Feeling Defeated

Nursing Students General Students

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Hi everyone,

Lately I have been feeling down. I feel so defeated with every test I take. I cry at least once a week, and I feel like crap. Sometimes I question if I still want to be a nurse. I still feel strongly about it, but I fear that I will not make it through or get the grades I want. I can't seem to get the help I need at school, and I don't know any nurses. I was wondering if anyone has ever felt the way I do?

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Specializes in LTC.

Not long ago, I saw someone here say, "If you haven't seriously considered quitting at least once, you aren't getting your money's worth" (or something very similar).

Nursing school sucks. I think more for some, and less for others. Sure, you'll see some who say they loved it. They are the minority.

So what you are feeling is completely normal. It's uncomfortable. I've also seen a lot of people say get comfortable being uncomfortable. There is a lot of wisdom in that.

I think many (most?) of us started out very driven and as straight-A students. Juggling life & nursing school wears you down. You can still strive to do your best, but sometimes your best isn't what it used to be. And that's okay, as long as you do what you need to do to stay in your program.

If you have room to cut yourself some slack ~ do so. If you are in danger of failing out ~ instead of feeling defeated, get pissed. Dig deep and do whatever you need to do to get out of that hole.

I'll leave you with a few more:

"C = nurse"

"Hardest thing you'll ever do, but totally worth it"

and possibly my favorite:

"I didn't come this far to come this far"

Best wishes. :)

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I swear I was suicidal and finally dropped out 1/2 way through my third semester.

I thought a secretarial job would be sooooo easy. I got a job in the mortgage department of a bank. Ha ha, jokes on me. It was AWFUL and I was fired!

Luckily the nursing school let me back in. I repeated the 3rd semester. It wasn't perfect but stuff started making a little more sense.

The first few years of nursing were still scary, but fast forward ten years later I was nominated for nurse of the year.

Honestly when I first read your post I thought, " Oh brother, she's a mess." Then I remembered my minor :) set back. I love nursing.

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I still feel strongly about it, but I fear that I will not make it through or get the grades I want.

Trust me, we have all been there. Something you need to accept is that you probably will not get the grades you want. Students who go into nursing school with a 4.0 in all of there pre-reqs do not always maintain those grades. Nursing school is HARD. At the end of the day, students that get straight A's and students that get straight C's still reach the same finish line.

I was an A student going into my program. I got all B's, 1 C and 1 A. It was the hardest I have ever worked/studied ever. I passed the NCLEX with 75 questions and am enrolled in a bachelors program. So what benefit would I have gotten over stressing over my grades? None.

#CsGetDegrees

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Trust me, we have all been there. Something you need to accept is that you probably will not get the grades you want. Students who go into nursing school with a 4.0 in all of there pre-reqs do not always maintain those grades. Nursing school is HARD. At the end of the day, students that get straight A's and students that get straight C's still reach the same finish line.

I was an A student going into my program. I got all B's, 1 C and 1 A. It was the hardest I have ever worked/studied ever. I passed the NCLEX with 75 questions and am enrolled in a bachelors program. So what benefit would I have gotten over stressing over my grades? None.

#CsGetDegrees

You're so right, thank you. That made me feel much better.

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I swear I was suicidal and finally dropped out 1/2 way through my third semester.

I thought a secretarial job would be sooooo easy. I got a job in the mortgage department of a bank. Ha ha, jokes on me. It was AWFUL and I was fired!

Luckily the nursing school let me back in. I repeated the 3rd semester. It wasn't perfect but stuff started making a little more sense.

The first few years of nursing were still scary, but fast forward ten years later I was nominated for nurse of the year.

Honestly when I first read your post I thought, " Oh brother, she's a mess." Then I remembered my minor :) set back. I love nursing.

Thank you for sharing your story with me. I like hearing success stories like that. Good for you! You deserve nurse of the year :)

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Not long ago, I saw someone here say, "If you haven't seriously considered quitting at least once, you aren't getting your money's worth" (or something very similar).

Nursing school sucks. I think more for some, and less for others. Sure, you'll see some who say they loved it. They are the minority.

So what you are feeling is completely normal. It's uncomfortable. I've also seen a lot of people say get comfortable being uncomfortable. There is a lot of wisdom in that.

I think many (most?) of us started out very driven and as straight-A students. Juggling life & nursing school wears you down. You can still strive to do your best, but sometimes your best isn't what it used to be. And that's okay, as long as you do what you need to do to stay in your program.

If you have room to cut yourself some slack ~ do so. If you are in danger of failing out ~ instead of feeling defeated, get pissed. Dig deep and do whatever you need to do to get out of that hole.

I'll leave you with a few more:

"C = nurse"

"Hardest thing you'll ever do, but totally worth it"

and possibly my favorite:

"I didn't come this far to come this far"

Best wishes. :)

Thanks very much! It's definitely hard for me to realize that my grades are going to drop. But I trying to focus on learning how to take these tests. I wish they prepared us a little more lol. Thank you for the inspiration! :) ;)

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I think pretty much everybody goes through this in one way or another. I left the Army after 8 years as a combat medic and went to nursing school. You know what used to get me? Pre reqs. God I hated them. I hated being stuck killing time in classes "necessary" for my degree that I would never use as a nurse. It felt like I was stuck in formalities while waiting to do something I already had experience in. I don't know how many times I almost called it quits and just re enlisted instead, and that was after 2 tours in Iraq. Everybody gets bogged down in nursing school. It kinda has a habit of making your goals seem further away. And don't sweat your grades too much as long as you are passing. Two things to keep in mind "C equals pass" and nobody is going to give your grades much of a look in the real world. I was never asked about how I did in nursing school during any interview. The only time you need to worry about GPA is if you are planning on going back later on and its a competitive program like RN to BSN. Even then you can just jack up your GPA with some easy classes then apply.

Don't get discouraged. What you are feeling is pretty normal for nursing school. Just dig in and keep advancing towards your objective and you will be fine.

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Specializes in Psych, Peds, Education, Infection Control.

I can't tell you how many times I cried in nursing school, especially during my rotation with one instructor in particular. She LIVED to make students cry, and openly admitted to it, because if we couldn't handle her, we weren't tough enough to be nurses (she claimed). I sat on the floor of my best friend's apartment at some point near the end of my first year, sobbing and swearing I was done with school and I was a failure and I'd have to find something else to do with my life. Well, I've been a nurse 14 years in May. And I'm good at it, despite what She Who Shall Not Be Named had to say. And I'm now I'm working on my MSN, studying to teach nurses! It's hard to hear "it gets better" when you're still in the trenches. But it does. And there is zero shame if nursing isn't for you, but don't let the frustration of a tough semester convince you of that.

And if you need a chuckle, check out any of Davey Do's threads here or another favorite of mine, Nurstoons. (Nurstoons ) Nurstoons hasn't been updated in years, but it was drawn by a nurse, and the humor of it is right up my alley! It saved my sanity a few times back in school.

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Specializes in Neonatal Nurse Practitioner.

Nursing school sucked so bad. The only thing that got me through it was working in the ER and knowing that wasn't what real nursing was like. If real nursing was like nursing school, I would've quit and found something else to do.

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