I passed!

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A little background: I am 29, and finished up a BSN program in December. I was a high school dropout, then a college drop out (multiple times!), and had a 2.5 GPA going in to school. I was put on academic probation for my first semester, and graduated after ~8 semesters with a 3.1 GPA. I'm so happy my school gave me a chance!

I've been a long-time lurker of the Allnurses forums. It began in 2014 when I was working as a tech at a pediatric hospital. I've always wanted to be in healthcare, and being a tech for several years solidified my desire, but I never thought I was smart enough to graduate from anything. Reading peoples' stories on the forums inspired me to get my act together and go back to school.

I took the NCLEX yesterday and was surprised to find that my license was active today on my state's BON website. So surprised that I was rendered speechless for several minutes and forgot how to talk. :) Last night was absolutely awful - I spent a couple hours on the forums reading posts and trying to gauge my chances of passing. So this post is for those of you out there who feel utterly hopeless and are certain you didn't pass.

Studying - My school used Evolve adaptive quizzing throughout the program. I paid close attention to rationales and critically thinking my way through a question. If I couldn't explain why one answer was better than the others, I would go back and study content till I could. At the program's end, we had 51 adaptive quizzes that needed to be at level 3 to pass the program.

The school provided a HESI live review during our last week. I did not find it superbly helpful, and bought the Hurst online review while it was on sale. Hurst is excellent for going over content that you may not have reviewed in awhile, and they provide 4 NCLEX simulation tests as well as a quiz customizer with hundreds of questions and rationales. The format was similar to the actual NCLEX test, down to the formatting and colors, which helped with anxiety when I went to take the test.

Day of the test - I was all nerves when I went to the testing center. I was only in the computer room for about an hour, and the computer shut off around 90 questions. I immediately started overthinking EVERYTHING. I had about 35 SATA, no math, and a few "order these in terms of priority". Lots of delegation questions and "who should you see first?" I felt confident about maybe a dozen answers. I went home, was sick a couple times throughout the night, and cried a decent amount because I was 100% certain I had failed.

In the morning, a friend/classmate who had already passed told me to log into the BON website to see if my license was up. I was terrified and told her it hadn't been long enough for them to process it. I did it anyway, and you know the rest of the story. :)

If you're lurking because you are positive that you didn't pass... give yourself the benefit of the doubt. Most nursing programs have pass rates >85% for first time test takers, and the chances are slim that you'll fail after having graduated nursing school. Don't obsess over what kind of questions you got or how many you had. It's ok to have a good cry (it's stressful!), but make sure that you have a solid self-care routine planned out for after the test. You deserve the best! Treat yourself - go for a walk, go to a movie, hang out with friends, snuggle your cat, DO NOT LOOK AT YOUR TEXTBOOKS.

Thank you Allnurses and current/future nurses for inspiring me to follow my dreams and for unknowingly encouraging me during the dark days of the program. You da best.

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Specializes in Medical and general practice now LTC.

Congratulations

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On 1/30/2019 at 1:57 PM, otterbeinbed said:

A little background: I am 29, and finished up a BSN program in December. I was a high school dropout, then a college drop out (multiple times!), and had a 2.5 GPA going in to school. I was put on academic probation for my first semester, and graduated after ~8 semesters with a 3.1 GPA. I'm so happy my school gave me a chance!

I've been a long-time lurker of the Allnurses forums. It began in 2014 when I was working as a tech at a pediatric hospital. I've always wanted to be in healthcare, and being a tech for several years solidified my desire, but I never thought I was smart enough to graduate from anything. Reading peoples' stories on the forums inspired me to get my act together and go back to school.

I took the NCLEX yesterday and was surprised to find that my license was active today on my state's BON website. So surprised that I was rendered speechless for several minutes and forgot how to talk. :) Last night was absolutely awful - I spent a couple hours on the forums reading posts and trying to gauge my chances of passing. So this post is for those of you out there who feel utterly hopeless and are certain you didn't pass.

Studying - My school used Evolve adaptive quizzing throughout the program. I paid close attention to rationales and critically thinking my way through a question. If I couldn't explain why one answer was better than the others, I would go back and study content till I could. At the program's end, we had 51 adaptive quizzes that needed to be at level 3 to pass the program.

The school provided a HESI live review during our last week. I did not find it superbly helpful, and bought the Hurst online review while it was on sale. Hurst is excellent for going over content that you may not have reviewed in awhile, and they provide 4 NCLEX simulation tests as well as a quiz customizer with hundreds of questions and rationales. The format was similar to the actual NCLEX test, down to the formatting and colors, which helped with anxiety when I went to take the test.

Day of the test - I was all nerves when I went to the testing center. I was only in the computer room for about an hour, and the computer shut off around 90 questions. I immediately started overthinking EVERYTHING. I had about 35 SATA, no math, and a few "order these in terms of priority". Lots of delegation questions and "who should you see first?" I felt confident about maybe a dozen answers. I went home, was sick a couple times throughout the night, and cried a decent amount because I was 100% certain I had failed.

In the morning, a friend/classmate who had already passed told me to log into the BON website to see if my license was up. I was terrified and told her it hadn't been long enough for them to process it. I did it anyway, and you know the rest of the story. :)

If you're lurking because you are positive that you didn't pass... give yourself the benefit of the doubt. Most nursing programs have pass rates >85% for first time test takers, and the chances are slim that you'll fail after having graduated nursing school. Don't obsess over what kind of questions you got or how many you had. It's ok to have a good cry (it's stressful!), but make sure that you have a solid self-care routine planned out for after the test. You deserve the best! Treat yourself - go for a walk, go to a movie, hang out with friends, snuggle your cat, DO NOT LOOK AT YOUR TEXTBOOKS.

Thank you Allnurses and current/future nurses for inspiring me to follow my dreams and for unknowingly encouraging me during the dark days of the program. You da best.

Congratulations

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