Passed my Nclex-RN

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Specializes in Cardiac.

Good morning all!

I just wanted to say...that I passed my Nclex-RN, first try with 75 questions. I graduated Nursing School actually the first week of July but due to some financial issues, family difficulties and deaths in my immediate family I could not handle dealing with the Nclex over the summer. It broke my heart seeing all my classmates take their boards 3-4 weeks after graduating and start at new jobs at the end of August but I figured...OK...this will work for me as when I sit to take it there will be almost no competition for jobs and Im lucky to live in an area with a heavy saturation of Hospitals and hence Nursing Jobs and most Nurses stay on floors for a few years and then move on to more advanced Nursing jobs/specialities so there is always turnover in the hospitals...anyway so I wasnt too concerned, but still it was a trial. I was also annoyed by everyone asking me at work (I work as a PCT on a specialized floor) when I was taking it and even some co-workers would make snide remarks behind my back that I must have actually failed and hence why I am saying I'm taking it in a few months. I didnt feel like delving into my personal life with people so id sjust say...Oh, I need the summer to relax and chill with my family. Anyway, I decided id schedule for sometime in October and I started studying around the end of August. I admit I have NO suggestions on how to study! I frankly just figured my best bet would be to review my Nclex-RN review books (like the big yellow Saunders one which reviews everything) and do Prep-U...I aimed for around 200 q's a day and in between just review different concepts. Some days I studied like a fiend...other days...ommm...not so much! LOL. But regardless as the date came closer I got sooo stressed out. I ensured I had reviewd all major concepts...maternity, peds, medical, pharm and mental health but hey...its a toss up, from talking to friends they said the test was heavy on Infection Control, Prioritization and Delegation and a LOTTA SATA. Now I always hated SATA but I found a few great Nclex videos on YouTube where they basically said not be afraid of SATA its just a KNOWLEDGE question its not anything else and so as long as you have the knowledge or can guess really, really well you'll be fine. LOL. Oh and on some random note a few of the new nurses on my floor said they got quite a bit of Mental health questions so that made my think...ok, def brush up on that more!

So anyway I changed my date 2 times to the end of October.cuz im a dork...and finally the week of came. I was at work actually the day before the exam and was frantically doing questions and ensuring I had memorized ALL lab data when a seasoned nurse came up and said "just put them away, relax, enjoy your day and you'll do fine! its not rocket science...you passed Nursing Schoolm NCLEX is easy compared to that!" I was done at 3 and honestly tried to go home and do her suggestions...I just relaxed the rest of the day, it was very hard and I was scared shiz-less about if I would fail as I had sooo much riding on this and I am very hard on myself and I did not want to fail andf have to go through this misery again! The morning of I got up at 4am-I had gone to bed at 8pm the prev night and actually slept like a baby...I slept SOOO good, weirdly enough, one of the best sleeps id had in ages... I woke up really blissed out and happy (also weird) and got out of the house by 5-am...OH and to note I ate a full blown dinner for breakfast...im talking like spaghetti and sauce and turkey meatballs and a salad and then made a blueberry smoothie for the car ride...During school I always did better on our weekly exams if I ate a hearty breakfast beforehand as I felt like I had the energy to really think things through... I had a 30min car ride there (I had prev driven the route over the weekend) and once I got there I walk for 30min to refresh myself then I sat in my car and reviewed some labs and reactions...

The time came...I went in...I was both scared but shockingly not as nervous as I had felt I should be. I sat down, used the ear buds and the headphones and started...the first question was HARD! I was like WTH! LOL...BUt I kept thinking to myself go with my gut instinct...think about what is the MOST important thing...like someone who could potentially be a bleed risk vs. someone who is potentially immunocompromised...both are important but which is MORE important. Think about that. I got a lot of infection control, SATA, proiritization and delegation and yes shocklingly a LOT of mental health like therapeutic comm and a some milieu-related stuff and 1-2 meds like lithium and zoloft. I got a lot of very random and increasingly obscure stuff which I felt like maybe I heard way back in fundies...gout? oxylates? shiz!!! stuff like that. Some questions I just guessed and while im not big on strategies some I could like of the 4 answers 1 would be obviously wrong and 2 were plausible and 1 was a maybe and id be like well these 2 are very similar so id go with the one which is plausible but nothing similar is in another question.,..you know those nclex strategies...I felt like the questions tended to be very obscure and lacked the details that one finds on nursing school exams...

Hence I really cant say I have a good mehtod to study...you just kinda fly by the seat of your pants! I think that if you did fairly ok in nursing school and got the majori concepts and esp could do pretty good on the practice exams then as long as you have the base knowledge there isnt much beyond that as it relies heavily on your nursing INSTINCTS-what your gut says...because when your on a floor...you need to go by your gut instinct and ive had many experiences even as a PCT where id gone into a room and someone say pulls out a line and they r gushing blood or are breathless, struggling to breath or going psychotic and pulling push pins off of walls...in those situations you need to do what your gut tells you to do and thats your nursing instinct and I felt like whats what the Nclex-RN is testing you on. Do you know what to do? Can you consider everything all at once and know what to do?

anyway I had a retched time waiting...it was around 50hrs before the BON listed me as an RN and you better believe for 50hrs where the WORST 50hrs in my life! I was done in 2 hrs and left and went to the library and a shopping area to relax and walk around but after 1 hr I felt sooo ill I had to go home and sleep and I did...I woke up and tried the PVT and got the CC page and cried for hours until I checked on here and saw they fixed the glitch for the PVT so if you try that and get the CC page just know the glitch is fixed! it aint accurate...at work everyone was asking, asking, asking and my clinicians and director said they checked the BON right after I left from night shift to go home and check thursday morning and they saw it up...they said they consjdered calling me but thought id be asleep and didnt want to wak me...I was like !!!!!! you should have called me! hahaha I got up at 230pm after being really unable to sleep and checked...and there it was.

anyway all Im saying is be patient, try to review as much as you can, do questions and practice those prioritization, delegation and infection control questions and think about prioritizes in care...low H&H vs. low WBC..whats going on there with those lab values that will vary how your patients are prioritized and cared for and similar things... btw I got no math, no ht spots, no peds, no maternity...I did get some cardiac stuff like a strip but it was written out...no strips shown.

OK all..peace out. Best of luck

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Specializes in Case mgmt., rehab, (CRRN), LTC & psych.

Congratulations to you for a job obviously well done! :)

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Congrats to you!!!

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CONGRATTS!!!!????..so how did you study? Am doing KAPLAN, NCSBN and also finished saunders..any tips?

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With those resources you will do great!!

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Jesuslover,

With those resources you will do great!!

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Ok, I'll admit that was WAY too much for me to read at this point in the day, but....

Congratulations :)

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Congrats!!

But you got NO peds? no maternity? no hotspots, no maths??? OMG, I wish my test was like yours!!! and I find it hard to believe how the people who pass at 75 questions are the ones crying about how they thought they failed....you couldnt really believe such a fallacy, considering you passed in only 75 questions. WHY do people exagerrate like this when they know they obviously passed?

Anyways, great Job and welcome to Nursing. I hope I will finally overcome this depressing examination one day..

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Congrats!!

....couldnt really believe such a fallacy, considering you passed in only 75 questions. WHY do people exagerrate like this when they know they obviously passed?

Y'know, I'll throw out there that I was one of those people who "obviously" aced the test, but I SWEAR to you I cried in my car on the way home. Totally shell-shocked walking across the parking lot. Called hubby, sobbing that I have NO CLUE how I did on that danged thing, it was too hard, I must have failed.

Really.

It was HE who gave me the "catch phrase" that I now use so VERY often on this forum: "considering what kind of student you were, how crazy you were about studying, how well you did during practice tests....what on earth do you think is the likelihood you bombed this thing?! Freaking slim."

They aren't exaggerating while they're panicking; statistics indicating they likely did pass doesn't help when all they can think of is "yes, but it's NOT 100% passing, so I MIGHT have failed...."

We all hate the NCLEX, but.....we do our best to soothe those caught in its claws still.

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Quick note on the kinds of questions you get. If the computer "thinks" you are weak in an area, below passing, it will keep throwing questions in that category of study until you either demonstrate you have it, it's all fine in that area, or....it recognizes you can't demonstrate competency in that area and shuts off.

Chances are excellent that the person who says they got no peds/math/etc questions actually got one, it was at a difficulty above passing standard, and it moved on. And much of the time people don't remember those questions because they didn't struggle with them, and moved on. A peds or maternity question can be broached in such a way that it's testing your knowledge but you're thinking of it from a different angle....math questions are often like that. Cloaked as something else, but still there.

But do poorly in that category, and it'll keep slamming those questions home!

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Y'know, I'll throw out there that I was one of those people who "obviously" aced the test, but I SWEAR to you I cried in my car on the way home. Totally shell-shocked walking across the parking lot. Called hubby, sobbing that I have NO CLUE how I did on that danged thing, it was too hard, I must have failed.

Really.

It was HE who gave me the "catch phrase" that I now use so VERY often on this forum: "considering what kind of student you were, how crazy you were about studying, how well you did during practice tests....what on earth do you think is the likelihood you bombed this thing?! Freaking slim."

They aren't exaggerating while they're panicking; statistics indicating they likely did pass doesn't help when all they can think of is "yes, but it's NOT 100% passing, so I MIGHT have failed...."

We all hate the NCLEX, but.....we do our best to soothe those caught in its claws still.

EXACTLY!

I don't know one nurse that leaves the testing convinced that they passed! At least you COULD drive home! I couldn't, had to call my husband to pick me up! I was so dead sure that I failed. I honestly could not think of one question that I KNEW I had gotten right! But, I passed!

A bit of history-the older nurses had to take the test on paper before CAT, and there was obviously no pvt. A friend's mother says that their "trick" was if the envelope that was snail mailed to them-6 or so weeks after the test-had an RN after their name or not. Hers did not, she was so depressed, she refused to open the envelope for days until her husband coerced her. And she passed! (that story is absolutely meaningless, I know-but perhaps a bit entertaining for those waiting for QR).

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Specializes in Cardiac.
Y'know, I'll throw out there that I was one of those people who "obviously" aced the test, but I SWEAR to you I cried in my car on the way home. Totally shell-shocked walking across the parking lot. Called hubby, sobbing that I have NO CLUE how I did on that danged thing, it was too hard, I must have failed.

Really.

It was HE who gave me the "catch phrase" that I now use so VERY often on this forum: "considering what kind of student you were, how crazy you were about studying, how well you did during practice tests....what on earth do you think is the likelihood you bombed this thing?! Freaking slim."

They aren't exaggerating while they're panicking; statistics indicating they likely did pass doesn't help when all they can think of is "yes, but it's NOT 100% passing, so I MIGHT have failed...."

We all hate the NCLEX, but.....we do our best to soothe those caught in its claws still.

LOOOL...indeed...actually people do fail at 75 and I was scared that I had...one never really knows until the scores are in and the BON posts your RN number. Sorry it was soooo long...LOL.

Also I really didnt feel like there was any maths,peds or maternity but hey, there may have been, I may just have not felt like there were...its all kinda a blurr...glad its over and 1,000 grateful and glad I never ever ever ever have to take it again!

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