Journey from Student-Nurse to Nurse

Year one of nursing school is down and I have just two more to go! Let's be honest, in just 8 short months I have learned TONS! I've narrowed it down to my top three lessons I've learned from my first year in nursing school:


Lesson #1: A true friend is one who lets you poke her with a needle...multiple times.
Sometimes we laugh about how different our major is. While the accountant majors are off somewhere crunching numbers, the nursing students are in the bottom of the SWKT injecting normal saline into each other and thinking it is the coolest thing ever.  I had no idea the extent of friendships that we ended up forming in just eight short months. There was a lot of studying and a lot of reading, but there was also a lot of laughing and forming wonderful memories. The crazy thing is, it's only the beginning...

Eating lunch at the 60th Celebration of the College of Nursing

Lesson #2: I'm doing better than I think I am.
Every Thursday at 5:30 AM my clinical group would go to Provo Rehab for clinical. This was our first "real" patient interaction, and we were basically scared out of our socks for it. There are times when I was unsure of myself or my abilities, but there were so many more times that I was satisfied with my ability in answering questions, or doing an injection successfully, or receiving a genuine "thank you" from a patient. It really is a journey.

My clinical group (and don't judge, it's 5:30 AM) L-R: Courtney Davies, Stephanie Jacobsen, Tina Stewart, Liv Lessard, me, Jen Orton, Brittni Miller, and Katie Holiday

Lesson #3: It's so hard, but it's even harder to feel sorry for myself.
 The program is challenging, time-consuming, and stressful. Amid all of this, however, it's hard to really feel sorry for myself. By learning about all of the possible things that could go wrong with the human body, and then associating with patients who have such problems, it makes me so grateful for my own health. If you have your health, then you have everything. I'm looking forward to the opportunity to serve people with the knowledge I'm acquiring.