What was your inspiration to become a nurse?

[joshindfw]

My inspiration to pursue nursing is my father. He was involved in a debilitating auto accident. I hate to see him in pain. He is always on pain medication and is always in pain. He told me certain nurses that took care of him were good as gold and made him feel better than the doctors did, but some nurses were bad to him. I want to be able to make a positive difference in someones life. Either if they survive or pass on, but if I can make someones last minutes valuable to them, that is worth more than anything that money can buy.

[BigBee48]

I always wanted to be a nurse, then my brother was in a horrible car accident, I was standing at his bedside, he had a cut above his eyebrow, with brainmatter coming out. I knew then I had to be there for other people as they or their family needed someone to care for them.

[sissiesmama, ASN, RN]

When I was about 10 or 11 yrs old, I happed to find some old books about Clara Barton and others. Those really started me thinking about the field. I found them at my aunt's house, and we talked about them. Turns out, she had been an LPN yrs ago but didn't work very long due to health issues. I don't know how I never realized she had been, but she got me really interested in the field.

By the time I was in HS, my grandmother - my aunt's mom) had a CVA and I saw her in the hospital a lot. The nurses were just wonderful, and it fostered my interest. When I graduated HS, she passed away. I knew that was my calling and have never even thought of doing anything else since.

I try to treat each patient the way the nurses took such great care of my grandmother. I just hope I have lived up to the nurses that took care of my grandmother.

Anne, RNC

[star77, MSN, RN]

I was actually standing with various med school acceptances in my hand, and I read them over, and I thought about residency.

And I just decided I didn't want to be abused like that.

I love patient care, and I love the fact that nursing comes from a place of understanding all aspects of the patient, not just a disease.

Nursing is a fusion of science, psychology, anthropology, sociology, and raw love at the end of the day. There is nothing that makes me feel more fulfilled nor lets me give more of myself that I've found in this world.

Rock on.

[bluemushroom]

I'm only a student (I'll be starting nursing school in August), but a few things have inspired me to want to become a nurse.

1. My dad and my stepdad died of cancer when I was a teenager. My dad's health deteriorated quickly and he died in a short period of time, but my stepdad was constantly going to the hospital. While he was in the hospital, there were many wonderful nurses that took care of him, but there was also a few who were just horrible. They would actually get really bad attitudes when a patient needed them. Even though I didn't have the best relationship with my stepdad, I couldn't stand to see him (or any other patient) being treated that way. When he ended up in hospice, he had some of the most caring, compassionate, and funny nurses I had ever met. They made a very stressful, exhausting, and sad situation a lot easier on everyone.

2. My original plan was not to become a nurse. I had wanted to be a doctor since I was little, and when I started college I was a pre-med student. I had to leave college about two weeks after I started due to Katrina and I was out of school for a couple of years. In that time period, I realized that I no longer had the desire to become a doctor. I decided that I wanted to become a nurse and that I would do my best to be just as good as all of the wonderful nurses I had met when my dad and stepdad were sick.

3. I like to care for and about people, and nursing definitely seems like a job that will allow me to do that.

4. It's not all about the money for me, but being able to make a decent amount of money while doing a job that I think I'll love is not a bad thing. :)