Well, I would like to share my first day of nursing school experience.
It all started last night when i could not go to sleep, then I woke up at 4 am, because I was so excited and anxiety had taken over! Well I got up, took a shower, took care of the dogs, and even ironed my uniform.
I ended up leaving home at 6 am, for the 1 hour commute, since I was afraid that I would be caught in the middle of traffic.
I ended up at school at 7 am, I sat in my car, had my coffee, and at 730 people started showing up. Well I found out that classes would not start until 9 on the first day, since they had people lost on the buildings, trying to find the classrooms, teachers coming back gathering loads of stuff, from a side to another, and finally classes started. It was funny to see all my peeps from pre-reqs there in addition to some other new faces!
It all started by our Pharmacology teacher (we have pharm all day long on Mondays) asking us to write a paragraph on:
- Why nursing?
- Semester goal
- 3 year goal
After we wrote that, she made us one by one, read it to the class, as an introduction! Well, I heard maybe half of the people with the CRNA goal, the other half with money/or NP goal, LOL hopefully they'll get there!
Then she started the syllabus, in which:
- 50% are tests
- 10% presentation
- 10% group work, participation
- 5% post test
- 25% finals.
Which is not bad. My first impression is that Our teacher is a nice Lady, she has been a NP for 12 years, and on still works 2 days a week on her private practice, which I thought was a plus, since she is updated on things.
Well, then lecture started, and we went over the nursing process, and then the 7 rights, and then we covered chapters 1 and 2 of the book (keep in mind 5 hour lecture LOL) the funny thing is: We have to know chapters 1-9 by next Monday!!! For our first test, she will give us multiple choices only, and will allow us to use a 4X6 flashcard, where we can write stuff on one side, and hand it to her, then she will return it to us on the first test day, keep in mind that we have 5 tests. OMG that is a lot of info, even though I had answered the questions already on the study guide...
She is really nice to us, always asking if it is all clear, anymore questions! I like her I guess! (Although you know... some people on the break room already started venting... blah)
Then she was telling us that we will have clinicals starting on the end of the month, so we can learn how to talk to our patients, practice some basic skills. (For the first 3 weeks we have Thursday and Fridays just for skills!!! 10 hours a week!).
She said that we will not do any invasive skill on ourselves, meaning no drawing each others blood, or giving any sort of injection. How the hell am I going to learn??? How did you guys learn this??? It makes me wonder, since I have no previous experience with that other than a few lovenox abdominal shots.
She said that in May we will start giving IM, IV, Sq, and all that good stuff. (But then again with no previous human attempts! She said that if we were to do it among ourselves, somewhere else... Whatever! But not in class!)
So it was exciting today, lots of information, and homework! Can't wait for tomorrow (but I am ok, anxiety level is down now).
We have fundamentals ALLLLLL day tomorrow, starting at 8-2pm
So, bottom line, so far I am very happy with everything, the nursing staff seems amazing so far (have dealt with them since pre-reqs) and all my classmates are cool (of course, there is the sleepy one, the parrot one, the repetitive one, the fancy girls, the CNA knows it all's, but they are ok so far!)
Comments are welcome!
Those who start(started) soon please post your experience here! Lets make this thread last all the way through our graduation!!!
It doesn't quite hit you at the beginning of the semester when they say 'look to your left and look to your right, at least one of these people won't be here at the end of the semester' until you get to the end and look back. I even forgot about some of the people bc the whole semester was such a BLUR! I am happy to say that I learned so much and kept thinking I was going to run out of room in my brain! My big purchase this summer is going to be a voice recorder, while it wouldn't have helped quite as much in my first semester, I hear it's pretty essential for next. .thumb.jpg.95579fecd0c06f764e0cfdf4eb6f58b0.jpg){kind=small}
9livesRN, BSN, RN
1,570 Posts
well yall, i was typing a whole big post here, but the computer froze and I dont have that much time left to write!
I hope yall are studying hard!!! well nursing school is not easy, as you probably know by now!
I have made it ok, and survived my first semester!!! - pharmacology and fundamentals!!! it was not easy!!! it is the beginning of a new career, and with no medical experience prier to this makes school even funnier!!!
LOL
it was fun to start trying to think like a nurse, prioritize, terminology, basic skills, and a whole new bunch of drugs to learn...!!!
"it is all about the therapeutic communication"
when we started the classes i thought it would be crazy hard!!! and it was... but looking back and after practicing skills on clinicals, and being able to co-relate the material of both classes it starts to click and make sense!!!
the hardest thing is to remember so many drugs and side effects, and interactions, and what they do, and how they do, and if they dont, and the nursing interventions behind all of that, and patient teaching..
...phew!
but it is fun and doable!!!
I thank God for the great pharm teacher I had - she made it understandable!!! sorta!
well tomorrow I start medsurge and OB...
and we are starting with straight up lecture on cardiac, 80 slides,!!! and i got tired just by looking at them!!!
good luck to you all
- hey- be proud of your self, even if you make a C!!!
NS is not for enyone!