I finally after the 4th time passed the NCLEX. This is a little motivation for those of you that are doubting yourself. If I can do it, then so can you.
Here is a little background on me. I graduated May 2012. The last semester of nursing school was very emotional for me. I became pregnant with my daughter and when I was 4 months pregnant my dad was diagnosed with lung cancer. During my last 2 weeks of school my dad had major surgery to remove his entire right lung (He is in remission 2 years now :) Shortly after that I went on bedrest for the rest of my pregnancy. I had my daughter at the end of Aug. 2012 and 5 days later my Grandmother passed away. I took the NCLEX for the first time Nov. 2012, then again May 2013, and May 2014. I got 75 questions, 75 questions and then 103 questions. I knew I was bombing it and was so frustrated. I have too many study materials that I was getting overwhelmed with it. I took the Hurst Review before my 3rd attempt and felt like it helped some. I decided this last time to stick with ATI (that's what I used to pass the NCLEX PN). I went through the Pharm and MedSurg book from ATI. I decided to go with a different approach to answering the questions. Before I was trying to find the "right" answer. This time I decided to eliminate the "wrong" answers. I took the test for the 4th time on Nov 1, 2014. I felt like I was doing good on the test. I started getting a lot of SATA and I had 2 that I had to put in the correct order. I did not get any medication calculations. When I got to the 75th questions I was scared to hit submit because I didn't want it to shut off. I felt that since I was getting the minimum amount of questions and failing then in order to pass I needed to have all the questions. I finally clicked submit and the screen went blue. I was so upset. I went to my car and tried the PVT. I did not know that they changed the website and since it went to the credit card page I knew I failed. I went home and purchased another study program. I decided to go on this site and see if the PVT changed because the website changed and sure enough I came across some postings saying everyone will get the credit card page. So I decided to try the new trick and pay for the test again. I got the "good" pop up. I was nervous about it because its still fairly new and I kept telling myself how could I pass with just 75 questions when I failed 3 times with 75 questions. I waited the 48 hours for the quick results and the words "PASS" popped up. I couldn't believe it, but its true I finally passed the NCLEX. 4 days later my license number showed up on the BON website.
What I mainly used to study:
"Prioritization, Delegation, and Assignment" by LaCharity
the ATI books
Hurst Review
but I think the most important thing that I did was change my strategy to answering the questions. I eliminated the wrong answers instead of finding the right answers.
Believe in yourself and never give up. It took me 2 years and 4 tries but I got there and so can you!
