Life on the inside: being a nurse and a pre-med
Nursing helped me gain the most valuable things to a pre-med; time management skills, a foundation of knowledge, and clinical experience. The ability to manage administering medication to over 50 people in about an hour and a half to two hours, how to balance all the tasks for a regular shift (orders, calling Dr.’s, families), with caring for the people assigned to my care, and overseeing the personal care attendants on shift with me.
Being a nurse is not always glorious; there are downsides to even the best careers. But the art of nursing is being able to keep a patients dignity intact when cleaning up incontinence, being able to comfort after being thrown up on, and being strong when caring for the dying and their family. Those experiences have shaped the type of nurse I am today, and the future physician I will be someday. Every experience is a learning experience, if you try to take something away from what is in front of you.
It helps when my undergraduate science classes relate concepts to drugs I’ve administered, microbes I’ve encountered, and diseases people in my care have had. In this competition towards medical school, I've encountered students who don’t think it’s fair that I came back to school. But I still wouldn’t have done it any different; the life can be stressful managing work, school, and trying to get involved around campus. But if it truly were easy, everyone would do it, and I am not everyone.
