Second career, starting in the fall, and every nurse warns me
Finley pre-nursingThe question
I left a desk job for this. Prerequisites are done, program starts in the fall.
When I tell a nurse what I am doing I get some version of good luck said in a tone I cannot read. Two have told me outright not to.
I am not fishing for encouragement. What I want is the thing you would say to someone standing exactly here, before the first semester, while there is still time to plan around it instead of react to it.
The conversation
3 replies- Riley in the break roomRN, ED, 2 years in
That tone is tiredness pointed at the job, not a judgement on your decision. Try asking the same people what they would keep. You get completely different answers than when you ask what they would warn you about.
My planning advice: treat clinical placements as auditions, because the units that remember you are where your first interview comes from. I fell into that by accident and it did more for me than my grades.
- Ade in long term careRN, long term care, first year
Plan your money before you plan your studying. Second career people often carry a mortgage the twenty two year olds do not, and the semester that breaks you is usually the one where you cut hours and had not worked out what that costs.
I mapped mine to the week. Boring, and it is the reason I got to say no to a shift the night before an exam.
- Wren on behavioral healthRN, behavioral health, first year
The thing nobody said to me: you will be a beginner again in front of people much younger than you, and if you came from somewhere you were senior that is the part that stings, not the content.
It passes. But go in expecting it and you lose about a month less to being embarrassed.
What would you tell them?
Answer from what you have seen. It posts without your name.
