Results 1 to 4 of 4

Thread: Completely new to nursing forums.

  1. #1
    Junior Member
    Join Date
    Jun 2012
    Posts
    2

    Completely new to nursing forums.

    Hello to all! This is my first signup to any nursing forums, but I have a fair understanding of how forums in general work. A little about myself: I am an RN who's been in the field for coming up on 25 years. My experiance has been varied from psychiatry to ICU. It's been a very interesting and rewarding journey, and I have never regreted my choice to become a nurse, although there have been (as I'm sure we've all had) those shifts where I've stopped and said "Why exactly am I doing this?" I'm presently liscensed in South Carolina and am working at an LTAC where I've been for coming up on 5 years. I am also in recovery, and am about 1 month away from from a successful completion of 5 years of RPP monitoring with no slips. But there were no diversions or PTI's involved. Just a person who reached a point (very bottom of the barrel, to any out there who are familiar with that unpleasant experience), who woke up one day and said to themselves "gee, my life is a wreck, and I need to do something drastic to change this situation". So I took the one good thing that I had left, my nursing career, swollowed whatever pride I had left, and went into work and said "I need help!". It was the first time in my life that I took such a stand, and was probably one of the hardest things I've ever done, but to this day, I believe it literally saved my life. There are absolutely no reservations in my mind that I am an addictive personality (I say it that way for a reason), and that if I use, I will lose. I am happy and settled in being clean AND sober. I always draw a distinction between these 2 words due to the fact that being clean is simply the act of not putting any harmful or mind/mood altering substances into my body, but being sober is all the rest. Life on lifes terms. Being sober is finding reason, purpose, and goals that run contrary to my lifestyle back in the dark days of abuse. Sometimes it's simply the act of remembering where I was and what it felt like, just to get me through any given day or situation. I am very thankful to say that this simple insight has thusfar kept any "urges" that I've had to an extremely limited amount of time. As always, there are good days and there are bad days, but I remain elated in the fact that whatever kind of day I'm having, it is MY day, and not the result of some drug-induced scramble to remember what I did yesterday, or the terror of waking up in some situation that I have no knowledge of ever doing. Today, it is MY sucesses or failures that motivate me to take that next step. I pray each day to find some sense of balance in all that I do.

    Ok, enough of the speaker meeting for now. The reason that I've chosen to join this forum is that I am now approaching the end of my commitment to RPP, and would like to reward myself with taking a some travelling assignments, but am uncertain as to the best coarse of action to pursue this. So many questions and concerns, such as the use of a permanent address while travelling and options to this, travelling with my pet, the best places to go and companies to use under my circumstances, how to best present myself to prospective employers considering my situation, among many other questions. I am also planning on using a big protion of my earnings while travelling to pay for the completion of a batchelors in graphic/web design, all geared toward my ultimate goal of becoming a medical illustrator. Big plans, but you never know what you can do until you try, right? Any insights or understandings that anyone may have will be greatly appreciated. Glad to be here.

  2. #2
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Mar 2006
    Posts
    695
    Welcome to this site

  3. #3
    Super Moderator cougarnurse's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2006
    Location
    Parked in front of the computer when I am not working
    Posts
    12,364
    Welcome to the site, RMH! No, you aren't ranting....just making good points.

  4. #4
    Moderator
    Join Date
    Jul 2008
    Posts
    1,409
    Welcome to the site and congratulations on your progress.

Similar Threads

  1. Nursing Retirements Have Critical Implications - Blogs - Nurse.Com Forums
    By nursinghumor in forum Staff Nurses/Nursing Issues
    Replies: 16
    Last Post: 07-31-2013, 08:00 PM
  2. New guy on the forums
    By TheCloser in forum New User Introductions
    Replies: 2
    Last Post: 09-17-2008, 02:00 AM
  3. New here and to forums!!
    By pixiedust in forum New User Introductions
    Replies: 2
    Last Post: 03-23-2008, 12:48 AM
  4. New to forums
    By JWoodRN in forum New User Introductions
    Replies: 3
    Last Post: 05-29-2007, 02:41 PM
  5. What I like about your forums
    By SecondCareer in forum Site Feedback
    Replies: 1
    Last Post: 10-11-2006, 08:29 AM

Tags for this Thread

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •