Found my Passion in nursing! Thank you!

[Neferet]

thank you everyone who replied to the, "what do you love about nicu" thread. you've helped me to figure out my passion in nursing and what i have been yearning to do for years!

i've been contemplating lately about going to work in the newborn well nursery. i knew that one day i will work there. i knew it the first time i walked onto the floor. it just fitted my style so much, the environment and the patients. i loved nursery, but there was only one problem. it was a piece of cake, it was too easy. not to say being a nurse there is easy, but what i meant was it was too easy for me because i enjoyed it too much. i don't know, might be sounding silly, but i wanted to do something more advance. i just don't believe that i went through 4 years of nursing school to do something that was a piece of cake. it was too sweet for me and i wanted myself to be more challenged. i needed to use that potential to the max.

but i also dreamed to go overseas as a nurse and help the poor. so i decided that i needed to get a few years of med/surg under my belt, and save the nursery dream for later. yeah, i'm hard on myself sometimes, but i guess that's what you have to do if you have dreams that you want to achieve.

i hated med/surg. i hated it so much when i was in school that just the smell of the med/surg floor would make me want to vomit as i came through the doors onto the floor. i forced myself to spend my last year of clinical in med/surg, forcing myself to learn and know. then i applied for a job for med/surg, and saved my nursery plans for later.

med/surg was nice due to the hospital and staff i worked with. they are great and loving people. but my hospital is not a high acute hospital, so now i'm left wondering what to do.

beginning in m/s i freaked out during emergencies, but more only because i don't know something, or haven't experienced it. in med/surg you don't have the time to look over every single patient's charts to a degree of satisfaction. and i hate that! just as some of you felt, i needed to be in control. i needed to know, so that i could prepare. i want to know the ins and outs of all my patients, so that i can do the best i can. i like critical care because you can focus on the whole well being of a patient. on med/surg i get sad sometimes when i spend the whole day running around, passing meds, and doing tasks. i really want to spend more time thinking about what is happening inside of them. it's true, i get sad when i spend half my nights turning, cleaning, wiping poop, and doing paperwork. i love helping my patients by doing these things, but i didn't go to nursing school for this. i want more knowledge, more thinking, more saving people's life. i just now realized that it's nicu that fits me.

initially my plan wasn't to go to nicu. i was too afraid to handle nicu babies because they looked so fragile. i didn't get to be in nicu much in school. i love nursery, but want something more challenging in that field, then it is definitely nicu.

saving little people in nicu is different than saving older people. i don't feel as rewarded from saving older people. most of the older people on my floor are dying and they want to die. and some of them refuse to take care of themselves and they die. it's near the end of their life, so it's a different satisfaction than saving someone who is at the beginning of their life. saving someone at the beginning of their life? now that's something that gets my heart pounding and willing, wanting to do.

one thing that i just found about nicu was that the doctors are around most of the time. yep, that's the place for me, i just know it. i want to be in a place that is critical, but where i would have access to a doctor. er is that too, but i am definitely not an adrenaline addict and can't operate on excitement all day. remember? most of the time i actually want to know what's going on.....not to be surprised all the time when patients fly through the door. nicu is perfect, because there are only so much that can afflict to newborns. it's limited to that age, so you don't get the plethora of disease and conditions in med/surg.

seeing the beginning of a problem and then outcome of my nursing interventions makes me a really happy nurse. i knew i wanted to see and know a patient from start to finish, but i just couldn't imagine doing this with adults. seeing the results of my care is the reward that fulfills my dreams of why i am a nurse.

another thing i love about nicu when i hear you guys talk about it. is that you don't have to be running all over the hospital to take care of your patients. there are many hallways in my hospital, and i am constantly running/walking back and forth. it's good exercise, but it isn't funny when it's at the expense of the patient's health or your health.

last but not least, i'd like to take care of babies. i think i've done my share taking care of older folks. i don't mind, but i getting tired of being nice and patient with adults who complain they can't pour their own drink, wipe their own butts, reach their own tv remote, eat their own food, when they really can. it's not like this with everyone, but it's very common. and i would love to do these things for babies who can't do it themselves.

one really weird thing i found out about myself is that i like to intensively monitor things. i was taking care of some newborn kittens that had lost their mother before they were weaned. some of them died of starvation. i just wanted to watch them, feed them, clean and attend to them every 30 mins. and it's weird, but i really enjoyed it. the weakest, smallest, unattractive one of all was the only one that survived. and now he is a beautiful, playful, and healthy little kitty. and i just feel so good about it. nothing compared to a newborn, but it's good to get the point out.

this is the end of my rant. but let me tell you something. i've spent at least three different summers taking care of newborn baby siblings and cousins. and can tell you that it changes a person's life. in some ways it makes you really at peace and humble. i guess you can say that some people go on life experiences where they go to some solitary place to find purpose or peace. during those summers spent with the newborns, i felt like i've experienced something like that. i think that you've missed out on a part of life, if you've spent some time caring for a newborn.

thanks you guys! :heartbeat