When did you know what specialty you wanted? - page 2

1. 
   Jun 16, '09

   Occupation: RN Trauma & Emergency Specialty: 5 year(s) of experience in Trauma & Emergency ; From: US ; Joined: Apr '09; Posts: 213; Likes: 124

   I think as nursing students that haven't quite found their niche we tend to only look at the glamerous parts of the different specialties. When I went to LPN school I was sure that I WOULD LOVE the OR.. yeah I went there saw a total hip replacement almost fainted on the floor. And, I am the same girl who can watch any surgery on television or in movies but when it is up close and personal with a real patients blood spewing everywhere and there face draped and actually watching the VS monitor..it made everything too real for me and I swore that I would never EVER like the OR. I only saw the glamour until I was exposed to it in clinical, and then..then I saw the pain! Don't get your heart set on anything--go in with an open mind and an open heart..something WILL find it's way in.
2. 
   Jun 16, '09

   Joined: Mar '08; Posts: 68; Likes: 20

   It was really just a lucky outcome after a process of elimination for me. I only had maybe a 1/2 clinical day in ICU, so it definitely wasn't the clinical experience that helped me decide. In fact, the area I was exposed to the most in nursing school is L&D (my practicum) and it was a yawnfest for me in between deliveries. To be honest, I just picked the specialty I thought I didn't like the least and went with it. Seven years later, I am still proudly an ICU nurse.
   
   Good luck!
3. 
   Jun 16, '09

   Occupation: CNA Specialty: 2 year(s) of experience in Med/Surg/Pedi/Tele ; From: US ; Joined: Apr '09; Posts: 291; Likes: 128

   I'm still a little way off to get my RN license but working as a CNA in pediatrics is the best. I think I would like to do L&D or NICU. I love working with kids but I would love to be a part of the first minutes for the babies... :heartbeat
4. 
   Jun 16, '09

   Joined: Mar '08; Posts: 68; Likes: 20

   Quote from nerdtonurse?

   I thought I'd be a nurse midwife -- grew up as free labor for my uncle's farm, loved it when the calves were born, watching a foal take it's first steps, etc. That was what I was going to do -- until the first time I had to give a crack mom back her baby. I will never forget that shriveled up looking child -- fullterm length, half term weight, having withdrawal. And the mom on the cellphone, too busy setting up her next fix to even touch her child. That child was as doomed as if I'd thrown it out into the middle of an interstate freeway. Social services had already taken her previous 5 kids away d/t neglect, but she could keep popping one out every year....and she was 19. Even the social worker said "too bad she didn't need a C-section so they could 'accidently' cut her tubes...'"
   
   After that, I was sort of adrift and depressed -- NOW what was I gonna do?
   
   Then I had an orientation in ICU -- and bells, whistles, Hallelujah Chorus, that's what I want, that's really what I think I was meant to do. Maybe when I get too old and brokedown to be a bedside nurse, I can do nursing informatics for an ICU, but I went back to post conference that morning and said, "Dang, I wanna be THAT."
   
   So, even if you think you might want to be one thing going in, only to find that it's not what you thought, keep looking. You'll have your own "Ta-Dah!" moment, and you'll wonder how you could have ever thought of doing anything else.
   
   Good luck, and see ya out in the world.

   Just wanted to say very well said.

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