New grad anxiety

Nurses General Nursing

Published

Hello everyone!

I recently graduated from a 1 year nursing program with no prior medical experience. During my last semester, COVID-19 hit, which shut down my capstone clinical. Now that I am starting my first nursing job soon, I am having major anxiety. The program I graduated from moved quickly to begin with, and I never had the chance to apply many nursing skills during the small amount of clinical time I had. I have never performed wound care or inserted an IV, NG tube, or catheter. It doesn't help that I have serious hand tremors whenever I get anxious. Although I graduated at the top of my class and passed the NCLEX, I feel like I know absolutely nothing and am very unprepared. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!

2 Votes
Specializes in OR, Nursing Professional Development.

What you are feeling is normal for new grads these days. You will want your first job to have a thorough and supportive orientation. You will likely not feel comfortable and competent until you have at least 1 year of actual nursing experience if not 2 under your belt- and actual nursing is a whole different ballpark from nursing school.

7 Votes
Specializes in Med-Surg, Trauma, Ortho, Neuro, Cardiac.

Pretty much all of us feel the same way when we start that first nursing job. Nothing you can do to change your experience and situation, just listen, watch and learn and ask questions. You'll get experience as you go along. Don't do anything you're unfamiliar with without your preceptor.

5 Votes
Specializes in Peds, Med-Surg, Disaster Nsg, Parish Nsg.

Like the other posters have said, what you are feeling is normal for new grads. A little bit of anxiety is fine, it keeps you alert and on your toes. You will get past the point of feeling overwhelmed.

You might want to consider reading this book by our career expert - Nurse Beth

First-Year Nurse: Advice for Working With Doctors, Prioritizing Care, and TIme Management

Good luck. It does get better!

2 Votes
Specializes in Tele, ICU, Staff Development.

I know it may not help to tell you you're graduating and entering the work force at an unprecedented, historical time. Everything is topsy-turvy.

Even in normal times, many new grads have not performed many basic procedures. Just be sure to never do any procedure the first time on your own. Your responsibility is to ask for help even if you feel pressured to perform.

This is true for all of your career. An experienced nurse using a blood warmer, say, for the first time is duty-bound to ask for help.

This protects you, your patient, and your facility.

You are not alone and we are sending good energy. You can do this.

Best wishes ?

4 Votes

Hi you mentioned being nervous about some skills you never performed before - foley, NG, IV insertion. Your preceptor will (should) ALWAYS be with you, guiding you. And feel free to grab supplies and practice. What I did to practice IV insertion was I got IV tubing and taped it to the desk. I took my IV kit and practiced on the tubing as if the tubing was the vein. I practiced right at the busy nurse's station desk, so that I'd be ready to be stared at and deal with commotion going around me when it was time to put one in the patient.

The Foley is harder, but there are little tricks. If you can make the patient laugh you can kind of see the "wink" for where to go in. I learned in pediatrics, so anatomy is a little easier than an older adult, but the biggest thing to tell yourself is this: the worst that can happen is you have to start over or ask someone else. You'll learn this happens, and it should not be a big deal to any other nurse since we've all been there.

I use humor to cover up my nervousness. Some people will write out the procedure step by step and keep it in their binder. Use whatever works for you. Best wishes!

1 Votes
Specializes in Cardiothoracic Progressive.

I'm a new grad and started end of March / beginning of April. One of the biggest things people come across is this, never having inserted and IV or a foley. I certainly have never ever inserted an NG tube and one day someone asked me if I wanted to do it (we were sharing the floor with a different unit) and it made me very nervous. In school we barely got any instruction or teaching when it came to IV insertion. The one good thing about being a new grad is that no one expects you to know everything. I also graduated with honors and passed NCLEX and not in a rude way, but this doesn't matter at all once you start working as a nurse. There's so many things we never got deep into in school like drains, wound care, different types of testing, drip protocols, etc. I'm sorry you didn't get as much clinical experience that you truly deserved. Take every day of work as a learning moment and your other nurses are usually happy that someone looks up to them and asks them for help or to show them how to do something. People will be very understanding of your situation. Use all resources available to you like a lot of hospitals have some sort of education modules, policies & procedures, etc. And remember, every shift you work is more experience that you have gained. Give yourself more credit than you have been and have confidence in yourself that you are smart, you know what you're doing or you are bright enough to figure it out. Because at the end of the day, there are still experienced nurses that see new things that none of us know much about, medicine is always evolving and there are always new things coming out. And sometimes, we just gotta fake it til we make it. As nurses we are constantly learning no matter what type of nurse or how experienced. So keep in mind all of your experience is valuable, you will only get better and more confident with each shift. You got this!

1 Votes
Specializes in Cardiac PCU.

Keep a positive attitude, ask questions and ask for help ! You will gain experience as you work. Hopefully you are on a floor with other positive attitudes:) Biggest advice - find a outlet for stress relief! For example, I play video games after shifts etc.

1 Votes
Specializes in CRNA, Finally retired.

To the OP: All of the things you "lack" in your post are tasks that require psychomotor skills and tincture of time is the only cure. Every institution has a different procedure anyway. We never learned IV's or NG's when I started during the disco era because we had to leave those things for the interns in my teaching hospital. Jackdaniels80 gave you great advice about stress relief. Go home and do something physical like a 20 minute yoga wind-down. Any de-stressors you come up with will serve you will. Now, if I took a shot of Jack Daniels when I got home, the rest of the day would be shot - bad pun.

1 Votes
Specializes in Cardiac PCU.

LOL, My username on all nurses is actually my gamertag on xbox live. I quit drinking 12 years ago.. it's just a reminder of how much I've accomplished. Stay positive and don't drink Jackdaniels after work ?

0 Votes
On 8/7/2020 at 4:23 PM, direw0lf said:

Hi you mentioned being nervous about some skills you never performed before - foley, NG, IV insertion. Your preceptor will (should) ALWAYS be with you, guiding you. And feel free to grab supplies and practice. What I did to practice IV insertion was I got IV tubing and taped it to the desk. I took my IV kit and practiced on the tubing as if the tubing was the vein. I practiced right at the busy nurse's station desk, so that I'd be ready to be stared at and deal with commotion going around me when it was time to put one in the patient.

The Foley is harder, but there are little tricks. If you can make the patient laugh you can kind of see the "wink" for where to go in. I learned in pediatrics, so anatomy is a little easier than an older adult, but the biggest thing to tell yourself is this: the worst that can happen is you have to start over or ask someone else. You'll learn this happens, and it should not be a big deal to any other nurse since we've all been there.

I use humor to cover up my nervousness. Some people will write out the procedure step by step and keep it in their binder. Use whatever works for you. Best wishes!

This was extremely helpful !

0 Votes
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