Tired of friends telling me I can do better than nursing

FutureNurse2005 · Jul 6, 2004

I havent had anyone say anything negative to me about it....everyone is very positive about me going into nursing!

I'm so sorry that you dont have that support and encouragement! Do what you want and let them get over it! Nursing is one of the best professions out there, and I for one am proud to be working so hard to enter this field.

Good luck!

RN4NICU, LPN, LVN · Jul 6, 2004

I think it's terrible for someone to say that nursing isn't a respectable job, but I think it's also terrible to downgrade any job, no matter how little or how much someone else makes. People who work at fast food places, supermarkets, and at wal-mart, etc. deserved to be respected also. I don't work at any of these places, but I think it's wrong to look down on anyone's job, no matter what it is. Nursing isn't any better or any worse than any other job in my opinion.

I was referencing college peers who look down on the major of another because it is their (uninformed) idea that nurses do nothing more than wipe other peoples butts, yet all the education in the world to the contrary will not budge them from it.

I pointed out that for their uppity-ness, they may be rewarded with a lesser-paying, less "professional" (according to their own definition) job than the one THEY were disrespecting. My comment was not to look down on anyone's job, but was made out of disgust for individuals who choose to put down people who choose nursing as a career as being less professional or less worthy or less desirable than themselves. Those individuals often find themselves with a degree and no "professional" job. Especially in the present job market.

lab2004 · Jul 7, 2004

I just don't get it. I've gone through 2 years of prereqs and was accepted into my school's BSN program. (I start this fall.) For some reason, everyone keeps questioning me on why I want to be a nurse and telling me that I should find a job that's "more respectable." Has anyone else been through the same thing? Sorry, just needed to vent.

I'm working on prereqs for ADN and I have gotten a lot of negative comments from people. Why?

emme2004 · Jul 29, 2004

I just don't get it. I've gone through 2 years of prereqs and was accepted into my school's BSN program. (I start this fall.) For some reason, everyone keeps questioning me on why I want to be a nurse and telling me that I should find a job that's "more respectable." Has anyone else been through the same thing? Sorry, just needed to vent.

Nursing IS a respectible career and takes a lot of hard work and commitment. I am sorry they don't see it that way.

janetrette · Jul 29, 2004

in my view personally i think nurses are the angels! doctors order but who really takes care of the patient?

also im in an ADA program and a lot of my friends look down at me because they are in their BSN majoring business. i guess the whole 2 yr and 4 yr makes a different to them! im planning to get my BSN once i graduated however hearing from my friend saying ADA are a lot easier just piss me off. she's comparing with the ADA program accounting program that she got in because she got kicked out from her BSN program for having a gpa lower than a 2.0!

yup.

no one need people that bring them down! vbmenu_register("postmenu_822386", true);

danu3 · Jul 29, 2004

It is interesting to see some people have negative comments from friends and some people have positive comments.

In my case, I guess I am one of the fortunate ones as I did not have negative comments from my friends (so far). I have a few who subtlely suggest I should consider medicine. One just thought it is a dangerous job because I am going to catch some disease and die.

But all of them meant good in their hearts as far as I can tell. What I find effective with my friends is that the opportunity to educate them when they are surprised. I will tell them modern nursing is so different than nursing way back when. They I proceed to give them some interesting examples like the following:

Nursing Informatics
Nursing Attornies
Psychiatric Nursing where in some state you are allow to prescribe meds. I'll show them the UCSF Psych Nursing program and show them that someone with that kind of training can be a person's primary health care provider especially if the person has a serious mental illness.
Flight Nursing - I always tell them I don't have a stomach for this specialty because I don't like to be in a helicopter without a parachute.
Travel Nursing
You can get a Ph.D. in nursing.
I don't have a MD as my primary health provider, I have a NP, not only that, a male NP as my health provider
I'll show them something that is overly simplistic but it makes a point, namely we have MD who specialize at the biological level (exception might be psychiatrist), we have psychologist who specialize at the psychological level, social worker who specialize at the social level, and chaplin who specialize at the spiritual level. Nurses are the only health profession (as far as I know) who has training in a 4 of these level as we look at the whole person. Again this is oversimplifiying things a bit, but it makes a point.
I encourage them to go to the discovernursing.com web site by Johnson and Johnson and scan some of the nursing profiles (there are over a hundred of them).
Mention a number of nurses have MBAs
Mention the flexibility in nursing in terms of career moves

Well, you get the idea. My friends learn pretty fast if they say anything negative that is not true, they are in great risk of getting me trying to recruite them into nursing. :)

-Dan

FutureIsBlue, LPN, LVN · Jul 29, 2004

To the people who are being negative about nursing:

They're just jealous!

Suckers!

Okay, I feel calm after venting.

Sheri257 · Jul 29, 2004

According to Reader's Digest nurses are the MOST respected of all professionals. The poll was conducted on what profession people give the most respect to. Nursing was #1. Nurses may not get the respect they deserve on the job, but people respect the nursing profession. Your friends are talking from ignorance.

Exactly. The annual Gallup poll found the same thing.

(Oops. I didn't realize that Hellllllo Nurse had posted the same thing. Sorry.)

:coollook:

AmyLiz · Jul 29, 2004

Yeah, like someone else said, maybe it stems from where you live. I'm in the midwest and whenever I tell people that I will be going to nursing school in the fall I always get "Girl, so you're going to making money huh?" "You will ALWAYS have a job!" "I have my degree in 'blank' (teaching, computers, political science, etc.) and I CANNOT find a job, EVERYWHERE I look people are asking for nurses. You've got it made!"
When you're a nurse and your friends look at your paychecks and the bunch of money you may make working nights and weekends, check their reactions then.... you may be surprised

Same here. When people find out I'm going to be a nurse, they say the same things.

danaRN2b · Jul 29, 2004

When I first started my nursing school application process, I heard several remarks like "Why not just be a doctor?" "We're proud of you, but you're so smart, you don't have to settle with being a nurse...", stuff like that. It kind of took the wind out of my sails a little, because I was really proud of the decision I had made. What is the saddest thing, is that I started to think maybe they were right...maybe nursing wasn't a "good enough" profession to go into. Of course, I've got my head on straight now, and know that nursing school is what I should be doing--I need to be in a position where I have one on one contact with patients. I could go into other aspects of the medical field, but I don't know if I would be able to have the type of relationship with patients that I'm seeking.

Don't let people get you down...nursing is such a noble field & we should be extremely proud of what we're doing!!

DZcarrie · Jul 29, 2004

My friends say the same. But I don't think they mean to offend me by saying "more respectable". They know that being a nurse is respectable. They really mean "respected".
well said :)