Out of school for 12 years

[Derise Augustave]

Hi,

I graduated PN school in 2009. I moved to NY and took my NCLEX in 2017 and failed. Someone told me that I should do a refresher or PN school all over because I wouldn’t be a competent nurse otherwise. Long story short couldn’t find a PN refresher so I decided to go to school again. I did 1 year and 1 full clinical rotation and had to leave school due to health issues. I then decided that I would not re-enroll and study my butt off to pass NCLEX. I did Hurst, Remar, Picmonic, and listened to Mark Klemick lectures. I busted my butt working full time, taking care of a family with 2 brand new babies, waking up at 2 in the morning just to study, studying on my lunch break and finally took my NCLEX on Thursday 8/5/21. Did the PVT and got the good pop up just waiting 48hrs for the official “unofficial results”. My question is with such a gap will I be able to get a job or will my  time going back to school count as a refresher? Please help, nursing is my passion and I need robe where my heart wants to be!

[K. Everly, BSN, RN]

Your nursing journey doesn't end until you say it does, just have to find a way to leverage the gap and explain what you've done in the meantime to stay up to date in the field and explain what other soft skills you've learned or honed in on in the 12 year period (soft skills like communication as a call center rep, time management skills as a restaurant manager, etc).