gaRdeNer77

Thanks for the encouragement.

I graduated nursing school in 2011 with honors and did everything that I possibly knew to make my resume stand out. In Colorado, we heard it was difficult to get a job. I arrogantly thought I was immune. Long story short, it took 8 months to land my first job as a RN. I applied everywhere (except prison nursing). You name it. Nothing but rejection after rejection. It was hard. Then I decided to apply for every CNA position in all the hospitals up to 30 miles away (foot in the door approach). I was rejected because I was overqualified. I applied to over 150 jobs (mostly RN) and did not have a single interview. Man oh man. Just when I was ready to volunteer my nursing abilities for free to gain some experience, I got a job working as a CNA (different title, but basically a RN working as a CNA) in a hospital. I worked on this tele floor for 3 months as a CNA. Finally, I could apply to RN positions at this hospital and they looked at my resume! It was a great feeling. I ended up getting a nursing position on a surgical spine floor. It was a 12 bed unit with 2 nurses on - providing total care. Coming from a 25 bed unit where we had staff everywhere, this seemed a little scary to me to have ONE person to ask for help. Still, it was the only job I could find. (Trust me, I would have worked in that nursing home had anyone offered me the job.) I was hired and unfortunately, made it only 5 months. The manager that hired me stepped down after a few weeks and I was trying to coordinate my "orientation and training" with the director of the floor and fill-in managers (4 total) while on nightshift. She assured me that I would be properly trained. I ended up orienting with 5 different people on both day and night shifts. I received a packet of information about the spine in a notebook with a 2 page quiz that I was instructed to take after reading through the information...this was my surgical orientation. And I was only given 6 weeks on the floor before being on my own. I wouldn't complain much except that the people that were hired after me who had been nurses for years also received 6 weeks on the floor training so I thought I deserved a little longer. I asked for 2 more weeks and they were okay with it, except our census was very low and I had 2 weeks of having 1-2 patients so it wasn't much of a time-balancing learning experience like I had hoped. This is not the most ideal scenario of course but none of these were the reasons why I had to leave. We were extremely short staffed. Then all but 1 other person on the night shift got very sick and couldn't come in for months. I had been off orientation for 3 weeks and each shift, they were floating someone new in to work with me. I was looked at as the "expert" on the spine and made charge nurse every shift. Once they floated down another new grad from my old tele floor. I called the house supervisor and informed her that 2 new grads were running an entire floor...and neither of us had ever used the crash cart. I constantly felt unsafe in my job. It was a great hospital and probably a wonderful floor had I been a nurse with experience but the timing of the management changes, the lack of real orientation and consistency, and the illnesses that took out the staff made it too much. I was getting severely depressed and had anxiety like never before. So I left. And that was last June. And I have been praying and trying to decide what to do next. I am not sure that nursing is for me..but I am hoping that this type of nursing is just not for me, at least right now. I have been looking at jobs again but with only 5 months experience and a strong distrust for managers who say they will train me, I wonder how I will ever get back into the profession again. Has this experience been similar to yours? Any ideas of what to do next? I would love to work with pediatrics and a clinic sounds much less intimidating but I don't even know how to apply for those. I desire experience but I am weary of taking a job that I think I would hate just to get it. Most of all, I am scared of the same thing happening to me all over again. I think I just need someone to tell me that it will be okay. And not to judge me like many of my fellow peers have. Thanks for reading.