Need help! I hate nursing school- what did I do?!

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Hi Everyone!

Before I get people wanting to stab me for hating it- I'm sorry! I'm hoping some of you guys will give me some good advice!

Anyways, as a background... I am going through a paramedic to RN bridge program that is eleven months in length. I am currently in my second month of school and absolutely detest it! I pretty sure working on the weekends as a medic does not help the situation, but I feel like everything is moving SO slowly! does it get better?? Will I be able to do some critical thinking in the future?? At the moment I am regretting going through it, as I feel like I am a monkey just doing skills and very little thinking!

Any advice would be GREATLY appreciated!!

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Specializes in Trauma, Teaching.

It starts with the basics, step by step. But you don't have to wait for someone to start telling you to think critically, you can start anytime on your own.

For instance, those tasks: a bedpan. Why are you doing it? Assess the needs while you do... immobile or too dizzy to stand up? Assess the skin while turning, color, turgor, elasticity, breakdown. Assess the characteristics of the urine and stool; what is significant about them? Anything out of the norm? Assess musculoskeletal, how much effort can the pt make, and how much is you? What systems are affected by the disease/trauma? GI, GU, Cardio? What might be abnormal?

Nurses are always thinking about what they are doing, what is significant about that simple task, what implications for this individual are there?

Good luck as you go!

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I hated, loathed clinicals for a while. I kept second guessing if it was what I was meant to do, should I go back to school. However, Once I entered third semester where we were given all the skills to be a nurse I finally figured out it was what I'm supposed to do. I say wait it out, it took me two full semesters before I felt fully comfortable and loved what I was doing.

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The truth is nursing isn't for everybody. I don't mean that to be rude, it's just honest. You have all the time in the world to be just whatever you want to be when you grow up. Maybe nursing isn't for you, maybe it is. I do think 2 months is a bit to short to decide if it's for you or not though. Give yourself a time frame and see what you think then and reassess where you are in life. Maybe your better off with your paramedic job? Or maybe you'd like to be a radiology tech. Or maybe you'd like to be an accountant! Life is full of options, and you have them ALL available to you, not just nursing. :bugeyes: Seriously, think about what you see yourself doing each day to bring you happiness. Is it being a nurse? Or do you see something else?

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Specializes in Emergency/Cath Lab.
The truth is nursing isn't for everybody. I don't mean that to be rude, it's just honest. You have all the time in the world to be just whatever you want to be when you grow up. Maybe nursing isn't for you, maybe it is. I do think 2 months is a bit to short to decide if it's for you or not though. Give yourself a time frame and see what you think then and reassess where you are in life. Maybe your better off with your paramedic job? Or maybe you'd like to be a radiology tech. Or maybe you'd like to be an accountant! Life is full of options, and you have them ALL available to you, not just nursing. :bugeyes: Seriously, think about what you see yourself doing each day to bring you happiness. Is it being a nurse? Or do you see something else?

Wow, thats not what the op was asking at all. They want to know when school will pick up. I hated the first 2 semesters of school because I felt the exact same way. Now as it is getting farther along, I find my education and thinking/skills to be growing exponentially as everything is starting to fit together. Some times you just have to start low and slow before everything starts working out and you enjoy it.

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In no way at all did I mean for that to come off as rude. I would just hate to see someone stick with something they don't like as it's 40 hours a week of your time being spent. I just think everyone should fill those hours with whatever they find happiness is. And many people try many things before they find happiness.

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Specializes in Nursing Professional Development.

I hated nursing school ... but loved my first job as a staff nurse 33 years ago. Nursing and nursing school are 2 different things. You might hate nursing school the way I did and yet find that you like being a nurse.

If you read a lot of posts here, you'll find that a lot of people who love nursing school, hate it once they become an actual nurse and leave the profession after a few months or years.

So ... which do you hate ... nursing school? ... or the provision of nursing care and/or actually being a nurse?

If it's just that you hate nursing school, then you may just have to be strong and endure it for a couple of years. That's what I did -- and became a nurse. If you are finding that you hate providing nursing care (being a nurse), then you should rethink your career choice. So, I suggest you pay attention to that for a while and figure out which it is.

Good luck -- however you work it out for yourself.

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Specializes in IMCU.

Our first clinicals were unbelievably unchallenging. My knee-jerk advice -- keep at it it gets better.

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Guys,

Thanks so much for the advice!!

Hopefully I can answer a few questions... and get more feedback

In terms of clinicals.. We are allowed to do a lot (e.g. give IVP meds, oral meds, start IVs, do Foleys, sterile dressing changes, etc... ) So I think I'm having a hard time adjusting to taking orders and stepping in midway in through treatment (e.g. a STEMI patient who I'm seeing after the cath lab (clinicals), as opposed to seeing him with an acute onset of chest pain (paramedic job).

Also, I am really confused with a nursing diagnosis! For paramedicine I make a differential diagnoses (e.g. COPD versus CHF and treat accordingly). for nursing it's more of what you see (e.g. dyspnea??).

In terms of what I want to do as a nurse... ideally critical care, I'd love to work as a flight or ED nurse, I really enjoy thinking at a fast pace and I think I really miss that during nursing school!

I'm sorry if this is rambling, I just would love some people's older and wiser advice!

Thanks!!

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How long have you been a paramedic? If you are doing well as a paramedic, you could probably find an area of nursing that would suit your preferences, that is fast-paced with fast thinking.

I can see where it might be even more frustrating that you're working as a medic and thinking in a very different way than what they want to see in nursing school. But paramedic-to-RN isn't uncommon and seems to work for a lot of people. It probably will for you, too. It's less than a year to finish and each rotation can be very different depending on the instructor you get and the unit you're on. You'll get a taste of many different areas and then you can decide if you want to stick with nursing or not.

I really didn't like the way nursing school was taught. It felt like they spent way too much time repeating & overexplaining the basics (every care plan had to emphasize preventing skin breakdown, turn-cough-deep-breathe, therapeutic listening, etc) and meanwhile we skimmed over a zillion medical conditions way too cursorily (one paragraph each in the med-surg book on signs and symptoms, pathophys, pharmacological treatment etc). When I graduated, I could write a mean care plan but still didn't feel I had much of a clue in regard to handling medical issues (besides generic answers like "assess the patient" "ABCs" "5 rights").

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