I really need help!

[JahbingRN]

Hi I am a new nurse. I went through an orientaion in a critical care program, which lasted for 8 weeks. This consisted of classroom and clinical time in CCU. After finishing my training I oriented on a tele floor and a respiratory floor, both 2 weeks each. Finally I went to my home floor (tele/stepdown).

In nursing school and the CCU program I excelled theory wise, but whenever it came to practicum/clinical I always felt ovewhelmed. Now that I am on my home floor (tele/stepdown) I only have 2 weeks of preceptorship before I go on my own. I feel that I have not progresses since I started, I feel like I lose it when I get overwhlemed and my confidence, esteem and everything are in the bucket. I know management is thinking that with the training I had, I should be at a certain level. I am starting to think I selected the wrong career.

I love the theory of nursing and want to be a good nurse. I pray to God everynight and everyday I go to work to give me competence, courage and confidence. I feel so disorganized, forgetful and slow. I forget to sign things off, I've staamped the wrong pt's name, I overlook things and the list goes on. My preceptors always have to help me at the end of the day, in order for me to catch up. I swear everyone around me are so fast, I stand out. I honesty feel that they are going to end up firing me or I will end up quitting.

I came home the other night and I cried so much I thought I was going to pass out. I am starting to think that maybe I need to see a therapist, maybe I suffer from anxiety... I don't know.

Do you think that is normal? Is there another area of nursing I can do without the extreme environment as a hospital.

Please, reply.

[Hairstylingnurse]

Hi I am a new nurse. I went through an orientaion in a critical care program, which lasted for 8 weeks. This consisted of classroom and clinical time in CCU. After finishing my training I oriented on a tele floor and a respiratory floor, both 2 weeks each. Finally I went to my home floor (tele/stepdown).

In nursing school and the CCU program I excelled theory wise, but whenever it came to practicum/clinical I always felt ovewhelmed. Now that I am on my home floor (tele/stepdown) I only have 2 weeks of preceptorship before I go on my own. I feel that I have not progresses since I started, I feel like I lose it when I get overwhlemed and my confidence, esteem and everything are in the bucket. I know management is thinking that with the training I had, I should be at a certain level. I am starting to think I selected the wrong career.

I love the theory of nursing and want to be a good nurse. I pray to God everynight and everyday I go to work to give me competence, courage and confidence. I feel so disorganized, forgetful and slow. I forget to sign things off, I've staamped the wrong pt's name, I overlook things and the list goes on. My preceptors always have to help me at the end of the day, in order for me to catch up. I swear everyone around me are so fast, I stand out. I honesty feel that they are going to end up firing me or I will end up quitting.

I came home the other night and I cried so much I thought I was going to pass out. I am starting to think that maybe I need to see a therapist, maybe I suffer from anxiety... I don't know.

Do you think that is normal? Is there another area of nursing I can do without the extreme environment as a hospital.

Please, reply.

Hi Jahbing, I hate to hear you are going thru such bad times. I still go thru this at times. This is a second career for me and I only felt like this for the first few weeks of being a hairdresser. I've done hair for 13 plus yrs. and am very comfortable in my skin but after 4.5 yrs of nursing while I absolutely love being a nurse home health is the only place that I'm extremley confident in. Ofcourse I keep all the nursing manuals and other info at my fingertips to make sure I'm ready for my next pt. Right now I'm doing ltc and private duty peds thru an agency just to get more experience and I still go thru exactly what you talk about at both places. I hope this is something WE WILL GET OVER. I'm doing everything I can not to leave this profession and get back to what I'm good at(hair). But I really want to help people when they are not at their best and be there for my pts. But something is very lacking. I'm currently working toward my R.N. and some days I'm wondering if I'm wasting my time and money. I really believe nursing is my calling, but I don't know if I will ever feel like I will have all the necassary skills to be as good as I want to be. Good luck to ya and don't give up yet. Let your nurse manager know if you think you need more time with the preceptor, They really don't want to waste all the orientation they have put into you so They will most likely work with you.:)

[Newbie_RNA]

Hi hun,

Unti I read this forum and obviously listened to a few fellow students, that so many of us feel the same! Its so very sad when we have all taken years out to train as nurses and the end result is that we are either bullied, made to feel incompetent, and generally made to feel and at times be told, we are never going to make it as nurses, even though the ward manager who says that still after being my mentor for 8 weeks, has shown me nothing and not even allowed me to do one drugsround, because I am too slow! I hav to say I am very disillusioned and I havent even started my first post yet. I wish that I had never trained as a nurse and studied something else, because unfortunately I have never been treated so badly by so many people in the nursing arena. Sadly this accounts for the current training in the UK also. So all I can say to you is hang in there, and Im sure you will make it hun, although at times I have to say, Im not sure nursing really is for me anymore x