I watched that video in orientation thinking, "these people are crazy. I'm a ray of sunshine and hope! I am a positive person! I believe in myself and I am ready to learn and BE AWESOME!!!! I LOVE THIS PLACE!!!!!!"
But here I am. Three days shy of a month in on my first job. And there is a bit of dread in my heart. I'm not sure how it got there. It snuck up on me rather insidiously. A couple of weeks ago, I was walking toward my car and I passed some respiratory students. I beamed at them happily and said, "Hello!" As I walked away, I heard one of them say, "Wow that was a happy person!" She was right. There was joy in knowing I could wake up to the hospital, my new home.
What happened? Is it that the high of graduation has settled, and the reality of going back to grown-up world has come back? Is it that I feel so completely incompetent?
I know what you students are thinking while you read this. "I'm going to be on top of the world! I'll never feel that way!" But mark my words - there is this strange feeling that sinks in where you realize that school didn't prepare you for this, and that you really aren't good at it no matter how hard you tried to be, and you have so, so much to learn.
I read that so many times here, and I believed it. I think I held that giant beaming smile on my face because honest to god, I went in prepared for how hard it was supposed to be. Even then, it overwhelms me knowing how much I need to know, but just don't yet. I wish I could take home the charting system to practice. I wish I could take home the omnicell to practice. I wish I could take home the policies and procedures link on the intranet to memorize. But then again..... surrounding myself by the ongoings of my children on days off has kept me sane.
Four days off.
Four.
Why do I feel like I'm always at the hospital? I'm home more days than I am there.
You know what is a little bit more frustrating? I'm a bit of a junkie for the critical care unit I am on. I absolutely love it. And yet.... I have buyer's remorse. I think to myself, "there is no way I'll get good enough for this... Maybe if I chose (med/surg/OB/peds/ortho) instead it would be easier......" Realistically, I know that's not true. I mean, probably not true. I usually STRIVE for a challenge and feel let down when I miss opportunities. I know I'd be frustrated if I were anywhere but where I am. But I'm frustrated, too, because I am where I am.
Being on orientation, I am frequently pulled for other experiences. In 4 weeks, I've had two days with my own patients. I've loved my experiences, of course, but I'm feeling the weight of, "I should be making progress by now, but I'm not getting the opportunities to." I'm not meeting goals. I've gained a lot of experiences, but I haven't met goals. Is trading one for the other good? How does that work exactly?
I have the blues. I'm very much a fighter. I'll keep moving and striving to be awesome. I know it's a long haul before I will feel like I'm awesome. I've waited through nursing school, I can wait longer.
But.... man.
You graduate nursing school, and you think to yourself, "I reached the goal! I'm there!!!!"
And then you pass the NCLEX, and you think, "No more studying these giant ugly books!!!"
And after that, at work you get your first name badge with the words "registered nurse" on it.
And you think, "I made it. I am here. I have arrived."
You save your energy up for that finish line. And then you reach it. And you feel you're on top of the world. No one thinks about what happens next, emotionally speaking. You walk into your first job, and find out that because you were so high on that mountain on top of the world that it is that much further to fall down when you have really hard days.
And you look up to where you were, up there on that mountain, and you remember...
"I wasn't supposed to fall."
