My Dilemma - need your input/experience

I am an LPN who has been away from nursing for 16 yrs. I worked as administrator to a specialty surgical physician practice at a university hospital. December 2003 I entered an inpatient alcohol recovery program voluntarily with encouragement from my family. There was no work related involvement with alcohol, no DUIs or any public involvement. After completing the inpatient program, attending some outpatient sessions and AA for several months, we ended up moving to Florida (husband's company). During that time I made the decision to go back into nursing - and to obtain my RN. I also wanted to begin work as an LPN again while going to nursing school. I applied for my LPN license by endorsement and answered the question on the application about having been in a recovery program within the last 5 yrs and also supplied the certification of completion of my in-patient program. I was evaluated by the IPN group in Florida and they drew up a contract to include 5 yrs of monitoring (starting now - not when I stopped drinking and received treatment), attending AA 3/wk, a nursing support group weekly, random urine screenings, restriction of work to one setting with one supervisor who will need to fill out monthly reports and then also a nursing refresher course (which I look forward to). I feel that this is extremely excessive monitoring but the only real issue I have is that I should have to tell my employer before getting a job and also that I would not be able to work for an agency which would fit into my school schedule. What happened to the anonymous part of AA?

I have an option to have a 2nd eval by another IPN physician or just bite the bullet and begin the contract now as they stipulate it currently. I am also not sure how this will impact my nursing school program since they did not ask about any past history, my urine and background check for school was fine.

Would anyone please give me some advice on whether to have the 2nd evluation or to just get started since it looks like even though I am 2.5 years into recovery, the clock has not really started on that yet.

Thank you all,
Karen Anonymous

Hi Karen, I'm not sure how it works in Florida but the contract they want you to sign for monitoring and meetings is fairly standard for nurses in recovery. Remember that the LPN and RN Boards are charged with public safety and that's why they put so many restrictions on us. Of course it never hurts to have a second assessment of your case so I would encourage you to do so. Also be prepared - here in California an LPN in recovery often finds him/herself in a whole new monitoring program when they become an RN. A friend of mine who is 13 years sober is currently in her 7th year of monitoring.

In any case the monitoring isn't that big a deal if you're already doing the right things like staying sober, working with a sponsor, attending meetings etc...

When you go to look for work only you can decide when to tell your prospective employer. Some say to wait until you have a job offer others say to let them know up front. I purposely sought out a Diversion friendly hospital. Something like 15% of the nurses at my Facility are in recovery, so it wasn't a big deal to them. Substance abuse/dependence is a huge problem in our field and most employers know that. They also know that with the way we are monitored we are less likely to be a problem to them than the addicts and alcoholics they don't know about.

My advice is to accept the monitoring and remember "Easy Does it!" Moves and job changes are very stressful and it's really easy to set ourselves up for relapse. Take one day at a time.

Peace and Namaste

Suzanne
Happy, grateful, recovering alcoholic,addict and oh so CO

Suzanne,

Thanks for the encouraging response. I obviously don't have much choice but to work with the program the way the Board and IPN stipulate. I have just been feeling so overwhelmed and frustrated that these 2.5 yrs of my recovery seem to mean nothing :( (no time off for good behavior).

I know that if I want to continue being a nurse (my childhood plan) I have to make this work and move on. My husband says that I need to stop trying to look at the whole "life" picture and just get started and see what is involved and keep moving forward day by day and maybe it will not be as bad as I have conjured up in my head. Doing what they want should not be a problem since I have been living a clean and sober life to date.

It just seems like now I will forever be walking around with the "scarlet letter" on my forehead. I just never imagined that even though my "bottle" has been empty for all this time - alcohol is now still controlling my life.

Accept the things you cannot change - thanks for helping with the - Wisdom to know the difference so I can keep moving on.

Thank you,
Karen