I married the right man, found the right city to live in, the right housing situation, but didn't know what I was doing professionally, despite, or because of, all those years in school.
I knew my current career path wasn't sustainable or viable, but didn't know what to put in its place. I thought through lots of random possibilities, then this whole nursing business kind of dropped into my head one day while I was waiting for the bus. I dismissed it, then several curiously serendipitous things happened, and the people close to me in my life didn't tell me that I was crazy or that I was just doing another degree and why bother.
When I attended an open house at the school where I now hope to study nursing, they suggested we become Certified Nursing Assistants so that we could get our feet wet in the field and make sure this is what we want to do. So that's what I've been doing. Eight days so far of clinic, and all signs still point to yes. I find this stuff compelling.
Then this is what my mom wrote to me in an e-mail, after she read all my blog posts back-to-back yesterday, and which I have her permission to quote:
Today I re-read the chapters of your blog I'd already read and caught up thru the latest entry. [...]. I think you have found the ideal vocation. It challenges your mind and engages your heart, providing the sense of giving back that you require. Good call.
:)
Your mom is so right. Thanks for bringing us along on your amazing ride!
ReplyDeleteI've been writing about nursing off and on for a dozen years, and I've developed a very healthy respect for the profession and all its myriad avenues. You are both talented and driven, and you will be able to accomplish a lot in this profession, whichever direction it takes you. I have utmost faith in that!
ReplyDeleteHazel Ferris was unable to post for annoying technical reasons, so she asked that I post the following comment for her:
ReplyDeleteI also have faith that you will succeed in and be satisfied by your proposed career.
I am curious how you see the ARNP, though. You are writing a lot about the practice of nursing, specifically the things I consider the core of nursing – caring for people (especially sick or debilitated persons) on a day-in and day-out basis, in ways that support the maintenance and improvement of their health, without (necessarily) diagnosing and treating them.
This is something that NACs, LPNs, and RNs all do, even though they vary in training and the level of support they can provide.
I think of ARNPs, though, as people who were nurses, and realized that they could doctor as well or better than people trained as doctors, so switched. As I perceive it, they’re basically doctors. They have a career of providing quotidenne care and support behind them, at the trade-off of slightly less scientific background.
Hopefully, doctors and nurses bring some of the same traits and behaviors to bear in their work. The emphasis does change, though, from supporting and implementing a care plan on an on-going basis to making (and periodically updating) a care plan. After your six months or so as a NAC, you’re emphasis will change much more dramatically by going into an ARNP program instead of an LPN or RN program. Have you thought about why you’d rather be an ARNP than an RN? Have you thought
about what you’d lose?
I haven't thought much about it/that. As an ARNP, I can still work as an RN. Not so the reverse. This is all just an intro to the field for me--there is a lot for me to think about, decisions to make, and luckily I have friends like you and mentors (my teachers so far, who've been quite supportive) to help me make these decisions.
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