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which one you take first.

Then there is routine and workflow. How do you ensure everyone gets their meds? How do you approach the complex problem of meeting all needs and yet getting all of the other work done? You have the tasks of assessment, meds, and charting when you come on shift. All of them take a good deal of time. To manage these tasks, you have to manage your time.

3. Sense of humor

You must be able to laugh. If you don't, the patients will feel it, your co-workers will feel it, and you will feel it. There will be no joy in going to work. Laughing at the antics of patients and coworkers can put a smile on your face. The old guy who is innocently flirting with you and telling old jokes is a bright spot. Use it to propel you forward in your day. Visit him when you have the chance just to laugh. People are wonderful storytellers and for the most part funny. If you can come into a room with a smile or approach coworkers with one, you are likely to encourage a sense of good feeling that helps all around you.

4. Confidence

You will get yelled at. Count on it, depend on it, it will happen. Those who don't know what they are doing - like new grads - are often frustrating for doctors. They don't understand why the nurse doesn't know a crucial bit of information. Some are just jerks and seem to enjoy making others miserable. I don't understand them, but I have encountered them. All that will get you through that time is confidence. On that phone, don't let them intimidate you. It will only make it worse. Screw up your courage and at least act like you have all the confidence in the world. They are the jerky ones, remember that. Then, when you hang up, you can cry or vent or whatever you need to respond to the pain and shame that doctor put you through. Now, don't ever think of it again. If you can do all of that, you'll get by just fine.

Should you be a nurse? That is a situational question. If you like fast paced - and I mean warp speed fast paced - you may like nursing. Understand you must work nights and holidays for a very long time, usually your whole career. If you are the type that can leave stressful things at work and not think about them, you could do nursing. If you are thick skinned and tough, it would help as well. Can you juggle a hundred things and then take on a hundred more? No? Think about this decision. It is a tough world out here.

Would I do it again? Absolutely. I had none of these traits when I started out. I have all of them now. I think they make my life better as a whole. If I would have known before how difficult my road would be, I probably still would have done it. I want to be in healthcare and have since adolescence. It is my career now, and I wouldn't go back. Nursing has shaped me into who I am today.

Learn more about this author, Lynda Lampert.
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