Failed NCLEX-RN twice, need advice and encouragement!

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Hi guys, so I graduated with an AS in nursing at a school in florida and have now taken the NCLEX-RN test twice. Before my first exam, my school offered the Virtual ATI course so I started with that but did not like the format because I am a hands on and visual learner. Therefore, I did Kaplan. Kaplan was only a 3 days course and the rest was online so I stuck with that and took my first test. I failed and was devastated. I took a few weeks off and decided to get back to studying. I still live at home and able to study a lot, however I have two issues: I get distracted easily or cannot focus after more than 4 hrs at a time (yes i take breaks in between) and also my parents are not understanding that I cannot rush into taking this test. The second time around, I took Kaplan again and got a friend to tutor me. I felt a lot more confident this time around but again my parents pressured me into picking a test date and refused to let me change the date, so in that case I failed againnnn and was even more devastated. Failing twice broke all my confidence down and now I am terrified of this test. I am taking the virtual ATI now and almost done, however I have major pressure once again from my parents. Why can't they understand I rather take my time and grasp the material, than rush and fail again!? I need some advice please!

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Are your parents nurses? If not, they can have NO CLUE how difficult this test is and how important preparedness is.

My suggestion is to give them the link to this site, tell them to read all of these posts in the NCLEX discussion forum to get an idea of what you are going through. Maybe they will learn that all this pressure could be why you are failing!

Also, go study elsewhere...a library is a good idea! That would get rid of the distrations.

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@scaredsilly Thank you so much. That is a great idea. I was also thinking of writing this email to my ati tutor and letting my parents read her response. I do not want to take the NCLEX again until I get the green light from ATI. However, I do need advice on test anxiety as well. I forgot to mention it above, but I get severe anxiety now that I have failed twice.

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I don't know if it'll help you, but this is what I did for myself. Going into the nclex, I was really nervous. Shaking, all that jazz. My personal situation, if I didn't pass the test, I could just take it again. I'm not saying I'm rich that I don't need the job, I don't need the money, I can pay the test fee anytime. I don't even own a couch (I don't really need one, so why get one?) I'm saying it wouldn't kill me. I had money to support myself so I had food to eat, roof over my head and clothes on my back. I think that's all I need to live. Sure it'll would have set me back 45-90 days, but I'm still going to live. So that's what I told myself to calm myself down. So I said to myself, if I failed, I'll just go back home, eat, sleep, study and repeat. Come next test date, try again. No biggie since I'm not in any "danger". I also thought about the people that move to a new city and have years go by before catching their big break. They just make sure they have food, shelter and clothes and just keep trying. People don't become successful overnight. Any profession. And in any profession there are people that have had to encounter numerous setbacks (failed business deals, bad decisions, failing nclex) before being where they are now. They just haven't given up and neither should you :)

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Specializes in Pediatrics, Emergency, Trauma.

How I studied was according to the blueprint on the four aspects of becoming a licensed nurse:

1.Safe, Effective Care;

2. Health Promotion;

3. Physiological Integrity;

4. Psychosocial Integrity.

These concepts can be found on NCSBN's website.

I first reflected on what issues I had in nursing school when choosing the best answer; I also knew I knew the content of Pharmacology, but knew I had challenges in choosing the best answer; so I studied from my Pharm success book and PharmPhlash flash cards from the Success series.

I did Kaplan's free practice test, as well as had used NCSBN's pre test to determine what my weaknesses were, then used Saunders NCLEX review flash cards-which are broken down per the four concepts of the exam; I also used Lippincotts apps on iPhone to help with NCLEX review.

I am a hands on learner; there is NO WAY to effectively be "hands on" in a computer adaptive test; however, my strategy that has helped me throughout nursing school and through the NCLEX is finding the action words in the question; as well as imaging me in the actual scenario in order to choose the best answer. I also used LaCharity for alternative format questions to help with imagery in each option that I could best "perform".

To help with my test anxiety, I mock tested and worked from the minimum all the way up to the maximum just in case I got more than the minimum; I studied each question and rationale; if I didn't understand the rationale, I would study it in preparation.

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