Should I even be considering nursing? (Asperger's)

[RustyS]

Hi everyone. I was wondering if y'all would be willing to give me some advice.

I'm looking at a career in nursing; my ideal job would be doing ambulatory surgery. I think I'd be good there because I'm capable of great focus, have a high tolerance for blood, guts, etc., and have good fine-motor skills (if I get to be a First Assist). I've always tried to anticipate what my coworkers might need and be a "team player," and am actually pretty eager-to-please.

However, I wonder if I can get to that point. While I'm quite good at school stuff (96 TEAS, 4.0 in all nursing prerequisites), I have Asperger's. For me, it means I have trouble reading and relating to people. I've functioned in customer service jobs in the past, and "faking it" helps maintain what social skills I have, but I was happier when I worked with plants, animals, and water systems. The thing is, I'm nearly 30 and have no savings because those jobs don't pay well enough for me to save a decent amount. Thus turning to nursing, which (a) I'm good at the schooling for, (b) pays sufficient that I can save up to take care of my parents in old age [unlike previous jobs], © cannot be outsourced abroad [unlike engineering, which was something else I considered], and (d) the education for which won't put me into debt.

OTOH, I started a job as a CNA on days at in long-term care yesterday, and it's possibly an alternative form of hell for me. People say, "Just treat residents as you'd want to be treated," but I know that's an inaccurate assumption and I try to treat people like my mom would want to be treated. Yet I still can't relate to the residents, I have no idea how to encourage the uncooperative ones to be more cooperative, and I don't know how to pull away without being rude when they want to tell me their life story or rant about other staff, even if I'm behind in my work. I want their lives to be better because everyone deserves that, but TBH, I'm not sure I care about them as individuals the way I should.

I think I'd do better in the more task-oriented OR, but don't know if I can get there without other nursing or nursing-adjacent experience, and the program I was accepted to is only an ADN, not a BSN, which would make it that much more difficult. (I was planning on RN to BSN after I began working.)

Should I even be considering nursing? If not, do you have alternative ideas?

[HouTx, BSN, MSN, EdD]

Kudos to you for your level of self awareness. It's often very difficult to recognize ones own shortcomings.

Have you looked into Surgical Technology? This is a very focused role that does not have a high level of patient interaction. They work in the OR environment, directly assisting surgeons. The educational preparation is not too lengthy. Take a look and see what you think.

[llg, PhD, RN]

I don't know what to advise you ... but I can tell you this: "A lot of us fake it a lot of the time." Don't feel guilty about faking it some times. But if you "never really feel it," then maybe you should find a career path that would be better-suited to your strengths.

[Morjayne4]

As a recent graduate of an accelerated program, I can clearly remember my first clinical instructor (who is an acute care np) telling my clinical mates and me that some of the best surgeons she knows have Asperger's. I think you're looking into a career (as an OR nurse) that could be right up your alley honestly. I'm not exactly a people person so I understand the "faking it" aspect at times but I know I have to in order to get where I want in my career which is in an OR-related field. This may not be advice but wanted to give you some encouragement nevertheless.

[ProperlySeasoned]

As a former OR RN, you sound like a wonderful fit. Very little patient interaction, and lots of technical, linear thinking. Everything is in its place, and there is a nice routine to it. It can feel a little robotic at times, but there is also great satisfaction in a smooth case and a job well done. Another area that might be a good fit for your is nursing informatics.

As others have noted, I applaud you for your self awareness.

[Nurse Beth, MSN]

If you decide to go to nursing school, watch the students around you to learn how they respond to patients and each other. You may not have the feelings, but you can mimic the actions. It will take a lot of energy on your part, but eventually you can find your niche- low social interaction, high skills. Best wishes!

P.S. I'm kind of rooting for you to stay in nursing :)

[Buyer beware, BSN]

OP: Have to say I like the "y'all" part.

Many of the previous posters have suggested to find areas in any field that you can focus on and then become an absolute expert in that field.

A very,very close relative of mine has Aspergers and is a Ivy League graduate who tends to fixate on particular, some would say narrow, areas of interest. But his knowledge base is encyclopedic in the things that interest him. In other words, he is the go-to expert for those of us that couldn't be bothered to understand the nuts and bolts of how things work or in many cases the complex issues in life itself.

I suspect that people from Freud to Einstein and many others may have had or have varying degrees of what I will call the Asperger effect.

So find the things in life that interest you, use your laser-like ability to understand things and, yes, work on your social skills. But for now, until you get better at social interaction, if there's no harm done, I think it's OK to "fake it till you make it" as one LPN once advised me to do.

I think you've got a lot of people here who are really bucking for you. And if I may be so bold to say, they do seem to represent the true heart of this gathering of sisters of love and mercy. Good luck in all things.

[TuesdaysChild]

Not to detract you from nursing (although you did say CNA seems like an alternative hell for you and you mentioned engineering), engineering is a great job and always in high demand, at least many areas of the country. I'd say half my friends (one of whom also has Asperger's) are engineers and not only do they make more $$ than any regular nursing position I've ever heard of, but they generally have the same personality aspects that you describe, being they're more focused on their interests than the social world around them.

Would your parents be willing to relocate someday? Plenty of jobs for engineers in Dallas! If you look away for too long, you'll trip over one while you're walking down the street. We have Texas Instruments and Raytheon, which are both enormous and attract engineers like flies. There's also countless smaller facilities that do a lot of B2B consulting.

An OR nurse can certainly say better than I can, but I think you have to go through scrub and circulating positions as well as extra training before you can take on an RN surgical first position, and those could potentially require more patient interaction than you would like, at least according to my research when I was looking into RNFA.

[whichone'spink, BSN, RN]

Don't go into nursing. Even neurotypical people should stay out. It's one of the worst jobs to have if you have trouble with social interactions. And what's worse is you will probably end up with a lot of complaints against you from patients and coworkers because no matter how much effort you put in to acting neurotypical, it doesn't work. Trust me, I know.