New nurse worried about entering new field.

[Cackalacky]

I'm a new RN! YAY! RN! I went from psychiatric nursing to school nursing in about 3 months of having my license because the hours sounded amazing for the adjustment I was making - I graduated, then two weeks later I was married and then two weeks after that I moved across the country with my husband, THEN I took and passed the NCLEX. 12 hour night shifts did not seem like my thing at the time!

I'm now super worried about my next jump. Next year, about this time, we will be moving across the country again. I'm pretty positive I do not want to go back to school nursing.

How smooth will my next transition be?

Will I still have a mentor assigned to help me around the unit?

Will they just see that I have 1 yr experience in school nursing and not even consider hiring me???

I feel like my skills are slowly falling away and I'm scared! I don't want to change jobs AGAIN because I don't want to be seen as a job-hopper without commitment and not get hired because of that.

Any tips?

[nurseprnRN, BSN, RN]

You won't look like a job-hopper if you mention that you moved cross-country, and that's why you had to change jobs. :)

As to all the rest of your questions: Your "transition" will be pretty much what you make of it. You will change jobs often in your working life; this is just one more. You go in with a good attitude and an open mind and it will be fine.

You will certainly get an orientation with a staff nurse preceptor for a greater or lesser period of time.

As to the experience thing, you'll just have to ask a prospective employer about that. You have a good work history, you weren't tardy or disciplined or anything-- that puts you ahead of most all the other new nurses around. Go in with a good attitude like, "I've got this!" It's contagious.

Stop thinking about tasks as "nursing skills." We teach tasks like that to people all the time. Techs put in IVs in radiology; moms do home dialysis and trach care for their kids. That doesn't make them nurses. The real nursing skills you have-- listening, assessment, organization, empathy-- you have developed those in your work. See "good attitude," above.

[Cackalacky]

Thanks for bringing that to light! I really like that.