Juvenile felony, can I still be a nurse?

[Pkam]

I searched on the internet and found a bunch of these threads but I also heard of people getting past it. My situation is that while I was 17 in 2000 I cut class, broke into some ones home with some friends and we watched TV waiting for the hour to pass so we could go back to school. Well we were arrested and our public defenders told us all to just plead guilty. We did so thinking that he had our best interests in mind. Instead of being charged with trespassing or breaking and entering which are all misdemeanors, we were all charged with 1st degree residential burglary (felony) and that was that. Since then I've moved on, served 6 years in the Army with an honorably discharge (injury in Afghanistan) and was awarded many honors. I had no negative records while serving and now I'm back in school chasing my dream to become a nurse. I fell in love with medicine in the Army after taking a few courses learning how to fix minor injuries should we get shot or our buddies got shot. I'm doing incredibly well getting straight A's in all my courses and am even TA'ing Anatomy and planning on volunteering at a local Kaiser. I always thought that I could have my records sealed until tonight when I googled it further and realized that my felony could not be expunged or sealed. Is there any hope? I honestly love helping people and have even patched up a gunshot wound (ironically not in war but in Seattle...) I finally found something that I can't wait to do and do to the best of my ability. I'm sorry for the long story but I'm really heart broken and desperate right now, any advice would be appreciated. I haven't gotten into any trouble aside from 1 speeding ticket since that incident 14 years ago.

[Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN]

thread moved for best response. This is a moderated forum so you will see a delay in the posting of comments.

[NurseGirl525, ASN, RN]

Was it on a juvenile record or were you charged as an adult? If it was juvenile it may be sealed and no one would be able to see it. You will have to pass a background check. Normally I would say don't worry but I know there is a big difference between a misdemeanor and a felony so I don't know for sure. I would check and see if it had been sealed or not and if not talk with your school. If you let them know it was a stupid mistake you made in high school, they may not have a problem with it.