Please tell me why you dreamed of being a nurse from a young age

[avhoney]

Hi everyone!

I love being a nurse! However, I am that nurse who did not dream of becoming a nurse as a child. Even when I worked in the nursing home (a job that I loved), I swore that I would never be a nurse!

It was not until I was older in college that I met a nurse that inspired me through her nursing philosophy of life that I knew that this was the career for me! She was absolutely right! Nursing has become my adult dream! :)

What I would like to know is your story or the reasons why you knew you wanted to be a nurse from a young age? I do not want to know that you wanted to do it for the money or that there were good adult benefits or anything like that. I hear this too often.

I also hear too often from people like me who found the calling later in life or while in school.

I am very curious to know how people knew from a young age their dreams. This is really fascinating to me.

I want to hear from people who are not like me.I want to hear the stories from the people who knew at a very young age that it was their goal to be a nurse. I am really interested in hearing your stories. Please share, my ears are open...

[CherryAmes_RN]

I didn't. I thought about it my senior year of high school, but was holding out on coming across something more... "Fun..." Yeah right. Became an aide @ 18, went to nursing school @ 22. 10 years in healthcare & can't see myself doing anything other than taking care of people. It's what I'm good at & it's a decent paycheck, provides benefits. Not fun, but I'm not complaining

[Calinurse4]

I knew since high school but I didn't become an RN until I was 33 years old. I went to medical assisting school right out of high school and did that for a few years before having kids. When my youngest was a year old, I decided to finally go back to school. I have been a natural-born caregiver my whole life; I used to take care of wounded animals, sick/hurt family members, etc. when I was a kid. I just enjoy taking care of others

[futurenurseOB]

Because mommy was a nurse, and as a young girl, I wanted to be just like my mommy. So I followed her path. CNA-LPN-RN. she says it's important to know and respect everyone on your team because at one point, you were everyone on your team....I love that quote.

Finally a nurse...All for my three♡♡♡

[SoldierNurse22, BSN, RN]

https://allnurses.com/general-articles-about/to-the-beginning-831130.html

[NurseDirtyBird]

When I was a little kid, I read medical books for fun. When I was older, my friends called me "Dr. Dirtybird," due to my knowledge of the human body and the weirdest diseases I could learn about. But it never occurred to me to pursue nursing. It wasn't until that limbo between high school and deciding what I was seriously going to do with the rest of my life, I accidentally came upon nursing program information. A lightbulb went off - Oh snap! I should be a nurse! That's perfect! Why didn't I ever think of that?

The only way I can explain it is I guess I didn't see nurses as "nurses" when I was a kid. They were always the nice people who gave me lollypops, hugs, and cartoon character bandaids. I didn't see them as health care providers. I saw them as nice grownups. I never made the connection between caring for health and caring for people when I was a kid.

[BrandonLPN, LPN]

When some of us were little kids.... well, let's just say it wasn't all that socially acceptable for little boys to dream of being a nurse when they grow up.

[CT Pixie, BSN, RN]

Like NurseDirtyBird, I would read things on the human body and medically related books for 'fun' even when in grammar school. I was always drawn to any television program that was even remotely related to medicine (Loved the tv program, Emergency!). I didn't play 'doctor' (haha), I played 'nurse'.

My best friend during grammar school and I would play 'hospital' all the time and had our dolls, stuffed animals etc lined up as if in wards. We had our supplies of band aids, bandages, 'shots' made out of pens, hospital gowns.

During high school, knowing there was no way my mom could pay for college, I sort of gave up on the dream of nursing school. Instead, of having classes focused on the sciences, I focused my classes on business because at that time, you could leave high school with a diploma and business classes and become a 'book keeper' etc. I ended up working as a bookkeepers assistant during high school in a nursing home, I then decided to apply for the medical secretary job, then became a CNA. All the while, knowing my heart was in nursing but knowing it wasn't obtainable due to finances. As a 38 yr old married mom of two, I finally said, enough. I went back to school and became an LPN, I just graduated in May and became licensed by my state as an RN in June. In October, my journey continues as I start my RN to BSN program.

While I never felt a 'calling' to nursing, but I sure as heck felt a strong pull into it :)

[SwansonRN]

Well if you read my college application essay it was inspired by my brother's battle with leukemia and my admiration for the pedi onc nurses that took care of him. However that's not actually 100% how it happened, it just won me a few essay contests. Although my bro was diagnosed right before I realized I wanted to be a nurse it actually had little to do with it. I was a sophomore in bio class and we were learning about the human body and I just got the brilliant idea by association . When I told my mom later that day she was soooo unbelievably proud and excited. I think the support and admiration from my mom played a huge role during the whole process.

[DoeRN]

It's funny because my family is full of nurses. I actually wanted to be a doctor and would spend time at my uncles practice as a kid. I wanted to be just like him. I went to a party school and I partied too much. Came home and decided to go back to school because I was paying student loans and didn't have a degree. It was a choice between nursing and IT and I picked nursing because I found out several of the hospitals had student loan repayment for nurses. So I became a nurse and now I'm going back for IT lol.

So no it wasn't a calling. And even though I have a ton of nurses in my family I never knew what a nurse did until I actually sat down with my school advisor and realize I could finish in a year. I already had all the pre-reqs done because I was premed before. So I got an associates degree and started working as a nurse.

I agree with the poster that said the people where nursing is a calling must have been exposed to a nurse at an early age.

Sent from my iPhone using allnurses.com

[kaydensmom01]

I never had any idea what I wanted to do with my life. When I was 17 I took a job as an aide at an MRDD facility for two years and as a result I said that I never wanted to work in healthcare again. I had my son when I was twenty and was waitressing when I decided that I wanted to go to college. The only two options that I was semi-interested in was nursing and teaching because we are fairly limited in our options in this area with majors. I chose nursing because of the better hours and pay. I had absolutely no idea what a nurse actually did.

I excelled at the science co-req's and was admitted to the nursing program after only one semester. I did not like nursing school, and felt that I had made the wrong choice. I did well in classes and graduated valedictorian but I was also so anxious in clinicals that I absolutely hated it. I always felt as if I didn't know what I was doing, regardless of how much I prepared. I didn't let myself realize that I was still learning and that I had never been exposed to the things that we were doing before. At my preceptorship everything fell into place and came together, and that is when I fell in love with nursing and realized that I made the perfect choice in a career.

[Guttercat, ASN, RN]

I didn't want to be a nurse from a young age. I just loved science and physiology.

If I had it to do all over again, I wouldn't be a nurse. I love medicine, and the patients are the reason I've kept going. I don't necessarily regret my choice, but I don't love "being a nurse." I'd prefer a different role within medicine.

[tokmom, BSN, RN]

I have always enjoyed medicine as child. I was the one glued to MD T.V. shows and Emergency! lol. I always wanted to be a paramedic but I can't due to motion sickness. A nurse was an after thought for me. I knew I wanted to help others. I didn't realize my path until high school, when I enrolled in a CNA class. Soon after, I found job in a LTC with a nurse that was also a nun. Her strength, wisdom and caring fascinated me. I wanted to be just like her. :)