When did you "Know" you wanted to be a nurse?

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What happened that made everything finally "click," and you absolutely knew without a single doubt in your mind that you wanted to be a nurse? Mine happened tonight.

I've been working towards nursing for a year now.. two years of pre-req, but decided nursing a year ago. Well, my grandmother of soon to be 89 just got out of the hospital a week ago for fainting.. stood up, BP dropped. Last night, she apparently stood up, and without fainting, fell back down and broke her hip.. clean break at the epiphyseal plate. I know surgery, hip surgery, is high risk at her age. I went with my parents to see her tonight. I wasn't blown away with emotion or anything, but I "felt it." I felt the empathy and urge to help. With all the family there, I leaned down next to her whispering words and questions to her. I wanted to make sure she was as fine as could be in that circumstance. I was holding her hand. I was just trying to keep her aware. It had been seven hrs. since her last morphine injection. In a gasp, mumbled moan, she said her leg hurt. I got the nurses. I talked with her until she started drifting off from the meds. Barely mumbling, she said verbatim, "y'all let me go." She had finally opened her right eye a little. I truly heard her.. heard the pain and the call for help. I wasn't scared or sad.

I was simply as wide awake as I've ever been. I wish I were able to help her now. If she passes tomorrow, I just want it to be painless. She's been "off" since '95 when her husband died. I feel it's her time.

So tonight, I know, without a solitary doubt, that I want and will become a nurse. I'll never have the desire to be an MD. I want to be there to directly care for the patient--- the person.

When did you know?

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I knew when I volunteered as a "candystripper" at 13.

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Specializes in RESIDENT ASST..

I knew when I had my first baby, they were so nice and caring and it made my recovery go well, I was 16 when I had my son and I admired what they did and the concern they showed me. I thought wow, I want to do this.

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I knew when I was 11 years-old and my brother broke his neck in a diving accident. Thankfully, he wasn't paralyzed but required help with his ADLs. I helped my mom take care of him by feeding him and watching The Three Stooges with him. I knew then that I wanted to help take care of people. I still have the paper I wrote when I was in 5th grade about what I wanted to be when I grew up.

My brother and I really bonded during that time. He's 12 years older than me and has always been my protector. For those couple of months I was his protector and I wanted to do that for others.

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Specializes in Emergency Room.

i realized it when i was a medical assistant working with nurses. i said to myself "i can do that".

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I knew when I volunteered as a "candystripper" at 13.

Hopefully at the age of 13 you were a striper and not a stripper.

I, on the other hand, did not get into nursing because I wanted to be a nurse. I was looking for a career after 20+ jobs, and I have found it. Or it has found me.

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When I got layed off from a long term job in corporate america with no other job prospects and a wife and child at home. Nursing offered the stability my family needed and I was willing to do anything legal to support them.

In this economy, I thank God everyday for the stability I have found for my family.

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Specializes in Trauma & Emergency.

Before I became a nurse the reason that I actually went into nursing was because I watched my aunt die from ovarian cancer and the idolized the hospice nurses. Learning to change her colostomy bag, watching the hospice nurses care for her like the unbeleivable angels they were and always will be. Those nurses inspired me to be where I am today and continue to inspire me every day. But AFTER I actually graduated from school and became a real nurse on my own..I still wasn't sure if I was capable of doing the job adequately. It wasn't until I began practicing on my own that I KNEW i really wanted to be a nurse. I learned that just sitting and holding someones hand while they are in unbearable pain can calm the soul and releive some of that pain even if its just for a little while. When sitting on the edge of the bed and folding the hair softly behind a patients ear while the patient who usually screams all night and never gets a wink of sleep..actually looks at you with tears in their eyes and says "thank you" and proceeds to doze off right in front of you..thats the very moment that I knew that I truly wanted to STAY a nurse =)

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Specializes in Emergency Room.
When I got layed off from a long term job in corporate america with no other job prospects and a wife and child at home. Nursing offered the stability my family needed and I was willing to do anything legal to support them.

In this economy, I thank God everyday for the stability I have found for my family.

your right. i must say my career choice is truly a blessing. i complain less and i appreciate more because i know i could be one of many without a job right now.

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I actually decided quite recently. I'm not like any of you "I knew when I was 12." I actually decided this a few weeks ago, after doing an intense set of research.

I've been babysitting for over four years now, and when one of my friends had her baby I got to see him within 12 hours of his birth. I don't know, it just "clicked". My mother suggested Neonatal nursing on the way home, and after initially disregarding it (I've always sworn never to go into nursing because I hate needles), I was tempted to do some research, and, well...it felt like what I wanted. It "called" to me, as tacky as it felt. So I start my pre-reqs this summer.

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Specializes in Pediatrics.

My story is kinda long...kinda odd...

When I was 4, I decided to be a doctor. I was going to be a pediatric oncologist. I was dead set on being a doctor. Until my senior year of high school. I started to think about what the role of the doctor is and what I wanted to do. I realized that I wanted so much to be the person who spent time with patients and was directly involved in care. I also wanted to be the one who did the procedures versus spending 15 minutes a day with a patient. That is when I decided I wanted to be a nurse.

I went to college when I was 17 and started as a pre-nursing major. When I took my health class, I met my instructor who was a Health Educator. She would tell me, "You don't want to be a nurse, you want to be a health educator!" I remember reading some nursing journal and getting completely freaked out. I looked into it and thought health education seemed cool. So I changed my major.

My junior year of college, I was looking online for jobs in health education. I really wanted to do patient education; diabetes, asthma, childbirth, something like that. All of the jobs I was interested in required having an RN license. So I thought I would go to nursing school, get my license, and then teach.

Later that year, I took an EMT-Intermediate class and had to do 50 hours of clinicals in the ED. I really loved it and did 150 hours. I decided that I really enjoyed the clinical side and thought I would like bedside nursing. I graduated from ECU with my degree in Community Health Education (although at a certain point I almost dropped out b/c I really didn't like my major and wanted to go to nursing school) and immediately went to nursing school. I couldn't be happier that I made this decision. And after all is said and done, I am glad I took this long trip around. Having an education background makes it so much easier to provide education to my patients about disease management and lifestyle modifications.

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I wanted to be a stand-up comic... but my life made my choices, I guess... I was born to be a nurse, but railed against it, until finally I gave up my dreams of making people laugh in bars and clubs, and now make people laugh in our rehab unit... even got one of the stuffy, very proper docs to snort once... *S* That was one of the highlights of my careet... I have learned the importance of laughter, and that even if a very serious event has affected a patient, they still need to know that it's ok to laugh and live...Besides, it's good for the lungs and releases endorphins... Very therapeutic.

I still have a photo of myself at 7 years old, with my brand new nurse kit, weating my brand new roller skates on Christmas morning... It was taken 51 years ago...

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