#im waiting on an email from my advisor rn and i am trying not to think abt it | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

mkm49 · 6 years

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2017

My 2017 was a long year. One filled with changes, hard work, tears, and many lessons learned. To set up this story, I have to go back to 2014, my first year at college.

I came into VCU as a freshman wide-eyed to try to get one of 60 spots in their Nursing Program. My journey to VCU was an easy one, considering my dad had gone here for undergrad before he pursued Medical school at MCV. Wishing to follow in his footsteps of pursuing a medical career, I saw that dream within reach when I received this email :

I was beyond excited. Not only did I get accepted into their program after applying once, this meant that within 4 years of college, I would graduate with my RN BSN!!! I became overwhelmed with excitement, to think I would have that title at the age of 22.

I started the nursing program my second year of college, fall 2015. I met the other 59 students I would be spending the next 3 years with, and found some of my closest friends during this time.

After my first semester of nursing, I was certified to work as a CNA. Once I learned I could, I eagerly applied for jobs. I got asked for an interview and offered a job in MCV’s Transplant unit and Cardiothoracic Surgery unit. I chose to take the Cardiothoracic unit’s offer, excited to begin working in the medical field.

Going into my junior year, classes got more difficult, more specialized, and I took the dreaded Pathophysiology and Pharmacology (Which i passed both parts!!). I loved it, every aspect of it. Taking classes with others as passionate, as driven, as eager as I was to start our careers.

My second semester of Junior year was not one of my best semesters. I began trying to take on more than I could handle. I was (and still am) an active student leader for an organization called Christian Student Fellowship at VCU, along with trying to juggle relationships, and personal life mishaps with nursing school can be extremely overwhelming.

As my semester continued, I came to a realization regarding an assignment for one of my courses. In my Nursing of Women’s course, we had a group of assignments called HESI case studies. These were online patient case-scenarios with practice questions following the case. All of which allowed multiple attempts, and answers and questions easily available online for review. We had many of these assigned in several of our other nursing courses. For many of our other courses, at the beginning of the semester you were assigned an allotted amount of HESI case studies to do or topic case studies to complete, and were typically told to complete these on our own time, but before the final exam. For my women’s class, I had thought it was under the same direction. I was wrong. Our professor had assigned dates for certain case studies to be due via our syllabus. And had missed them.

I quickly did the math, and realized that without credit for those assignments (which were worth 5% of my grade for the course), I would not obtain a passing grade of 79.5% in the course. I met with my professor, hoping to receive any partial credit toward this late homework assignment that I completed. The sum of our conversation resulted in her hands being tied due to the due dates being stated in our syllabus. My heart was broken, I was devastated at the idea that these homework assignments would cause me to fail a course.. I tried to study as much as I could for the final exam, and hoped that would be enough to account for something. I got a 96% on the final, but unfortunately that still wasn’t enough. I was sitting at exactly an 83.2% after the final exam, and when she added those 0′s, it dropped to a 78.2%. I was so close to passing, but not quite.

After i realized I was not going to pass my course, I reached out to my nursing advisor to set up an appointment to discuss what would happen as a result. When I went in, I was reminded of a course I took a year back.

Spring 2016 I took a course called microbiology. For some reason VCU only has one professor for micro, and he is HARD. Since I was in the nursing program while I was taking micro, when I didn’t pass, that counted as my first strike, out of two, for not passing courses. Even though this wasn’t a nursing course, it counted against me due to me being in the program when I took the class. So moving forward to Spring 2017, when I got the word that I had not passed women’s, I realized that’s two strikes:

im out.

Thankfully, I was told about their readmission process. I would have to change my major, take 9 credits, get a student academic evaluation, write a personal statement regarding dismissal and a plan for success if readmitted, and a reference from a professor I was taking from my semester out of the nursing major. It was also emphasized that I would have to get all A’s if I wanted a good chance to be readmitted.

So with that, I walked out of the nursing building into an anxiety-filled summer.

I have never dealt with anxiety before, until this moment. There would be nights I would lay in bed, kicking myself on how I should have read the syllabus more carefully, should have studied harder, should have done the case studies sooner.

Nights I would lay there and just have all of these thoughts rushing through my head, unable to sleep, hours on end. I wasn’t giving up by any means, but I was beyond disappointed and exhausted.

My dad called me one day during the summer, and told me he had a package coming for me in the mail. I went to the stoop of the condominium building I live in, and opened an amazon package containing a book titled,

Anxious for Nothing by Max Lucado

This book, that I am still reading, has been such a blessing throughout dealing with everything I had been facing. Anxiety is not something I have really ever dealt with to this degree, and this book provided a lot of relief when I felt overwhelmed.

Some of my favorite quotes include:

“Anxiety and fear are cousins but not twins. Fear sees a threat. Anxiety imagines one”

“Anxiety is not a sin; it is an emotion. Don’t be anxious about your anxiousness”

“Your anxiety decreases as your understanding of your father increases”

The best I could do, was trust in God. All I have to say, is without God I wouldn’t have been able to move forward as quickly as I did. I couldn’t do it without my faith.

During this time, I tried to do my best to lean on God and the support system that surrounded me as I continued into the readmission process.

Going into the semester in which I had to change my major was hard. Taking classes of a major I wasn’t familiar with, much less wanting to be in was hard to accept. All I wanted was to be back in nursing.

With that, I worked hard. I put forth the effort to obtain all A’s, something I’ve never done. I always, have had a semester with AT LEAST 1 B (damn you BIO 101 with Carr), but never straight A’s. So with that as my goal, I didn’t give up..

I got a reference from a professor who has history as a nurse, and went back to teaching. I received a promising student academic evaluation. I worked hard, and achieved my 4.0

I got denied my readmittance..

I was heart-broken. 2/3 done with a Baccalaureate program for nursing. I was going to be graduated this spring of 2018. Once dismissed, my vision to graduate became spring of 2019. Now denied re-admittance, I don’t know exactly when that date will be, but i’ll keep you posted haha ;)

But, one thing I do know, there will be a graduation date.

I could never give up on this. Nursing is more than a career, it’s a passion. One that will leave your life changed, in hopes that you’ve touched the life of another. I’ve never felt God so present in my life. I am more than sure that this is what God has planned for me, but just in different timing.

I am looking into other programs in the Richmond area to continue my education for Nursing. I’ll get there. I won’t ever give up.

I am a firm believer that God has a plan for me. One better than I could ever make for myself. I have to trust that. I can’t wait for the day that I am standing in my scrubs, RN badge on, and am able to look back and go, “ah, I see what you were doing there God. Thank you”. I look forward to that day.

I will be a nurse. One day. In his timing. And i will be better because of it.

Never give up on your dreams. Ever.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight” Proverbs 3:5-6

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fluffairy · 4 years

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so what’s going on with Little Miss Fluffairy these days, you ask?

•I am applying to jobs up and down the east coast during the weekdays and feeling inordinately sad and depressed and hopeless as every single day goes by that I don’t hear anything back. I know that I’ve only been applying to jobs for literally two and a half weeks and I’m expecting too much too soon but I don’t think I was ever prepared for how BAD this would feel. I’m scared, I am fucking scared, that I’ll never get a job and everyone will be right, I’ll never get a job with my fucking stupid art history degrees, and all of this will have been for nothing. Clearly that’s not true and things are moving slowly but I am so goddamn sad regardless. Applying for full time jobs brings out the absolute worst version of me, who is jealous and depressed and deeply anxious and snooping around LinkedIn and feeling progressively more hopeless.

•I got a part time job for the time being as a barista at a bookstore lmao and it’ll be fine and good because I’m getting bored and sad just being at home with my grandma every day but the fact that I’m gonna be a BARISTA, the very thing everyone always told me I’d be with my freaking art history degrees, freaked me out for a day or two, even if this is not permanent

•emailed my former MA thesis advisor to ask her some stuff and briefly mentioned me possibly applying for a PhD in the future and in her response, three days later, she said apropos of nothing, that “to be brutally honest” she does not think I have the necessary qualities to succeed in a PhD program. which uhhh,... fuck her very much??? Just another kick in the face from a professor who has hurt me so much, just another way that she’s hurt me from thousands of miles away and across an ocean. I don’t really want to go back to school for multiple years, I don’t really want to do a dissertation, I’m just thinking about it because I feel like Im in over my head with this job stuff right now. But then I will get a job and I’ll fuckin move on. But the fact that she, who never really supported me, now thinks that it’s appropriate to tell me that I could not get a PhD, makes me want to scream and throw things. If I ever want to do it, I’m damn well going to fucking do it and no one will stop me. I have no idea why any of my MA profs are educators when they clearly hate their students. I can’t believe that she thought that was appropriate to say to me.

•Me and my grandma have watched the three seasons of The Crown and now we’re watching Sherlock and I feel very early 2010s tumblr lmaooo

•I’ve read 7 books so far this year (three of them rereads but still) and now I’m rereading The Goldfinch!! I feel like a clown but also I’m excited

•I’m sad and I’m lonely and my entire life rn is job apps and books and sitting on the couch. starting my barista gig will be good but goddamn, I need to get on with my life. I want a job so bad and I’m so scared I won’t get one. I want a little flat with a little cat and a job to pay for it. I want to recover from my MA trauma, I want to not have it haunt me, I want to forget every single person who ever told me I couldn’t get into a good college, get into grad school, get an MA, and now, getting a job, which I am GOING to get eventually, but as usual, good things come to those who wait but I ain’t in a patient phase. absolutely doesn’t make it easier tho. grad school will haunt me forever and not sure I’ll stop thinking about my prof’s biting words in the near future. but I just gotta try to prove some more people wrong I guess

#post-grad

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