Newtons

So I haven't even hit my year mark and i was told, not even by my manager, but another nurse, that i will be precepting a new grad, i go to check my email and lo and behold my manager sent me a email a few days ago saying i've been "selected" to precept. Thanks for asking me btw. I have wanted to eventually precept a new hire but only when i got to the point where i feel confident in my own abilities. I've been an nurse about 11 months now (including the months i was being precepted) and I still ask lots of questions and need sometimes help with my own patients. There's quite a bit of turnover on my floor. A lot....most except a couple...of the nightshift staff are all new nurses with less than 2 years of experience, everyone more senior than me will be precepting, hence why I am gonna teach a new nurse too. With that out of the way, are there any tips or tricks or advice i can get in order to be a decent preceptor? Like i mentioned earlier, I still ask a lot of questions myself, i feel like this gonna end up as a let's learn together moment most of the time, which may not totally be bad, but i'd like to at least instill some confidence in her that she'll have someone who kinda knows what they're doing showing her the ropes. I know if i was in her situation, i'd be a little bummed and frustrated that the nurse i was supposed to learn from doesn't have any real experience. I just want to give my preceptee the most that i can and try to make sure she's gets something good out of my sh*tty teaching. ?

I've just graduated from nursing school, and I'm very unsure of where to work. A part of me wants to work on a med/surg floor and get my "basic nursing skills" foundation, and another part of me (a huge part btw) is telling me to skip the hospital and work in some type of outpatient setting. While I do really kinda want that basic foundation of nursing, I'm really scared that I won't be able to handle working in a hospital. My senior practicum in school was in a good setting, I had an instructor who worked in the float pool and as such I got to experience a few different floors. HOWEVER, I hate to admit that even by my last day, I honestly wasn't that much better than how I was at the beginning. I'm an extremely awkward, shy, and introverted person, so hearing me talk to patients is a cringe-worthy experience. And I don't know if it was because of the system of the hospital in place for capstone students, or if I'm just trying to find something to blame other than my own incompetency; but I literally had no idea when patients had diagnostics tests to be done or labs to be drawn, I had no idea what orders were put in, or what to do with orders, I talked to a physician twice in the time I was there and both times I looked like a complete idiot because I had no idea what the hell I was doing. In my defense, as a student I couldn't access or even see the orders put in, I also didn't have an iPhone the staff in the hospital used to communicate with each other and other departments. But even with that I feel like I should have had some more understanding of everything going on with the patient, my nurse did tell me what was going on with the patients. Giving report at the end of the shift is when I realized how bad I actually am at nursing, which was a bit of a shock to me, as someone who was a low A student during school, I thought I should have been in a better position to be able to practice nursing, and I'm not. Grades very obviously don't correlate to physical nursing performance, as evidenced by my peers who were on the brink of failing but flourished during their capstones. Giving report I basically just read off a handoff report that was required for each patient, and I couldn't put together what happened that day with the patient and understand it and tell the next shift what was going on or what to expect. So now I'm stuck, I don't want nor can I afford a really low paying clinic job, but I'm scared I'll be having anxiety attacks if I try to work at a hospital and even worse I won't be able to practice as a safe and competent nurse. What's even more annoying is that there are no nurse residency programs open at the hospitals I'm wanting to apply to, which I don't even know is a blessing or curse, at least I wouldn't be stuck in some commitment. I also went to nursing school out of state, now that I'm back in Washington state I have no idea of how the work culture is in certain hospitals, nor do I have friends I can ask, and online research is turning out to be very biased. Someone just help me, where should I apply for my first job? should I just apply to hospitals and pray I don't end up killing myself or ruining my career, or can I start in an outpatient setting and work my way up to a hospital, even though all the advice I've ever been given tells you to work med/surg in a hospital first.

I'm about to graduate nursing school in just a few weeks. I'm in my senior practicum and i honestly hate it. Like despise it. I've done pretty decent in school, i'm a low A student, i've basically made it through. But i've been dealing with these thoughts for a while, and i really don't like nursing. Before this quarter i had a revelation that i REALLY didn't want to be a nurse. I've spent 3 years trying to get into nursing school and here i am literally almost finished and i'm crying because i have a shift tomorrow at my capstone placement and i am trying so hard to force myself to even go. It's not like it's even terrible, my preceptor seems like she's nice, other nurses have been friendly enough. But I feel like an idiot, i'm barely able to draw up meds, my hands shake, i'm super awkward i can't really talk to patients, i don't know anything. And i'm freaking out cuz i've just put myself in massive debt to get a degree that i will hate. I have 12 more 12hr shifts/days i need to complete and i'm scared i'm going to end up quitting. my preceptor was talking about a previous student she had that was so lazy and couldn't do anything, and i'm terrified that i'll be the most recent version of that. I've never felt this way during my other clinicals, sure there were times i didn't want to go, but it was never because i hated nursing. I don't know why i hate this capstone clinical so much. I'm thinking it may be because i'm alone here, there's no other students and friends with me. I don't know what to do with myself, i'm a really awkward and introverted person, and i hate talking on the phone which you do a lot as a nurse. Everyone else is so confident and knows what to do, and i'm that idiot nursing student who can't draw up meds correctly. So what do i do? i'm so sorry for my rambling, but i need some sort of advice from anyone. I definitely will finish nursing school, but how can i make my capstone more enjoyable? How do i make myself more comfortable in the role of a nurse? What type of job should i apply for after school is over?