Thinking about Nursing

chicagrl72 · Jul 21, 2005

Help! I am a third year child psychology major, but I have a feeling that this would be the wrong choice. I have been researching becoming a pediatric nurse, but I am worried. In highschool I never took bio, and I am scared to start taking classes and make a change. I already have E.C.E units (early childhood) and psychology units under my belt, but it dosnt feel right. Nursing sounds like it might be the right choice. I have a love for children, and for taking care of people. How many years did it take for you to get your degree? How hard was nursing classes? I have to work 40 hours a week in order to pay my bills, but I have been able to do that so far. Do you ever get used to giving shots? PLEASE HELP! I am full of questions and scared.

well i believe the time to do it is now ...a lot of us on this board are older and have done other stuff and are now coming back to do nursing

perhaps though we are at the point to suck it up and do it b/c we decided on a goal and are gonna stick to it ! when i was younger i was so indecisive

having a baby (going through childbirth and all that it encompasses) solidified(word????) my choice to become a nurse

i suggest volunteering b4 u do anything major as far as changing your major etc

i used to think i could not handle blood etc but once you make your mind up to do it

it is much easier

what jobs are you hopoing to get with a psych degree - from what i know you will have to keep educating yourself to get a job

what about teaching ? there is a big need for teachers and that seems right up you alley !

good luck

tridil2000, MSN, RN · Jul 21, 2005

Help! I am a third year child psychology major, but I have a feeling that this would be the wrong choice. I have been researching becoming a pediatric nurse, but I am worried. In highschool I never took bio, and I am scared to start taking classes and make a change. I already have E.C.E units (early childhood) and psychology units under my belt, but it dosnt feel right. Nursing sounds like it might be the right choice. I have a love for children, and for taking care of people. How many years did it take for you to get your degree? How hard was nursing classes? I have to work 40 hours a week in order to pay my bills, but I have been able to do that so far. Do you ever get used to giving shots? PLEASE HELP! I am full of questions and scared.

i wish you the best and i hope you do seriously consider nursing!

the only thing i can warn you about with peds is that it is kind of hard doing ivs on little babies. they're small enough that they don't know what's going on, but getting an iv on a baby is truly a skill.

then there's the kids under about 7. they're a little bit easier to get, but sometimes you have to hold them down, and that's tough in itself.

god bless peds nurses who do this all the time. i'd need therapy myself!

jelly · Jul 21, 2005

Help! I am a third year child psychology major, but I have a feeling that this would be the wrong choice. I have been researching becoming a pediatric nurse, but I am worried. In highschool I never took bio, and I am scared to start taking classes and make a change. I already have E.C.E units (early childhood) and psychology units under my belt, but it dosnt feel right. Nursing sounds like it might be the right choice. I have a love for children, and for taking care of people. How many years did it take for you to get your degree? How hard was nursing classes? I have to work 40 hours a week in order to pay my bills, but I have been able to do that so far. Do you ever get used to giving shots? PLEASE HELP! I am full of questions and scared.

Maybe you should look at school's nursing programs online that you might be interested in going to, and see what pre-req's are required and how many more you would need, and then talk to a counselor. That might help you figure out how long it might take. From my experience and those around me, the science courses like Anat/Phys, Chem and Microbiology take SOOOOOOOO much studying. I worked full time throughout my education also (and I'm not done yet) So far I've been going to some degree or another for 8 years (had to take some time off when I was in the Army and for the past year). There weren't many other students who worked as much as me, and I know I had to work harder. I took the advice of the students before me and didn't pair Anat/Phys 1 or 2 with Micro or Chem. So I would take, like Anat/Phys 1 and Human Development. Due to working full time, I'd spend like every available minute on the Anat/Phys. A full load of science classes with a full time job will be unbelievable hard. Well, my little plan all changed once I got to the nursing program. You usually can't choose class times or clinical times and it's a full job in itself. My program actually told us "you can't work!" Well, ok, pay my bills then? Nothing stops me. Anyway, I was lucky that I had a night job, but still unbelievably hard. I worked from 10:45 pm to 7:15 am then went straight to class and pretty much just sat there cause I had to, but wasn't really "there". Then I'd get a few hours sleep before work again. Sometimes when there would be long clinicals, I'd work, go to clinicals for 12 hrs then go back to work again, and I passed out once. I was sick a lot. I ended up not being able to finish. But I was actually lucky cause I worked at night and could study at work. I don't know how anyone could do it otherwise. Now I'm in the situation where I have just a year left to finish my RN (I'm an LVN now), but I can't get back cause I work a regular day. I was an outsider with my class too because they would all study and chat on breaks and I was like the weird zombee with my head down on break and I was a little bitchy too from lack of sleep lol. Anyway, I don't want to detour you or anything, cause I'm still doing it, but just to let you know, it's one of the hardest degress to do if you work full time. But, then again, I'm sure you have hard classes and clinicals with your present major. And btw, giving shots isn't the hardes part to get over, it's the really stinky stuff!

Kelly

jelly · Jul 21, 2005

Help! I am a third year child psychology major, but I have a feeling that this would be the wrong choice. I have been researching becoming a pediatric nurse, but I am worried. In highschool I never took bio, and I am scared to start taking classes and make a change. I already have E.C.E units (early childhood) and psychology units under my belt, but it dosnt feel right. Nursing sounds like it might be the right choice. I have a love for children, and for taking care of people. How many years did it take for you to get your degree? How hard was nursing classes? I have to work 40 hours a week in order to pay my bills, but I have been able to do that so far. Do you ever get used to giving shots? PLEASE HELP! I am full of questions and scared.

Another quick thought for you. If you aren't completely sure Nursing will be for you and you've already spent 3 years in school, maybe you should just do the LVN first and make sure you like it before you spend so much more time in school. If you don't want to do that, you can do you Associate RN first and make sure it's what you want before you spend that extra couple of years taking different chemistries and stuff like that! I was in the Associate degree program and we had to have algebra, english, phsychology, then Anat/Phys 1 & 2, Micro, bio 101, Human Development and that was pretty much about it. Then two more years of nursing courses or one more year for LVN. Then, if you like it you can go back and get the BSN. I have been working on my BSN pre-reqs all along even though I haven't gone to a 4 year college yet. But I have taken all those "other" classes that I don't really need for the 2 year degree. But let me give you one piece of advice while I'm blabbing. Since I work, I thought online courses were a blessing. Well, Chem 101 and other so-so courses were fine, but taking Chem 111 online, totally self-taught, along with some other courses as well about killed me. That is hands down the hardest class so far. I think I passed out of the kindness of the instructor's heart. I'd take the hard sciences in real life if you can :)