me in Boston for as little time as possible and my designated check out time from my apartment wasn't until Monday (which would significantly increase my exposure and really affect my family if I brought the virus back to them...) So I had my return flight for the next morning (Friday march 13th). Giving me basically a little more than 24 hours to pack my entire apartment. Long story short, I did all the tasks and coordinating I needed to do, I packed the entire night. I went to bed on my bare mattress at 4:30 am when I had finally finished... and had to wake up at 6 am for my flight back to San Diego. I finalized all my plans for my friend to pick up all the boxes of my stuff that had been pilled into my living room... and made my way back to the airport to return to my family. I flew home after sleeping a total of 5 hours over a period of 48 hours, and finally got some real food and crashed at my family's house and slept for 18 straight hours. It is likely one of the craziest experiences I've ever had. Surprisingly I was not that jetlagged! One positive thing to come out of this experience.
Overall since then, I made sure to handle the hassel with residence life (again) and making sure the move my friends made with my stuff to the storage unit was smooth. (Which it was!). Now I am finishing my semester out here and having to deal with the effects of not being in person to deal with this transition of my major.... It has been an interesting process to say the least, I'd say that I have a thread of emails with my nursing dean that must be at least 40 emails long. There is a lot up in the air now, as I still need to complete some pre-requisites that I am missing and need to make up to enter in the nursing program. Overall I now need to take A&P 1 and 2 online. Mostly as I am unsure about the status of our Summer semesters and I do not want to fly back to Boston and deal with all this hassel again for temporary housing situations, plus the tuition rate for Summer courses at my university is INSANE, it would cost me around 10k to take these 2 courses....
Overall, I'd like to think I'm a pretty resilient person. I have gone through many crazy things, and will continue to do so for the rest of my life (I'm hoping this trait will make me successful as an RN someday!) I have basically had to be my own advisor now in deciding course registrations for the fall and fitting in all my last minute pre-reqs I need before I start my professional years.
I give so many props to the nurses who are actively dealing with this horrible pandemic, I am sending love and I wish there was more I could do to help, but for now I will do my civil part and continue to social distance (plus California has been on lock-down for awhile). Keep on kicking on, you guys are the real bad-asses.
Specializes in Education, FP, LNC, Forensics, ED, OB.
On 3/24/2020 at 12:34 PM, tnbutterfly - Mary said:
This article contest will be different than the others we've had in the past. Instead of cash, we are going to give away gift cards to restaurants to the top 3 winners so you can have a break from cooking by picking up food instead. Some of these articles may be featured in our upcoming magazine. Get your article in today for a chance to be featured in the magazine. The winners will be selected by the members in a poll.
The top 3 winners will split the $300 prize.
We want to encourage you to share your story of what is going on in your life now...how you are coping with the constantly changing protocols that COVID-19 is creating. We know you are having to deal with many shortages and are risking your own safety to care for patients.
We thank you!!
The topics for your article can be about anything as long as it is about COVID-19... how this is altering your life - emotionally, educational, physically, etc. Here are a few suggestions for topics:
Fear
Anxiety
Paranoia
Financial worries
Graduation delayed
Clinicals canceled
NCLEX delayed
Nursing programs closed
Have you tested positive for and become ill with the COVID-19?
Are you in a high-risk group?
School closings/children at home
Lack of childcare
Social isolation
Who Can Enter
This contest is open to all. You don't have to be an experienced writer. This is open to nurses and students. We all have our own Coronavirus stories to tell... Please share yours with us.
Rules of Submission
We are so glad you wish to submit an article. Here are the rules of submission:
Article tone and content must comply with our rules and Terms of Service. No solicitation.
Articles must have a minimum of 600 words.
No plagiarism - Your article must be written in your own words and cannot be posted on other websites, blogs, etc. prior to posting on allnurses.
Articles will be reviewed and approved by staff for consideration before displaying publicly.
Articles must be unique and should not be listed on other websites, blogs, article sites, etc. prior to posting on allnurses. Once your articles have been published on allnurses.com, you are welcome and encouraged to share them on your other sites and social channels.
You may submit multiple articles.
You grant permission to allnurses.com rights to publish in magazines, books, etc. You will be notified and credited if published.
Keep personal formatting choices such as font choice and size to a minimum - use only for headings.
Check grammar, punctuation, and spelling before clicking SUBMIT.
How to Submit Your Article
To submit an Article anywhere on the site, go to the forum of choice and click the green tab on the right: ADD NEW TOPIC
When that loads, click, "Article?". Then, click the dropdown menu that reads: "Yes I'm Submitting An Article".
Follow the instructions to complete all required fields (TITLE, ARTICLE SUMMARY, and CONTENT), scroll and click SUBMIT TOPIC.
Once you have submitted the Article, it will be reviewed and approved by Administration. If Administrators have questions, they will contact you for additional information.
Only Articles containing 600 words or more will qualify for the contest.
If you have questions about Article submissions, please contact the Admin Help Desk
Good luck to everyone! We are looking forward to reading your articles.
Panera's Chilis Home Depot Olive Garden LongHorn Cheddars Yard House Bahama Breeze ...and more
Get your Article in for the contest!
How to Submit Your Article
To submit an Article anywhere on the site, go to the forum of choice and click the green tab on the right: ADD NEW TOPIC
When that loads, click, "Article?". Then, click the dropdown menu that reads: "Yes I'm Submitting An Article".
Follow the instructions to complete all required fields (TITLE, ARTICLE SUMMARY, and CONTENT), scroll and click SUBMIT TOPIC.
Once you have submitted the Article, it will be reviewed and approved by Administration. If Administrators have questions, they will contact you for additional information.
Only Articles containing 600 words or more will qualify for the contest.
If you have questions about Article submissions, please contact the Admin Help Desk
Living for 12 hour shifts behind this precious, wanted commodity, just one precious mask that us nurses don and doff as little as possible to protect ourselves from contamination from this dreadful virus, leading us to not eat or drink during our long shifts which therefore makes us nurses have to hydrate at night leading us to less sleep because we are up peeing all night. That's when we do our most pondering, at night, when the shift is done you see, it's only done for our shift but not in our minds, it's as if we can never stop thinking. " How can I disinfect my mask?" When our governing bodies that we have looked up to for decades of nursing has loosened their guidelines due to a world wide shortage ? Instead of increasing the guidelines or at least giving nurses and all healthcare workers the comfort of having the belief of solidarity in any form of infection control we have ever known? "How will I comfort my patients and instruct them what to do when the CDC changes their minds everyday ?"
" How will I as a nurse prevent panic in my colleagues ? When no one is certain what to believe in ? Who to believe? And well how do we know this isn't a bad sci fi dream and soon we will all wake up from this nightmare?"
As I don and doff my protective one mask that probably will infect me, I pray as I'm careful not to shake it up too much as to prevent the virus from being expelled from my dirty mask into the air into my lungs, I hold my breath with prayer. I'm cautious while I check my fellow sisters and brother nurses to make sure straps are tight enough around their heads, when donned we take deep breaths within their hot, stuffy, cardboard feel of them to ensure the air isn't escaping when we breathe, witnessing eachothers fear in our eyes, no one speaks but there is much being said to one another. We don't need words to hear eachothers thoughts.
It's hot, oh so very hot, we are thirsty, we have itches that we can't scratch, no one at all can touch their face. So we ignore the itchy nuisance to our noses, in our hot gowns and shield that we know we are lucky to have thinking the whole time with sweat dripping off our brows into our eyes that intermingles with our salty tears, " we are United in solidarity with eachother, it's all we have now, even if we get sick"
We don't have to say this to one another because it's a given. Nurses from all around the world during this pandemic share this bond in sickness and in health, despite all that has failed to govern us, when we are called to act, we do.
We show up, despite it all and do what we have to do. Our oath to our patients, ourselves and all humanity.
I've never been more afraid in my 28 years of nursing as I am now. This invisable enemy but I've also never felt this courageous.
Behind this one mask I'm breathing in and out, my own hot breath and I am proud to be part of this family of nurses across the globe, I love you all
Specializes in Education, FP, LNC, Forensics, ED, OB.
CONTEST ENDS: Monday, April 27, 2020, at m/n EST!
Just another reminder to get your COVID-19 Pandemic Article submitted!!
How to Submit Your Article
To submit an Article anywhere on the site, go to the forum of choice and click the green tab on the right: ADD NEW TOPIC
When that loads, click, "Article?". Then, click the dropdown menu that reads: "Yes I'm Submitting An Article".
Follow the instructions to complete all required fields (TITLE, ARTICLE SUMMARY, and CONTENT), scroll and click SUBMIT TOPIC.
Once you have submitted the Article, it will be reviewed and approved by Administration. If Administrators have questions, they will contact you for additional information.
Only Articles containing 600 words or more will qualify for the contest.
If you have questions about Article submissions, please contact the Admin Help Desk.
My whole life has been effected by covid19. Physically, emotionally, most notably mentally. This has take a toll on my family structure, socializing and my monetary income. It has depleted my morals, and has me questioning whether or not I should continue to be a nurse. It has brought out people’s true colors, and sides of co workers I have never seen before. It has taken my faith in America and turned it on it’s side. This virus has made me feel lost in a world that I used to feel secure in.
Specializes in Peds, Med-Surg, Disaster Nsg, Parish Nsg.
JUST A REMINDER
This contest ends at midnight EST tonight. Submit your article today.
Please follow the directions for submission.
How to Submit Your Article
To submit an Article anywhere on the site, go to the forum of choice and click the green tab on the right: ADD NEW TOPIC
When that loads, click, "Article?". Then, click the dropdown menu that reads: "Yes I'm Submitting An Article".
Follow the instructions to complete all required fields (TITLE, ARTICLE SUMMARY, and CONTENT), scroll and click SUBMIT TOPIC.
Once you have submitted the Article, it will be reviewed and approved by Administration. If Administrators have questions, they will contact you for additional information.
Only Articles containing 600 words or more will qualify for the contest.
If you have questions about Article submissions, please contact the AdminHelp Desk.
EDITED TO ADD - WINNER ANNOUNCEMENT
The contest is over except for announcing the winners. A big thank you to all who shared your COVID-19 stories of how the Pandemic has affected your life. We enjoyed reading every one of the inspiring and poignant stories. You can find all of the articles in the COVID-19 forum. Look for the red ARTICLE tab. There were so many great articles to choose from, which made for a close race.
The 3 winners of $100 Restaurant gift cards each are...
Specializes in Peds, Med-Surg, Disaster Nsg, Parish Nsg.
WINNERS ANNOUNCEMENT
The contest is over except for announcing the winners. A big thank you to all who shared your COVID-19 stories of how the Pandemic has affected your life. We enjoyed reading every one of the inspiring and poignant stories. You can find all of the articles in the COVID-19 forum. Look for the red ARTICLE tab. There were so many great articles to choose from, which made for a close race.
The 3 winners of a $100 Restaurant gift card each are...
Sgates99, BSN, RN
5 Posts
I am in a very unique situation. I am just entering nursing school and unfortunately due to the spread of the virus, all of my plans have been changed/moved around. To start this complicated story we have to look back a few years ago as I was a high school student trying to figure out what schools I wanted to apply to for undergrad. I have always had a passion for medicine and science. I have had the goal of going to medical school for years, so after many hours of decision making, I choose to go to a college in Boston (Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences - MCPHS University). I entered as a pre-med student in 2018 and up until recently, I have continued my plan to go to medical school. This past fall I worked as an EMT for a very short period of time for a private company (I barely made it through my full orientation - around 3 months) and found that I really did not love the prehospital setting of medicine. There were a lot of physical demands, and I was not really able to meet up with them nor was able to meet the mental demands of the job AND continue to be full-time student at my university. From this, I decided after a lot of worrying and almost identity crisis that I was not cut out for being an EMT then how was medical school going to go for me? I knew that if I really wanted to I could get through medical school, but for my own personal priorities and ideals of work-life balance I started to realize that although I told myself I'd be okay working 80+ hours a week, I began to realize that if I wanted to keep my own personal ideals and compete for the two most difficult subspecialties (pediatrics and surgery) - not putting in my A game and working even more hours beyond the 80+ workload that these individuals work, is just an injustice to patients and to my coworkers. So after lots and lots of self-discovery, I started to turn to alternatives. For a long time, people have asked me why I don't consider nursing. For the most part of my life, I have been deadset on that goal of becoming a pediatric surgeon. However now that I am becoming older and I am able to understand my own personal values more, understand my success as an undergraduate candidate (my GPA isn't too hot right now as I've taken competitive advanced science courses designed for medical school admissions) and understand the WIDE scope of practice nursing has, I've turned around to the idea.
So now here I am, (currently, a 2nd-year biology undergraduate student trying to transition into my school's nursing program. I will "lose a year" of my education, by entering this fall as a 2nd-year student, however, I actually graduate on my anticipated graduation date due to my school having an accelerated nursing program. But now with this virus in full force, it has caused a significant impact on my life. I planned on completing the TEAS exam, finishing my nursing program interview and meeting with many advisors of mine to confirm the track I've decided to change to.... however COVID decided we would do this differently. I was on my Spring break the week of March 9th. I have family in San Diego (now remember I'm from Boston (close to a 7-hour flight). It's always been a tradition for me to spend my Spring break out here in San Diego... At this point I was aware of the impacts the virus was having on the country, however I was not ready for my university to entirely shut down and enforce students to move out of the dorms. My residence life at my university isn't the best and very few students actually live on campus (as on-campus housing is sporifice). The premise was the university wanted us out in the next 5 days, and by the time all the information was given to us about the university switching to online classes and that my dorm was closing (and requiring move out) the residence life decided to immediately leave the office right after they sent the email. Likely to avoid having a swarm of messages, however that did not work for me. I had no information about the status of my stuff in my on-campus apartment. Two individuals of my family are considered high-risk individuals for Covid19 so we needed to make decisions quickly. After so long discussion on the status of domestic travel, my risk for flying to and from Boston to San Diego we ultimately decided that it was best to have me fly out as soon as possible and to pack up my entire apartment and then turn around and fly back to San Diego to finish this semester online with my family here. So here I found myself booking a flight on the way to the airport. I managed to get a seat on that ongoing red-eye flying back to Boston that night (weds march 11th). I landed in Boston very early in the morning. Made it home to my apartment (had many difficult discussions with public safety on why I was back early and residency life was not good at communicating with them so it was a difficult process), either way, I got access to my apartment because I had left my keys in my rush to fly out to Boston (of course I did...) luckily my roommate had stayed home during Spring break! So we chatted for a bit, and then I was too hyped to back to sleep so I started packing my ENTIRE apartment. I got a few hours of sleep later on that morning as the adrenaline left me. I could only afford 3 hours of sleep as I needed to continue to plan out my move, meaning I needed to get a storage unit for my stuff, figure out what residence life was doing and arrange for a close friend of mine to come pick up all my stuff that I would pack as my parents wanted me in Boston for as little time as possible and my designated check out time from my apartment wasn't until Monday (which would significantly increase my exposure and really affect my family if I brought the virus back to them...) So I had my return flight for the next morning (Friday march 13th). Giving me basically a little more than 24 hours to pack my entire apartment. Long story short, I did all the tasks and coordinating I needed to do, I packed the entire night. I went to bed on my bare mattress at 4:30 am when I had finally finished... and had to wake up at 6 am for my flight back to San Diego. I finalized all my plans for my friend to pick up all the boxes of my stuff that had been pilled into my living room... and made my way back to the airport to return to my family. I flew home after sleeping a total of 5 hours over a period of 48 hours, and finally got some real food and crashed at my family's house and slept for 18 straight hours. It is likely one of the craziest experiences I've ever had. Surprisingly I was not that jetlagged! One positive thing to come out of this experience.
Overall since then, I made sure to handle the hassel with residence life (again) and making sure the move my friends made with my stuff to the storage unit was smooth. (Which it was!). Now I am finishing my semester out here and having to deal with the effects of not being in person to deal with this transition of my major.... It has been an interesting process to say the least, I'd say that I have a thread of emails with my nursing dean that must be at least 40 emails long. There is a lot up in the air now, as I still need to complete some pre-requisites that I am missing and need to make up to enter in the nursing program. Overall I now need to take A&P 1 and 2 online. Mostly as I am unsure about the status of our Summer semesters and I do not want to fly back to Boston and deal with all this hassel again for temporary housing situations, plus the tuition rate for Summer courses at my university is INSANE, it would cost me around 10k to take these 2 courses....
Overall, I'd like to think I'm a pretty resilient person. I have gone through many crazy things, and will continue to do so for the rest of my life (I'm hoping this trait will make me successful as an RN someday!) I have basically had to be my own advisor now in deciding course registrations for the fall and fitting in all my last minute pre-reqs I need before I start my professional years.
I give so many props to the nurses who are actively dealing with this horrible pandemic, I am sending love and I wish there was more I could do to help, but for now I will do my civil part and continue to social distance (plus California has been on lock-down for awhile). Keep on kicking on, you guys are the real bad-asses.