New Grad Nurse Shout Out: @periopnursesam

Through my approximate one month journey entering the healthcare blog and Instagram world I have come across so many inspirational and interesting nursing students and nurses running their own accounts. Through browsing through the "Recommended" page I found the page of now @periopnursesam! At that time she had just graduated from her nursing program and documenting her journey of studying for the NCLEX in various Instagram posts. 

I few weeks ago I asked her to share her story on my blog about passing NCLEX and officially becoming a new-graduate nurse! Read her story and words of wisdom below:

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“Pass”

Upon seeing these words on my screen, my heart felt like it actually fell out of my chest. Tears immediately sprang from my eyes. I had passed my NCLEX! I was officially a Registered Nurse.

All the studying, all the stress, and all the misery actually worked.

I did it.

Hi! My name is Sam. I just recently graduated from an Accelerated BSN program in NJ. Go Class of 2017! In June I was offered a job working as an Operating Room nurse at my dream hospital in NYC, and just last week, I took and passed my boards.

I’ll begin working as an RN in mid-August.

When you graduate nursing school, life seems to move in the blink of an eye. It’s kind of crazy to think that it was only 4 months ago I was still in school, and now I’m relaxing for a month before orientation starts.

I say all this in hopes that this can inspire you to keep at it. As a nurse blogger, I can 100% attest that social media is not always what it’s cracked up to be. You see tons of other nurse bloggers always studying and working hard, and I of course being one of them. However, it’s not always the case. I’ve tried to be honest in my posts; I have a few posts talking about being burnt out from NCLEX studying to the point where I didn’t even pick up my books for a few days. At the end of the day, we’re all human and sometimes we see ourselves so tightly wound up from stress we feel like a balloon about to pop.

Despite feeling defeated and stressed, I did it. I preserved. And so can you. Nursing school is probably one of the hardest things you’ll ever have to do. But there really is no other feeling in the world like holding your diploma, receiving an offer letter for your dream job, and seeing that “pass.” Nursing is the greatest profession out there; we get to touch the lives of so many people at such a vulnerable part of their life. It is both a privilege and an honor, and it is no wonder why nursing is continuously ranked as the “most trusted profession.”

It is absolutely 100% worth all the stress and hard-work that goes into it.

Here are 3 of the best pieces of advice I can give on how to conquer the beast that is nursing school and get that degree!

1. Find out the best way of studying...for YOU. I can’t emphasize this enough. If you study best alone, but all your friends are in a study group….don’t join the study group. There is a time for studying and a time for socializing. After all, you will be taking the test alone. Through trial and error, I discovered I personally studied best by locking myself in my room and basically just talking all the material out loud; I would pretend that I was teaching somebody else. I found that this active form of studying really showed if I knew the material or not, and anything I couldn’t find myself being able to explain I’d study a bit harder.

2. Take a day or two a week off for mental health. Now, this may or may not be able to applicable to every nursing student’s situation, but it really is important to take some time off from the books. Go do something fun, even if it’s just watching Netflix. If you continue studying without taking a break, you’ll overload your brain, that material won’t even be processed, and it’ll be like a waste of time. That being said, also do NOT start studying the night before. Maybe you could in your prereqs, but when it comes to nursing classes, there is a LOT of material in a short amount of time. Just do a little bit of prep leading up to the exam, even just 1 hour everyday. You should be good to go by the time the exam comes around!

3. When in nursing school, it’s hard to think of the future. After all, all we want to do is just get through this upcoming exam, this upcoming clinical, this whole semester. But it is really important to think about what comes after nursing school. When was the last time you updated your resume? What kind of nursing do you want to get into? Are there any nurse residency programs in your area? Especially in our last semester, these are questions to start thinking about. Start networking ASAP, especially during clinicals. You just never know, and honestly all it takes is one connection to land your dream job (which is exactly what happened to me).

Nursing school is hard. BUT with perseverance and motivation, soon you’ll be seeing that “pass” across your screen too! 

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@periopnursesam on Instagram!