Nursing Student Coach
Join Lauren Chapnick, RN, as she takes you through the journey of becoming a nurse! On Nursing Student Coach, Lauren, who is a new nursing professional, along with her knowledgeable guests will give you the tools to succeed in your nursing career. They will discuss ways to reduce anxiety and stress, share tips on studying and preparing for your NCLEX, and so much more - you won't be alone in this adventure! New episodes air every Thursday.
Nursing Student Coach
Struggles in Nursing School: Personalized Coaching to Boost Your Grades and Refocus Your Mindset
Imagine no more pulling all-nighters, stressing over exams, or feeling lost in clinicals. We're here to help you combat all the hurdles that you face as a nursing student. Today we're going to share practical steps that can turn your struggles into stepping stones, enabling you to embrace not just the nursing student title, but also equip you to be the future nurse you've always dreamed of becoming. We're not just going to give you generic advice, we're offering one-on-one coaching sessions, tailored to meet your individual needs - because we believe in your unique journey.
Wondering how to stay organized, plan your studies effectively, or master tricky subjects like maternity? We've got you covered. Tune in to learn about proven exam techniques and mindset shifts that can transform your educational journey. We'll share insider tips on gaining confidence in clinicals, and how to communicate effectively with patients. Remember, every struggle you're facing is a step closer to becoming the best nurse you can be. So, join us, let's turn the struggles into strength, and fear into confidence. Prepare to be inspired, to learn, and to grow - we can't wait to take this journey with you.
Nursing school is a wild ride, but that doesn't mean you have to run and hide when the going gets tough. Don't leave your stress undiagnosed. You gotta call the nursing student coach. Real-life tips from a registered nurse, in school and out. She's seen the worst. Now, without further ado, yeah, here is your host. It's the nursing student coach.
Speaker 2:Hi everybody and welcome to Nursing Student Coach. My name is Lauren Chapnick and I am your host. I want to start today by asking you a question what are you most struggling with right now? What is your biggest struggle? Now you cannot be in nursing school and not be struggling with something. Even if your grades are top of the class, you are struggling with something. So what is the biggest struggle that you are facing right now? Is it one specific class? Is it nursing exams in general? Is it a certain professor? Is it self-care? Is it struggling to communicate with patients in clinical?
Speaker 2:What is it for you that is giving you the biggest obstacle right now to reaching your fullest potential To be the best possible nurse that you can be? What is that? One thing, or is it more than one thing? Often, it's not just one thing that we're struggling with. It's lots of different things. It's a general feeling of overwhelm, of chaos. What do I even do if I need to decompress because I don't have time, because I'm in nursing school?
Speaker 2:Well, I have a really exciting announcement today I am now offering one-on-one coaching sessions. These are online virtual sessions when we video chat and you schedule it at your own convenience, when it works for you and this is your customized time. These are 30-minute sessions, one-on-one, where we flush out whatever is going on with you and we get you to reach your ultimate potential. So what is coaching all about? Maybe you're listening to this and you're thinking Well, that sounds good, but I don't really understand. What would we even talk about? That makes me kind of nervous, I don't know. I'm going to give you an inside look as to what happens during a coaching session. I'm going to play some clips for you from some sessions with students that I'm working with right now. They've given me their permission and just to give you a little glimpse.
Speaker 2:Now, no two sessions are going to be the same. Yours might be completely different. You might not have any of the same struggles that some of these students are facing, and that's okay. I just want to give you a taste of what it would be like so that you could see if it's potentially the right fit for you. And there's no obligation.
Speaker 2:What we have is a free 15-minute introductory session. Everybody, whether you sign up for just one session or you sign up for a package, everybody will start with a free 15-minute introductory call when you can really see what you're going to see. What would this look like for me? Let's jump on a call, we'll chat, we'll talk about what's going well for you, what's not going well for you, and I will lay out a plan of what we would work on together during our time. So what I would like to do now is just play some clips from some introductory sessions. These are three different students who have three different struggles, and I'm just going to give you a taste of what happened during their introductory sessions. So take a listen Now. How do you feel about the way that you're going about studying? Do you feel that you have good techniques down as far as time management, as far as getting organized for your classes, planning your time, or do you feel like that's something you could work on as well?
Speaker 3:I feel like again, like back to last semester going into studying I didn't really have the right mindset. Like now I feel more confident in my abilities and retaining the information. So this semester I've done really well in prioritizing. Like today I'm going to do this and even if, let's say, for a farm, like a whole new subject, and you're listening to the lecture and you're like what the heck is this Like, I'm able to calm myself down and say you will get it by the end of the day. So I think that's what we're gonna do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think so too. I mean, like my whole framework is 100% mindset because, and to be confident, like it is all about putting yourself in the right mental place and it sounds like you're on the right track. But, like everybody, you probably have moments where you don't, where you do question yourself, and so I think, just like working on techniques as far as how to silence those inner monsters in your head that tell you like you're not smart enough to do this, or this is too hard, or whatever it is, I think it's an ongoing process, continuing to work on all that stuff. When you go to take the test and farm what goes wrong, do you think that you haven't quite learned it well enough yet, or do the questions themselves throw you off, even if you know it?
Speaker 4:The questions throw me off, even if I know it. I think it's a mixture of both. I feel like I should always give farm extra time. The time I did the best was when I actually started two weeks prior.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Well, that's exactly right. I think when that first, when that exam, when's your next exam? Next Friday, next Friday, and when Friday ends, you're going to start this weekend to start studying for the next one, even if all you're going to do is, once the kids are in bed, lay in bed with headphones and start listening to the lectures. But what you could do is start listening to other videos on psych meds. Yeah, just start there. When you start your day, do you have a plan for what you're going to do or do you win?
Speaker 2:Honestly no I think that would help. I think that's something to strive for. We could work on that. I would listen to as many videos as I could Anytime you have downtime or you can lend an ear to listening to something. You don't even have to be watching it Showering doing anything, driving.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to sit there and go through each drug through, but I'm going to give you the tools and give you different study ideas as to how to do better on this next one, and I want you to try something different than what you've been doing, and what you've been doing is it's not getting you where you need to be.
Speaker 4:It's not enough. It's not enough.
Speaker 2:Something's got to be different. I personally think looking at slides and studying is the most boring thing you could ever do.
Speaker 4:It has to be interactive and it has to be more fun and then I also have been writing so far what he's highlighted. So this is all on headaches and I've just been writing notes on so far what's highlighted.
Speaker 2:But I think what you need to do is focus on the need to know. I think you might be looking at all the extraneous information and you need to focus on what do I have to know? What is the most important thing to know about these drugs? How can you make your own notes a little bit more fun and make it more enjoyable because you're going to do better on something that you enjoy doing?
Speaker 2:And if you have this mental block in your head saying I don't even like farm, you're not going to do well. You have to change it somehow and say, okay, up until right now, in this moment, I haven't liked farm, but I have to like farm because I'm a nurse. My entire being is being able to educate my patients about drugs and administering drugs safely, because they're going to ask you well, why am I taking this? And if you could just remember, like the key points from your farm class, then you're going to be so much better off and you're not going to remember key points by staring at pages and pages of notes. I think handwriting notes is helpful when you're in class, but then you have to consolidate it down and get it.
Speaker 2:And that's where we're going to get you. How do you feel about nursing exam questions Like? Do you feel like you need any help? Just drilling them and breaking them down and talking about, like, why this was right, why this, like, are you doing your? Are you doing practice questions outside of class?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I do a lot of practice questions like anything that I can get my hands on, but the one thing that always tricks me up is like especially for psych there was one question about how a neighbor was hearing voices about killing his neighbor's son, and the question was actually like how would the nurse interact with the patient? Or like try to get more information out of him? And like some of all the choices seemed logical. But there's always like picked the most correct answer the one where you're not.
Speaker 3:you're not trying to make it about yourself or you want the person to say more than one word, but, like in the real world, I feel like anything could get the person to speak more.
Speaker 2:But yeah, yeah, it's learning more than one word. It's learning the language of nursing. Exam questions and psych questions are really hard and there's different techniques to answer psych questions. We can go through some of that, too, when you block out your time for the week when you sit down to do your plan, or do you have a system that you use, like do you sit down on Sunday and write out everything you need to do for the week? How does it work when you do your time?
Speaker 4:No. So I yeah, I need something more like a time block, which is not what I've been doing. I've been sticking to the same way of just like having the whole month out and just putting like, okay, test this day you know, everything is like study up until that day you know time, like give that time and like either appointments, but it's not structured, it's not Okay, yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay, we'll start our next session by. I will just give you a little like how to, on how to take that planner and how to use it to the best, like the best way that you can to be the most productive. So we'll start with like a 10 minute planner tutorial, okay, because I think you could benefit from that, and then I'll give you like different challenges to do. And then let's like I think your biggest problem right now is mindset and execution with Farm.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and it's also like I try to learn it all, like I go through the slides and I try to like retain all of it and I just no, no, here's here's what.
Speaker 2:Here's what will work better. Do all of your highlighting and stuff, like you've been doing in one color during class, but know that some of that is going to fall away If some of it sticks, great. When you're in class, don't beat yourself up if you have no idea what he's talking about, because it's okay. You don't need to know everything you need to know, so there's need to know nice to know and nuts to know.
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 2:That's what Mark Clemick, the NCLEX guy, says. Oh, yes, yeah, and I think you're focusing on the nuts, to know. We are focusing on the need to know and it's really easy to do in Farm because it's a thousand pages of slides.
Speaker 4:I think that's where I get kind of stuck or tripped up, is where I feel like, okay, if there's a question, it's like, oh, this is, I do the opposite. So if it says I'll know what it does, and then it will say, well, it's an agonist or an antagonist or it's like, he'll ask, like what the opposite of it is and I'll tell it, like what it does.
Speaker 1:So, yeah.
Speaker 4:So I need to know like okay, and if it's not doing this, it would be this instead.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. I think knowing what the question is asking, yeah, Is huge. That's everything, because you could know it and still get it wrong. Exactly.
Speaker 4:Sometimes I just feel like it's all just one big thing and I just can't. It's hard, wow, it's really hard to break the deck. It's always and like even last semester, health assessment, and health assessment was my best, and then fundamentals was my second best, but farm was always my struggle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're not alone in that. It's hard. You have a mental block of like this is hard.
Speaker 2:I don't get it. And so your mind, your subconscious, has accepted that you don't get it. And you do get it. You just need a good trick to remember those inhibitors and inducers and explain what an inducer is and what an inhibitor is. What do they do and what are they. And then I want you to just kind of try to get yourself in a different mindset and it takes training. Like every time you hear yourself say out loud or think I don't even like farm, I want you to say or write out I love farm. Farm is amazing, I love it. We have to just make a shift. We're going to make a complete shift and get you like. You don't have to love farm really, but you have to tell yourself that you love it. Yes, Are you implementing self care at all into your routine? Yeah, I definitely love my dream.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I've definitely made more of a priority to work out now. Like last semester I was like dead, like so tired all the time and I was too tired to work out, but this semester I've been really good with working out, like taking care of myself, because last semester I would come home exhausted and I didn't want to do anything. So, yeah, you're confident and like I feel like my grades are even better too.
Speaker 2:That's awesome. That's really, really good, because your mindset is everything If I think having that semester under your belt is really helpful. So what I'm hearing from you is you want to keep working on how to continue to implement self-care into your routine and Practice questions, drilling, practice questions and possibly some time management strategies. Is there anything? Is there anything else you would want to work on?
Speaker 3:I Would also say like just being confident in clinicals, because there's a big difference taking tests and actually being in the hospital or yeah, yeah, Okay yeah absolutely, we can talk about Clinicles.
Speaker 2:So do you feel? You feel like you just want more confidence in clinical?
Speaker 3:Yeah okay. Yeah.
Speaker 2:With knowing the medication.
Speaker 3:No interacting with the patients because oh, okay. Sometimes I just feel like I'm just standing there just.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's. It's something that you have to just practice and you'll get better at it. But we can absolutely talk about, like, how to get good and more comfortable with talking to patients. We can absolutely talk about that. So we'll spend some time talking about Having a plan, what it means to have a plan and how you can make it work in your life, and we can spend some time talking about study strategies for maternity.
Speaker 2:And we can even go through some different questions. Do you feel like when you walk out of? You said you feel good walking out of the exam, but when you look back at the questions you got wrong.
Speaker 5:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:Are there any patterns that you're noticing? Is it things that you just didn't know, or is it the question tripped you up?
Speaker 5:Um, a little bit of both, I think, because the PowerPoints there's so much information and I'm like I'll focus on this over this and then, like I forget about the other stuff in general, if you can Trust your first instinct, a little bit more, you're probably right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, usually it's like, your first instinct is probably right, so go with that More. But I think you're not in it. You're not in the danger zone, but let's get you more in the comfort zone. It's. It's like little shifts, it's like little tweaks that you need, and then your mind, you're getting in your own way with your own, just yeah, mindset barrier, that's it, and you can totally push through.
Speaker 4:It's true. Yes, like you said, even with, like the CYP stuff, sometimes I'm like I just kind of push it to the side. Oh, I don't want to look at that. So I yeah.
Speaker 2:Something in you and you're probably saying to yourself I'm not smart enough to get this, and you are. That's that. I think that's what it is. That's really what the truth of it is in the back of all of our minds. When we say we don't like something, it scares you because you're like I'm not smart enough to you, so are you are so smart enough to do this. It is mind over matter completely, and once you get into the oh, I love this it's, it's gonna be great. So, guys, that's it for today.
Speaker 2:I hope that this gave you a really good idea of what coaching is all about, what you can expect and if this is something that you think could be a good fit for you or maybe somebody you know. You can go to nursing student coach comm. Click on the coaching tab and all of the information, all the different packages, are right there. The first thing you would do is book a free introductory 15 minute session and we can sit down and really see if coaching would be the right fit for you. It can find out what's working for you, what's going well for you, what's not and how I can best help you. So that is nursing student coach comm. Click on coaching and from now until December 1st, if you use the promo code nsc that's nursing student coach, but NSC all caps that is a discount coupon code and you will get 10% off any single session or package. So definitely take advantage of that and until next time, guys.
Speaker 2:I thank you so much for watching. I so appreciate all the positive feedback I've been getting and it doesn't seem like it would be a big deal or make a big difference. But if you can just take a few seconds, pull out your phone, whatever platform you're listening on Google podcasts, spotify, apple podcasts if you can rate the show, give us a quick five star rating if you like what you're hearing and write a quick review, just a quick one or two sentence blurb of what you like about the show. And if you're watching on YouTube, it makes a difference if you make a positive comment, if you hit the thumbs up button and if you subscribe, because we can get this podcast in front of more prospective listeners who may not have heard it otherwise. It does change up the algorithm the more interaction and positive ratings and reviews that we have and, as we know, it is my personal mission with the show to put more great nurses in the world.
Speaker 2:So nursing is a team sport, nursing school is a team sport, and I am just so happy to have you all on my team because we are all in this together. So, guys, until next time. This is Nurse Lauren, and I hope you have an awesome day and I hope to speak to each and every one of you so soon. Bye, bye. Thanks for tuning in to the Nursing Student Coach podcast.
