Unwinding the maze of Prereqs

If only becoming a nurse was as straightforward as when I went to design school. Back then, I identified a school that fit with my life (had a night program so I could raise my son during the day) and I signed up for classes. Done and done.

Not so with nursing it seems.

Turns out, although there is a huge shortage of nurses, there is a massive bottleneck of nurse-educators, which makes getting into a program super competitive. So my ideal first choice of staying close to home, friends and church while going to school may not be possible. Yesterday I spent most of Thanksgiving putting together a massive spreadsheet to do a competitive analysis of all of the schools in my region, and some out of state options, just to get a handle on some possible pathways into nursing.

And then there are more and more questions that pile on. Should I get the quickie 2 year ADN-RN or, since I'm in school anyway...go straight for the 4 year BSN? I have a total of 5.5 years of college so far, so that seems reasonable. But if the limited number of public BSN programs are so hard to get into and I need to wait a year to get into a program (as many wannabe students do) --should I then think about the lesser LPN option, just to get to work faster? And at some point, I may get impatient and decide to cough up and head to a private school if it means I could finish faster.

The impatient me is just chomping at the bit to get on with it already.

Regardless -- any pathway I head down will still require the same basic batch of prereqs and I'll be chipping away at them starting next month. At the same time I'll be hooking up some volunteer hours at a local hospital for some work experience that will look good on the applications. I'm really looking forward to that, since I'll get a semi-immersion look at the field.

Investing in technology

It's the day before Thanksgiving and I have taken the day off work to drive to see family in Portland. While here, it's a great opportunity to purchase my new laptop. This laptop will see me through school, and its purchase here helps, as Oregon is a sales-tax-free state. Combine that with my student discount and it's worth doing here. (I'm 2 weeks left at my job and anticipating impending poverty with dread. Ouch!)

I have selected the new Macbook Air. This featherweight computer is ideal for me, specifically because I haul myself and whatever gear I have up 220 stairs every morning to get from my cabin on the beach to the car. I envision the laptop, plus all the nursing school textbooks as being quite a payload, and am glad this light computer is available for a beacher like me.

I'm rewinding to the 90's when I was in Art school in my twenties. I bought the very first mac laptop, the black and sleek Executive powerbook. She was a thing of beauty, and as a testimony to the superlative design skills of the Apple group -- it still looks great today! Looking at the slim lines of this new machine, I'm thinking about all the things we're about to go through together with a mixture of excitement and total dread.

Gulp!

Nah...Bring It ON!

I Hate Being in the Vault

I'm an all-out-there kind of girl. Transparency is pretty much how I live my life. So having made this monumental decision, and not having made it known yet at work...is killing me.

I love my firm and the people in it. For 10 years it has been my home and my family, and that isn't over-stating it. Our firm is known for it's warm environment. And if I hadn't decided to switch careers in mid-life...I doubt I would ever leave.

I'll be sharing this blog with my friends at work once I break the news...so, work family -- this post is pretty much an open letter to all of you!

Why am I leaving?

• I'm at that pivotal point between the time my son gets married and starts a family, and the time when my parents get older and start needing me around. Nobody ever knows how long that period may be, but if I were going to make changes...now is the time.

• I have learned that I'm no longer interested in the business world -- I have 25 years to go before retirement, and staying engaged in business means: days, weeks and years filled with meetings, management, and key performance indicators! I have decided I don't want to fill my time that way.

• I'm an adventure junkie. Change excites me. Variety feeds me. Serving people is where I find my joy. As I research the nursing industry -- it seems tailor-made for me. There are so many paths nursing can take me down, that if I crave change in the future, I can explore them. The path I've been on is rather linear and defined. It is really too soon to say what area will interest me, but I am rather intrigued by travel nursing. I will be gearing my preparations after graduation toward becoming a travel nurse. These nurses travel the country taking short 3 month assignments anywhere they like, with an option to extend. I love the idea of moving around for a season and exploring areas that strike my fancy. I'll write more later on the other things I have learned about this path.

• I'm a single woman. This recession is pissing me off! But because I don't have the income of a spouse to fall back on, I am particularly vulnerable if the promised Hope and Change doesn't come, and things in this economy continue to decline. Nursing is one of those recession-proof jobs and will enable me to expand my reach far and wide if I need to. As an artist, part of me always chafed that in the "lifeboat of life" -- I'd likely be thrown overboard or eaten by the doctors, teachers and engineers who would be needed during rough times!

• I have something to contribute! Unfortunately, I have been a consumer of healthcare more times than I would have ever thought. I have been in so much pain at times, that I know what it is like to actually not care if I lived or died in those dark moments. I have spoken the words "just let me die." and given up. I have gone through painful rehabilitation requiring daily PT and sustained narcotic meds to get me through. I have faced personal demons, wandering quite close to depression during the worst part of my recovery -- and come out the other side. Combine my experiences on the patient side of things, my life experience as a leader and business person, and my passion to comfort and aid those who are suffering, and I am betting my future on the fact that I will make a great nurse.

Big Gulp

Most people might think I'm crazy -- just 40, at the pinnacle of my career as Director of Marketing and Graphic Design at one of the state's top firms, son about to graduate and head off to college...and what do I do? That's right. I'm going off to college too!

After 15 years of being in the design profession -- first noodling around with it at my former job in my 20's. Then art school, and working as a designer while attending night school. A stint in Seattle. Then freelancing. And finally, my longest run at my current firm -- and now it's ten years later.

Man, time does fly by.