It seems like emergency nursing is my ideal job right now……
This sucks I always criticize myself…I have decrease confidence…because sometimes I really don’t know what I’m doing. I get scared when people don’t know what the heck they are doing, but act like they know what they’re doing. Some people have told me…”just act confident, then you’ll be confident”……true I’d probably feel more confident…but that doesn’t change the fact that I didn’t know how to do something. I can’t do that to my patients…..I want to know everything. An emergency can send me to my books in less than a second, but throw something that’s not an emergency to me…I’m not gonna move…..(well, I will but at an unmotivated pace)…
Ughh,…I really do feel like I didn’t learn all the real stuff in school. I’ve always wanted to know a lot of things…to know what I am doing and be good at it. But what I always heard people say is that, “you’ll never know everything.” Yeah, that’s true…but I WANT to. Or at least be up there. I’m so interested in mass emergencies…I’m into studying all about survival and stuff and always imagine myself doing CPR or emergency care on people….I really do day dream about these things…I catch myself doing it sometimes, and it’s just drives me crazy now that I’m looking for a job….I just realized that maybe I should just start in the ED …it feels good for me IF I can feel confident and know it all. Or at least know what to do in an emergency. But the problem is I don’t really know it….that’s the reason why I’m not so confident.
I really have low self-esteem. I hate med-surg nursing. Not because it’s bad…but it’s just not the thing for me….I imagine working in an isolated place where people are counting on me and my team to give them great emergency care. Yep, I imagine myself sewing skin and doing other surgery and weird things……But I can’t work with staff who are biting eachother every chance they get. I’ve heard the posts about how ED staff watch out for one another, and a lot of teamwork…and I love that idea…..until I got to reading about how they will treat you if you’re not confident or know don’t what you’re doing….that’s sad….but I don’t blame them….If I was an ER nurse and someone didn’t know what they were doing, I’d probably not want them there also…they’ll put the patients at risk…but people have got to get THERE somehow….and there’s gotta be a more easier way than going through hell, making youself miserable and giving up on nursing. I love knowing about everything…that’s what makes it exciting but I can’t stand when a teachers/mentors steps on me. I need to know that they are supportive and even though I’m dumb…that they will be a great mentor and teach me ALL they know.
The thing that scares me the most is when I don’t know what I’m doing. I wish I had a great mentor who could teach me all that stuff. I’m sick of preceptors and teachers that I’ve had who new nothing about teaching!.....They could have at least been enthusiastic or patient…there were only a few of those, but it only takes a few to make you lose hope….I wished I was some of those lucky students who got those great mentors. I felt like I was intimidated most of my nursing education…..that sucks…it just made me less confident and gave me low self-esteem in my work. Also, it’s my fault too…..I’m always so hard on myself.
There’s a hospital I know that are taking new grads for ER. But if it’s a place where I’ll get torn apart…then I’m not gonna do it. I can’t do that to myself. I’d be suicide on my career. That is the place where I would need the most help in the world, because people are dying in there. But then I don’t want to be doing something else. I’m not exactly type A personality. I’m not totally type B either.
I’m just going crazy right now. I didn’t exactly enjoy the ER on my clinical rotations…and most of that was because I didn’t feel like I had any of skill to do hands on. I really just felt like I was in the way. But I can’t get over it…can’t get over the scene of the person dying, the person who needs medical help now, can’t get over it….there’s so much adrenaline there…just thinking about it makes me excited…….! Darn! I’m a mess…..shoot I don’t want people to hire me just cuz they need an ER nurse….I want them to do it because they believe they can train me to be a great nurse….I would be glad to study forever if someone would be glad to give me great training and respect….darn…thinking too much again….
Worst things why I'm worried if I take a job in ER: not organized, and not as "fast" a thinker as I'd like to be, yet....low confidence....and I don't like selling myself as something I'm not.....
ER?
Tell me about it?...were there people who you thought was hopeless, but made it through ER?
thank you everyone for all of your help. i've been doing med/surg now for 2 years. it's doable, but not my passion. i get stressed sometimes because of the lack of time on medsurg that does not allow me to know all the things that i'd like to know about my patients. this medsurg worked for me. i prayed very hard for god to find me a great hospital to work in. and i found the perfect one, all the staff i work with are so helpful and we work together as a team all the time.
i've finally found what i would like to do in nursing now. it's nicu nursing. i didn't know until i stepped onto the nicu page on allnurses. i knew i liked nursery, but didn't actually spend much time in nicu during clinical. nicu nursing allows me to be close to my patients, not running around crazy on the floor like on medsurg. it allows me to know all my patients in dept and know their ins and outs. it allows me to deal with emergencies with help from the docs and other nurses who work as a team. and i found that on the nicu site, some of those nurses have that same need of knowing mostly everything about their patients. and i am so glad, because i was frustrated about not knowing everything about all my med/surg patients. it was impossible to on a med/surg floor, because time does not allow for it.
i used to be so stressed, but this was only because i didn’t know much. i’m a person who likes to be control, and know what i’m doing to be confident. and with nicu being specialized to a specific age, that narrows it down.
i’m hard on myself, but only because i know you have to know what you’re doing in these areas. my confidence has grown greatly due to my experience on med/surg, and greatly due to the great staff there.
i know that taking care of babies will help me to value my work more. that’s because most older people on my floor is dying or wants to die. people say just let them die, and they are dying. but that’s not why i became a nurse. i wanted to save people who do not want to die, who still have purposes in their lives that they wanted to live out. and i think babies are perfect for this, because they are at the start of their life, with everything ahead of them. when i think of it, it makes me very excited.
i found that i didn’t learn much from clinical, and it was hard to apply book knowledge to the real thing. but once i started medsurg, i started to understand more of why this?, and why that?, or how?.
i’m glad i didn’t do er. i know that i get stressed with too much emergencies that are “unexpected.” and i like adrenal sometimes, but definitely not addicted to it. i like how nicu has it’s fast and slow times.
i still dislike med/surg nursing. it’s only bearable, i know, because i like taking care of the patients, and my co-workers are a joy to work with.
i think i will love and feel so rewarded by being an nicu nurse. because then i will know that i am saving a life that is not meant to die, or is not it’s time to die. and that’s the reason i went into nursing.
Neferet
41 Posts
thank you everyone for all of your help. i've been doing med/surg now for 2 years. it's doable, but not my passion. i get stressed sometimes because of the lack of time on medsurg that does not allow me to know all the things that i'd like to know about my patients. this medsurg worked for me. i prayed very hard for god to find me a great hospital to work in. and i found the perfect one, all the staff i work with are so helpful and we work together as a team all the time.
i've finally found what i would like to do in nursing now. it's nicu nursing. i didn't know until i stepped onto the nicu page on allnurses. i knew i liked nursery, but didn't actually spend much time in nicu during clinical. nicu nursing allows me to be close to my patients, not running around crazy on the floor like on medsurg. it allows me to know all my patients in dept and know their ins and outs. it allows me to deal with emergencies with help from the docs and other nurses who work as a team. and i found that on the nicu site, some of those nurses have that same need of knowing mostly everything about their patients. and i am so glad, because i was frustrated about not knowing everything about all my med/surg patients. it was impossible to on a med/surg floor, because time does not allow for it.
i used to be so stressed, but this was only because i didn’t know much. i’m a person who likes to be control, and know what i’m doing to be confident. and with nicu being specialized to a specific age, that narrows it down.
i’m hard on myself, but only because i know you have to know what you’re doing in these areas. my confidence has grown greatly due to my experience on med/surg, and greatly due to the great staff there.
i know that taking care of babies will help me to value my work more. that’s because most older people on my floor is dying or wants to die. people say just let them die, and they are dying. but that’s not why i became a nurse. i wanted to save people who do not want to die, who still have purposes in their lives that they wanted to live out. and i think babies are perfect for this, because they are at the start of their life, with everything ahead of them. when i think of it, it makes me very excited.
i found that i didn’t learn much from clinical, and it was hard to apply book knowledge to the real thing. but once i started medsurg, i started to understand more of why this?, and why that?, or how?.
i’m glad i didn’t do er. i know that i get stressed with too much emergencies that are “unexpected.” and i like adrenal sometimes, but definitely not addicted to it. i like how nicu has it’s fast and slow times.
i still dislike med/surg nursing. it’s only bearable, i know, because i like taking care of the patients, and my co-workers are a joy to work with.
i think i will love and feel so rewarded by being an nicu nurse. because then i will know that i am saving a life that is not meant to die, or is not it’s time to die. and that’s the reason i went into nursing.