Archive for year: 2015

Today’s the day of our pinning and I feel a mix of emotions: happy, excited, proud, scared, sad…

I am so proud of all of my classmates and happy that we have made it to the end. All of our blood, sweat, and tears have brought us to this point and I couldn’t be more excited for our futures. I have made lifelong friends in this program and will be sad when we all go off on our separate ways, but I know we will all look back on these years with good memories.

Looking back on the last 3 years, I realize how much I have changed and how much I have learned. Every lecture, sim, project, test, discussion board, and clinical day has built up my knowledge, critical thinking, abilities/skills, and emotional/psychological strength. I still can’t say I’m 100% confident in myself, but I’ve come a long way since the beginning when I was unsure if I was even capable of being a nurse. I know I’m capable now, and I know that I can make a difference in the nursing profession and in people’s lives with what I have to offer.

What do I have to offer?

I have my knowledge and critical thinking skills – which I’ve gained from amazing instructors and preceptors who knew how to encourage, push, shape, and mold us. I will use this to recognize potential problems, initiate proper interventions, and educate when needed.

I have my compassion – which has grown even more in the last 3 years. I will use this to care for every patient as if they were my own family member or friend.

I have my determination and perseverance – something I have come to learn about myself. I do not give up and I do not let failure bring me down. I will use this to make sure every patient under my care has the best care.

I have my humor – which will help keep things light when situations are dark.

and I have another one that I thought I could never use in this field… my creative side. When I joined nursing school, I was prepared to say goodbye to my artsy crafts and drawings. But I’ve learned that I can use my drawings to help patients. I have already used my pictures numerous times to help with patient education when language or hearing barriers got in the way.

I don’t know what type of nursing I will end up in, but I have been well prepared and I am ready for it!

This week has been really bittersweet for me, as I have been reflecting on the fact that we are finishing our education and entering a new chapter of our lives. I will miss the close friends and support system that we created for each other, the long nights of studying and becoming hysterically delirious as the hours go by and sleep deprivation increases, the stressing over care plans and exams…yes, I will actually miss these to some extent because their disappearance also represents the end of something good. But now we are each starting our own nursing journey independently, and there is also something incredibly special and exciting about that. As I am writing this final blog post, I’m thinking of what has impacted me the most this semester in regards to critical care, and I think that I have realized that now we each create our own nursing practice. Before, we were guided by academia and our faculty…but now we are new graduate nurses. I have seen some nurses treat patients and approach patients in a very rude and unprofessional manner in every semester of nursing school, and there will always be a few nurses like this. Critical care is a unique specialty that blends a high level of critical thinking and pathophysiology knowledge with a need for knowledge of public health and case management, and that is why I love the specialty. Patients in critical care and their family members are vulnerable, and need a higher level of emotional support in this time of crisis. So, there is an even greater need for nurses to be sensitive, communicative, and excellent healthcare providers for these families. So as new graduate nurses, each of us needs to make the choice. When someone asks me what kind of nurse I want to be, rather than replying what specialty I am interested in, in reality I want to say, “I am the kind of nurse who will give my patients excellent care regardless of what others may be saying or thinking…I am the kind of nurse who will not criticize patients behind their back…I am the kind of nurse who will hold your hand even if you don’t “deserve” it…I will work hard to gain more knowledge and skills to know how to care for you safely, and I am committed to your care, because I am that kind of nurse.” As student nurses, we are limited to some extent when we see nurses we work with treat patients with disrespect or provide suboptimal care. But now, we have the power to really make a difference and even change the culture of a unit that we work in. Critical care is what I want to do, but the above statements represent the kind of nurse I want to be. There is a difference. And that is what I look forward to as I begin my own nursing journey.