Nursing Students General Students
Published
I am in first semester Nursing School and need some help.
For background, I am the type of person who needs orders to do a job. I see myself as a tool to be wielded by a hand: a natural born servant. I find most of my work related joy comes when being praised by a superior I respect for helping carry out their will. I have no real ambition for it's own sake and chose nursing based on faulty, outdated information concerning it from family (not that I blame my grandmother and older aunt, of course - medicine changes fast and has changed quite a lot from when they were in school and nurses were just helpers to the MD in charge). That lack of personal ambition is proving to be a crippling hindrance, however. I have made an average of D on my exams. I have come to realize that the NCLEX style questions are designed with natural born problem solver type people in mind - those who spot problems before they even start and are always thinking three steps ahead of illness and complications. I am not among those who think this way; I am a reactor who has never been able to think ahead very well. It is a personality that I respect and serve, easily, but is antithetical to my own personality.
Does anyone else feel this way? Like maybe you made a mistake or didn't really appreciate the full gravity of what Nursing was before you got into the class? Are some people simply not cut out to be real nurses? Should I expect it to magically click? My aunt says it might just click for me if I stick it out but I am worried about me GPA and financial aid situation if I stick it out and totally fail the course. Even with the stress of the program set aside, studying for three to four hours a night to carry a failing grade is demoralizing enough to make me consider dropping nursing to choose another path.
I don't want to sound like I fault my professors either; each is an amazing person who has completely ignited in me a complete respect for the profession of Nursing (more so than was already there). If I am too dumb for this sort of career, it certainly isn't their fault.