What I learned my first year as a nurse. (Things they don't teach in nursing school.)

[3sodapop]

Being a nurse isn't about grades. It's about being who we are. NO book can teach you how to cry with a patient, NO class can teach you how to tell a family that their parents have died or are dying. NO professor can teach you how to find dignity in giving someone a bed bath. A nurse is NOT about the pills, the IV's and the charting. It's about being able to LOVE people when they are at their WEAKEST moments and being able to forgive them for ALL their wrongs and make a difference in their lives today. No one can make you a nurse... YOU JUST ARE

I got this quote from facebook, and I just had to post it here. I've been working in a nursing home and it's so true.

[Mexarican]

Actually, I found many Instructors who showed me dignity in giving a bed bath by helping me and showing me through example. And being a nurse isn't about grades, but being a nursing student is.

And nurses who aren't about IVs Pills and charting aren't very good nurses. A nurse is about all of that and more. Ivs Pills and charting are very important to everyone!

Oh, and in my Palliative Care class, I've been able to discuss and explore many of my experiences related to death and dying of my patients, which most certainly HAS taught me to be a better nurse than I was previously when it comes to the death of my patients.

Sorry to be a downer, but that paragraph posted in another one of those "angels of Mercy" things, where we downplay educuation and training, and focus on something else.

We can give a wonderful, diginified bed bath, cry with our patients, chart the whole thing, and still be smart, intellegent and a incredible advocate for them all. We can and should do it all, instead of focusing on the whole "Nurses are angles" thing.

wow...whata buzz kill...LOL

Mex

[cardiacRN2006, ADN, RN]

Get over it.

[amjowens]

I do think that skills/knowledge are so important in nursing. It's important that our profession broaden beyond the angel of mercy image alone. I think we're doing pretty well, but a long way to go.

I had quite a learning experience with a preceptor...the kind that we learn how not to be. She was totally there for a paycheck, and unabashedly didn't like being a nurse or even the patients. At the time, I was really hurt by her-to see that "this is nursing?"...well, I've learned otherwise. Still, that experience etched in stone for me the absolute need for humanity in nursing. The basic caring principles should be requirements just as the ability to accurately administer meds, etc.

[carolinapooh, BSN, RN]

Get over it.

Ouch.