Whether you’re a vocational nurse, a registered nurse, a critical care nurse, traveling nurse, or another type of nurse not listed here – you will run into one thing: challenges. Challenges aren’t to be looked at as something bad, either. Challenge should be embraced as an opportunity to grow as a nurse.

And for the record – look, you aren’t going to be perfect. That’s OK. You also won’t know everything. That’s OK. Don’t beat yourself up because mistakes will happen.

It’s All About the Family

You might read several articles of the writer’s opinion listing what he or she believes to be the hardest part of being a nurse. But from our own experiences – mind you, this is our opinion – the absolutely hardest part of being a nurse is dealing with the families of patients who are clearly ready to die, but the family won’t let them go.

This difficulty will send you through a roller coaster of emotions, and you’ll undoubtedly find yourself questioning your morality and/or ethical values, asking yourself whether or not you’re “doing the right thing”.

The level of intimacy you’ll face on the job with your patients is both a blessing and a curse. It’s what makes a nurse, a nurse. But all nurses are exposed to the inevitable idea of death & you’ll struggle with it at first, but you’ll learn to accept that part of your job, while developing the right people skills throughout.

Our Advice to You

Our best advice we can give you is to let these types of situations happen naturally. Follow your instincts when it comes to addressing the situation from a place of sincerity & compassion. When you sit there telling yourself “what should I tell them?” or “what should I say?” then you’ll overthink the situation entirely.

One other, unrelated pro tip:

Don’t procrastinate your tasks – If there’s something to do and you tell yourself “Oh, I’ll do it later.” Most nurses won’t “do it later” because they end up getting too busy. So our pro tip to you is to do any task that comes up right away. Out of sight, out of mind.