187 - Kennedi Newman Pt 2: It’s Okay If You Don’t Know What You’re Doing

Continue with relatively recent graduate and Spokane, Washington native Honored Guest Kennedi Newman as she chats about being okay with not knowing what you’re doing in life, how she dealt with the negative feelings and concerns that came with changing careers, the freedom that came with going to college again after already getting a degree, balancing working full time alongside nursing school, what she loved about nursing school, the importance of maintaining empathy in nursing, how med sure is more fun than you think it is, and more!

Contact us:
thanks@feedingouryoung.org to send a note of appreciation to any of our honored guests - let them know how they touched you - I'll make sure they read your praises!
info@feedingouryoung.org all other inquiries, including having host Eric Miller speak to your nursing students or nurses!
+1 (509) 666-5636 text/voicemail line

Follow us:
@feedingouryoungllc Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube

Many thanks:
Jon Holland (Jomarkho - found on SoundCloud, Spotify, and the like) Music - intro/outro/sting composition
10com Web Development Logo and website design
Jeff Burton (88 Creative) Planting and watering the seeds to start this podcast

Transcript

0:01

Oh, welcome back to the Feeding Our Young® podcast, the part two B side of the Kennedi Newman experience. Kennedi, welcome back and thank you for that lovely intro. I felt, I was gonna say, I felt like I was in your class and I'm like, I love it when we can flip the script here. But. also like to state it's real. Like that was how I would start teaching because I am just a chaotic gremlin and would just be like, all right, we're doing it. Like here we are. So, yep. oh Well, I'll start this episode flapping my gums for a minute because there was something I wanted to share at the end of your last episode. You you're talking about teaching and you're talking about having to get it. You guys, if for some reason you're catching this episode and didn't listen to Kennedi's first, go back and listen to that one. We ironically are able to fill 40 minutes of airtime without talking really about nursing much at all. And that's how we roll. and this episode will be all about that. But the long story short was, you we ended talking about why she ended being a teacher. And I just think it's the two fields to me, you you give all these shout outs and I'm going to give a shout out to my sister who's a teacher who was inspired by my dad who as he was trying to figure out his way in life, you know, he figured out that, you know, he was in a band, he could play every instrument known to man that you handed the guy, super talented, all the things. And yet he figured out you couldn't make a real strong living uh in that world unless you really took off. And so he had to figure out something else to do and ended up becoming like a restaurant manager. And then I remember I was old enough when he went back to school to become a teacher. And I mean, he, you know, by the time he was retired, and I'll say this super respectfully, he was ready to be retired and he probably should have retired a few years earlier. He loved his students and he loved like drawing things for them, playing music for them and creatively teaching them things. And yet, you could tell how hard the field was on him. And, you know, my wife is a paraeducator, so not, she's a teacher, as one person told us, she's like, no, you're a teacher, you're just not a teacher. You know what I mean? And those paraeducators, like she's, her heart is for those students who have to come and need a little bit of extra love in their life. You know what I mean? They're having a rough go at things, they're in detention, they're... doing the things and her heart is for them and her students love her. But every time she comes home, like I hear the stories, you know, without giving details, of course, she talks about how hard it is to see what students are going through these days. And I don't think that's, I don't want to say it was a ubiquitous thing all the way through history. You know, that gets into a much deeper conversation about how society has changed over the last, what, five, six decades and in relation to authority and. And that goes both ways. But the long story short is kids have it rough. Kids have it rough these days, even before the pandemic and now post pandemic and all the things. It's just life is tough. And that's the part that I think has never changed. But I'm digressing. The whole reason why I'm bringing this up is because I feel like you've got health care and you've got education. And like you said, Kennedi, you know, I mean, there's some overlap in both of those. Both of the systems in our country are broken. uh Nobody knows quite how to fix either. I do concur, even though I don't have your perspective, uh being only on the nursing side of things in that regards, I do concur that the education side is vastly more, has a lot more work that needs to be done in order to bring that up. But it's interesting that two pillars of society, two of your major pillars of society, we're hurting it. And we're hurting big time. And that makes, I like to almost look at it in an optimistic standpoint that our students, our patients, people, the fact that we're all doing as well as we are, question mark, despite these two pillars of society, you know what I mean? Trying to crumble before our eyes. It is incredible to me. It's the two pillars that get attacked. You know what I mean? When you want to talk about certain governments, I'm not trying to get into a political discussion on our country. But just, you you look historically, what do you attack? You attack education. You take away the freedom of education and reading and book burning and all of that. That's number one. And then healthcare, right? Like then you've got to control this and control that. And yet they are two of the most rewarding fields you could ever be in. And so Kennedi, I greatly appreciate that you started off by kind of opening up that door to your classroom, so to speak. Not just literally in the intro, but figuratively in your last episode. And there is a topic you wanted to talk about, and I know we haven't even covered the second half of your careers uh so far. But you want to talk about changing your career path and something you're passionate about there. So just tell us what it is that you want to share about. Yeah. So in my, in my route to becoming a nurse, what's funny is I actually didn't even plan on becoming a nurse. I went back to school for environmental science. I was like, I'm going to go study nature. And weirdly enough, I like dirt. was like, I'm going to go study dirt, like do some microbiology, something like that. And like did a semester of that and was like, love it, but what the heck am I going to do with this? And I had a friend who was like, Hey, like take some nursing classes. Like you, you might actually enjoy it more than you want. Like you're still trying to figure out what you're going to do. Like. Just try it, see what happens. Here we are, I graduated nursing school. And I really wanted to say to people like, it's okay if you don't know what you're doing. Like that's the biggest thing. It's okay if you're like sitting here and you're like, maybe I want to go to nursing school, but I'm not sure. Like gap years, love them, huge fan of them. Trade school, go for it. Military, awesome. Live your dreams. Like you do what you need to do. And it's okay if you're doing it against other people. Because I can tell you, I did not have the most support when I chose to leave. teaching and go to nursing school. A lot of people actually did not think that I had what it takes to be a nurse. They were like, I don't think you can handle and it wasn't like empathy side. were like, I don't think you can handle the blood and the guts and the poop and the throw up and all those gross things. Um, and jokes on all of you. am here and I am doing it and I do a lot of it. Um, but I want to tell people like, if you are considering like trying something new, do it. If you are like, a business major right now listening to this podcast and you're like, you know what? I've been kind of toying with nursing. Take a class, go work in a hospital volunteer there. Um, there is nothing wrong with changing your career path. I'm totally fine with outing myself to say I'm almost 30 years old now and I am so much happier having changed my career path. Um, and taking that leap of faith, it is terrifying. It's going to be one of the scariest things you do, especially if you don't have a huge support system behind you saying, yes, go do it. But if you have the passion, if you have the drive, do the thing that scares you, because you're going to regret it if you don't. And I never would have known that I love nursing and working in healthcare if I hadn't have just taken that leap of faith and tried the classes. And then now here I am doing a job I'm incredibly passionate about and can bring my past life experiences towards as well. So do the thing. I love it. Do the thing. And what I want to add, I'm going to piggyback right off of there, Kennedi, because I mean, wasn't a nurse until I was 30. And that's when I first started my nursing career. Now, granted, are there a lot of years of decent earnings that I missed out on because of that? Yeah. But uh that's the only negative because, you know, there were other things that I feel like we put so much pressure on our kids, our, you know, offspring and on society. Like, oh, what college are you going to go to? Oh, what are you gonna learn? What's your major? What are you gonna? I don't know! And if you're 18 and you don't know, what did I know at 18? I did not know a lot at 18. And especially looking back, you know what mean? And so try the things, do the things, and you may stumble into what you love. And you may go into something and be like, well, that was absolute horse crap. That was not what I thought it would be. I definitely don't want to do that. So it took you what, a couple years to figure that out? guess what you've got a long life you know assuming that nothing weird happens like you've got a long life ahead of you yeah no we're talking an average lifetimes or average lifespan yes you've got plenty of time so try the thing because again and I only have it from the limited perspective of going from peds oncology to postpartum And I've talked about it before on the podcast that I was terrified just to do that Just to go to a different field within the same career that I'm already doing and that was terrifying and yet guess what I am so so grateful I did it because that opened the door to so many other things that either I was dragging my feet on or wasn't motivated yet to do or you know I don't know whatever fell in the blank. So let me Kennedi this this segue is naturally Everybody's like, just talk about nursing. Please, dear God, talk about nursing. And we're going to get there. I promise you. But I want to because this is the juncture between education and nursing for you. And this segues into one of the answers you gave to the question of um share about any challenges you've had in life. Talk to us about that. Yeah, I mean, the hardest challenge for me to date, I would like to say, I still have a long life to live, uh was making that decision to go back to school and to go into nursing. ah I really spent a lot of time with those negative feelings of feeling like I failed myself and I failed everyone's expectations for me and I failed those who supported me going as a teacher because I didn't stick to it. And I also felt like I... failed my students and that I did them a disservice by choosing to leave. And thankfully I had quite a support team behind me as well. I had the haters and I had the supporters. They were both there and thankfully my supporters were louder and they got me through it. And shockingly, here's the shocking part to everybody who is making big life choices. ah No one's as mad as you as you think they're gonna be. Your brain is your worst enemy. ah The only people who got mad at me were my students and it was not the like, oh, how dare you leave us? I mean it kind of was but like it was more the like, what you're not gonna be here next year? Like what? And but also the side of no, we're really proud of you Newman they called me by my last name oh and so Like do the thing like people are gonna be upset no matter what you do whether you do it or not It's you who matters and your opinions of yourself and do the thing Like, if you're on a unit in your hospital that you hate, do the thing, like change your units. Because you get one life, you get to live that one life. like, talk it through, obviously. Don't just be in full-foot. Or do, live your dreams. ah But like, I'm not, I can't tell you what to do. Live your dreams, do your thing. You get one life and like don't waste it on what other people think. And that's like the biggest lesson I took out of this was because. So many people had their opinions on me deciding to go back to school or not. And they still do. But I did the thing and I'm so much happier in my life because I did it. All it takes is like going for like a walk outside and a fresh perspective and just taking some time to think about it. But you're going to be so mad at yourself for not taking those chances like you said, like just try it. What's the worst that could happen? You don't like it. Okay. Go somewhere else. Like You have a long life to live, so what it takes a couple of years to get there. I don't feel behind just because I'm now starting nursing. I love this and I love what you started off with that when you said, you know what I mean, like it's not usually the voices, even though there may be negative voices in your life telling you this is, what are you doing? This is crazy. It's the negative voices in your head that you're making it out like, oh, these people are absolutely gonna just, you know, burn me to the ground. My wife and I were just talking about this, about, you know, family members of hers that she was like, I was pretty sure I made this particular family member really upset and I hadn't talked to them for a few months. And I was like, nope, you know what, I'm gonna reach out, I'm gonna say hi and do all the things, even though my fears are saying that they're upset with me and they weren't upset at all. And so be very careful with that everybody. And the other thing I wanna piggyback off of that, keeping this very professional of course, is that old saying, it might be cliche, but that uh opinions are like butt holes. Everybody's got them and most of them stink. So don't live your life based on the opinions of others, okay? That's how that works. All right. Speaking of body parts nursing, nice, nice smooth segue. So Kennedi, you decide to become a nurse, you know what I mean? Well, you decide to go into environmental sciences and then you try out some nursing classes and then you decide you want to be a nurse. Talk to us about nursing school and particularly from the perspective of someone who A, had already gotten a master's degree in another field for the love of. goodness gracious, but also be from the perspective of someone who it wasn't like, this light bulb moment, I am definitely gonna be a nurse until it happens, right? What is nursing school like for someone like you? It's a different experience. I mean, I think I went into it with the perspective of I've done this before, like school. Like I didn't feel like I needed to join all the clubs, like the nursing school clubs. I didn't feel like I needed to get straight A's because everybody hears the term C's get degrees. It's entirely real. You're gonna get C's in nursing school. You're gonna get humbled. If you're a straight A student, you're gonna go in and be like, oh my gosh, I got like a 70 % on this MedSurg test. This is wild. That's normal. Like, honestly, hospitals don't look at your GPA when you graduate. ah And so I went in with that perspective of like, recognize, like, yes, GPA is nice. Getting your little quarter graduation is nice, but like, it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. What matters is my hands-on experience and what I put into this. ah And I went in, so I did my prereqs and I decided I was like, you know, let's be a CNA first. Let's go work at the hospital and be a CNA. So I started as a CNA while doing my prereqs at the same time, went into nursing school. My first year of nursing school stayed as a CNA as well. I was a flip-full CNA, worked on, can actually say now I have worked on pretty much every single unit in this hospital that you and I both work at, including I've worked with you. ah So I went, I went and was a CNA and then I became a nurse tech my last year of nursing school, hopped around on a bunch of different units there, got to try different things going through it. And so for me, What was more important wasn't my test scores. Going into that, it was more about my hands-on experience and getting that like in the hospital experience and doing the things and trying to do all the things. Because I recognize that there's so much information that you know, and every nurse was going to tell you, you learn how to be a nurse on the units after you graduate. And you just learn how to pass a test in nursing school. And I stand firm on that. ah You learn how to pass the test. Like it is a hoop you have to jump through. You learn important information for sure. They teach you skills. They teach you hands-on opportunities, but you also learn a lot of stuff that is just to pass a test to say, hey, look, I did the thing. And I think going in with that mindset of having already had two degrees, I could go in and be like, okay, like this is going to be hard, but I do also know kind of routes that work for me for studying. So that was helpful. I already knew. I wasn't into like, like I said, the clubs. Like I was like, I'm not going to join every club. I don't have time for that. because realistically, I was working full time at the same time as going to nursing school full time, ah which is wild. And it was, don't know how I made it. Honestly, I think I blacked out a little, uh but we're here. I did it. Passed my exam, so we did all the things. uh And so like that was really hard because I was like, I don't have extra free time for things. I'm an older student, like going through this. Granted, yes, there were students older than me with kids. Um, and like my best friend, two of my friends, one of them went through her, like her second year, she was two weeks postpartum after a C-section, week to two weeks coming into her second year of nursing school. Wild to me. Those are incredible women. Um, and so like, it was a different perspective for sure. Having already had two degrees going into this because I think I had less, um, less of a like BS, like I had more of a BS threshold. I did not have the energy for the BS. that is some of the things that happen in nursing school. And so I think it added a little bit more like straightforward trajectory for me of like, I'm going to do the thing and I'm just going to get through it. Because I was just trying to survive a little bit, but I made it. We're here. Yeah, yes, yes, we are. And I'm so excited for you in that regards. Would you say also that not only was your BS meter much higher, but uh perhaps there's a tendency for some, like you said, Cs get degrees, you get focused on being a good student, GPAs, numbers, As, all the things. Like, did that, did your prior experience also help kind of maybe beat that, any bit of that that existed in you out of you? Yeah, absolutely. Because you're going to burn out if you just try to constantly achieve like those A's and B's. Because again, grades don't matter once you graduate. Like nobody's going to ask you what your GPA is once you graduate. And so I think for me, I was able to pace myself and say like, what's your threshold? Like what's your moment where you're going to burn out and just fail this test because you're so dead to the world. And so I think that really built like this aspect of like I don't have to be perfect to get through nursing school because most of the nurses I've met and worked with, none of them got straight A's through nursing school. And we all graduate, we all take the same taste test at the end. We all pass it in some way, shape or form, whether it takes you one, two, three tries. I don't know what the max is for how many tests you can take, but whether it takes you a couple of tries, we all still get there. And most of the time you can have a straight A student and a straight C student from nursing school and they'll end up on the same unit together. Mm-hmm. I think that's an important thing to keep in mind too. Like don't burn yourself out on those perfect grades and those perfect test scores because it's not an accurate depiction of what you're capable of. That is, there's a quote for a t-shirt right there. That is a quote for a t-shirt. And I'll shed some light on this on my own. Like, I'll tell you what, like, you know, again, learning later in life, right, had done kind of this ministerial path for a little while. And then realized that full-time ministry was not for me. I love teaching. I love teaching the students. I was a children's ministry director for a number, a couple of years and loved teaching the students. It was everything else that I absolutely despised. You know trying to do the organizational side of it and in the poll of the political side of it It's very much. There's a lot going on there, and that's not to whatever I'm not throwing anybody into the bus from back in the day, so I took this detour all right Well, then I got to get back to school I got to do other things and I've already talked about how you know nursing came to be as part of that but when I decided to make that we had our first son and He was a few months old we moved over to Spokane totally relocated our life and the whole goal was to get back So at that time I was working full time and going to SCC doing prereqs, but I could only do one prereq at a time. So I was joked it was my four year, two year degree when I graduated with my ADN. And so because I had to do one prereq per quarter, and it was just a, and you you kind of get through the easy stuff. My first one was like sociology and that instructor who's an amazing woman and actually works in healthcare as well. You know, she's, she's still followed, like, it's just amazing uh how these connections work. And yet, um always a good student, you know what mean? That's never been anything I've had to worry about. Horrible athlete. Never tried out for the football team, shockingly enough, if you've seen my body frame. But uh no, it was always a great student. And so much so that when I finally got into A &P and we got through our first accident and all the things, and I finally got into A &P, and that was a two quarter type deal, you had to do one class and then a second class, the way SCC was built at the time. I, both of those I got I think it was 102 % uh and 104 % in in anatomy and physiology and the reason that's not a brag on me what I'm saying is I could memorize like nothing else I had all the systems in place to go do the things that I needed to pass anatomy and physiology did I take extra time so I could get those hundred no I didn't care about that part of it it was just that I was studying so much and so hard that I I was able to ace them And I was very excited about that. And then you get to nursing school. And like you said, you have that like, oh this is mid 70s. and we're happy about this. People are happy about this. Okay, what, what am I doing wrong? And that's not the question you ask yourself. It's not, that's not the case. You are right where you need to be. And I love for you, Kennedi, that like you said, you had already been through. already done the things. And it sounds to me like it took this weight off your shoulders that so many nursing students, myself included, when I went for the first time. You go into school and you have these, either whether it's perfectionism or expectations that are placed on you by others or yourself, and you're trying to get through it all. And yet here you are to me, like I felt unburdened listening to you talk about this. Like I knew that all I needed to do was pass. Like I'm okay, you know what I mean? And so, This is gonna, maybe you've already answered this question because of that, but what would you say to those that are like, my gosh, you were able to do this and still work full time as a CNA, other than blacking out, how else did you balance those two things? I thankfully, so I ended up being fortunate enough to go to nursing school at the same time as my best friend. We were in the same class together. Um, and I would, I would say find your group. Like that is so important. Find your support group. Um, find the nursing students you are suffering with. Um, and I say suffering. Yes. It feels like you are when you're in the midst of it afterwards. You're like, okay, that's not actually the worst thing that I'm going to experience in my life, but it feels like it when you're in the middle of it. So find your people and lean on those people because you need them. and it is a weight off your shoulder when you can have that mindset of, just got to pass. Like I just got to get through it because some of the hoops you have to jump through are just that they're hoops. They are state standards, national standards that are set aside. And you'll see when you go from nursing school into like actual nursing, so many nurses are like, okay, so this is what they teach you to do. This is what you're actually going to do. This is real world nursing. Nursing school is not real world nursing. And I feel like we don't like a lot of teachers, at least mine, were very real about that. They were like, this is not real world nursing. This is just NCLEX world. You're going to hear that a lot. So once you realize like, I'm just going through school and like, I'm going to get a degree at the end of this. And the fact is my test scores don't matter as long as I pass. Because again, like I said, they are not an accurate depiction of what you are capable of. Test scores do not define you. Your grades don't define you because A lot of people, and I'm finding this, lot of nurses are not test takers. They don't do well on tests. ah They are not the textbook people. We don't, we aren't textbook people. We are hands-on people. We are the, we learn by doing the thing. And unfortunately, nursing school doesn't allow you so much time doing the hands-on things. uh But you are more likely to be able to show what you're capable of by doing the things. And you're going to realize the test scores are going to suck. but also your real life skills and knowledge, like that's incredible because you take what you learn in class and you use it in clinicals, you use it in the real world and you're like, I do know things. But when you go to take that test, that stressful anxiety inducing test and do those assignments, your brain is going to be completely blank. And you're going be like, what the heck are these things? I don't even remember learning this. You did, you know it, you apply it in your day to day. um But those test scores aren't accurate. They just don't define you. And I feel like so many people don't talk about that. Like you go in and there's all this external pressure, right? Like everybody's like, you gotta get these good grades. Like that's how you define us in nursery. Like if you get good test scores, like top of your class, you're gonna be an incredible nurse. And that's not true. That's not reality. And I feel like we need to spend more time talking about the reality of like nursing schools, I hope to jump through and you just gotta do it and you get to the end and then you get to do the thing you're really excited and passionate about doing. And you do learn things in nursing school that you don't learn at all. Mmm. I'm gonna say something that's ubiquitous to that as well as patient care and all the things and it's this don't focus on the numbers That's what just popped into my brain. Don't focus on the numbers when you're in school Don't focus on the test numbers when you're a nurse Don't be so caught up in the numbers of what you're seeing on your monitors, etc Etc that you're missing the whole clinical picture and you'll see it in your patients who will also and their loved ones who will also get caught up in the monitor and will be like, my gosh, I remember taking care of someone at the end of life in my Peds Oncology career. And the family wanted the monitor on for assurance. And we will happily provide that. We give the education, hey, you know what I mean? This is your time with your loved one. I'm gonna encourage you focus on your loved one, not on that screen. If it's providing assurance, we will provide it as long as you wish. But we have now reached the point in your loved one's life. where we can comfortably turn that off and we're just focusing strictly 100 % on comfort. I like, it gets me choked up thinking about it. Don't focus on the numbers. Don't focus on the numbers. Just enjoy the process as best you can. Do the thing, go through it, get the hoop jumped through so that you can do the things that really matter. So, oh, I'm so glad you brought that up. So Kennedi. Anything else? uh Nursing school itself, what'd you love about nursing school? I mean, it sounds like you're not doing a lot of the extracurriculars and all the things. Wonderful. um But what did you love about nursing school in particular, if anything? really loved like the ability to try different things and learn different things. um For me, I went to Washington State University, so I can only speak to our program specifically. But we each semester is a different thing usually in every nursing school. And you got to go to different hospitals, different environments to work on them. So doing med surg clinicals, getting ICU days, which I sacrificed my ICU day for an OR day. I traded somebody and so working in the operating room. working on, I don't even, in the ER, like you get to try different things and I really love that. Like I, like doing psych was such an interesting experience for me for where I was placed. But I always like joke, I learned how to play chess from a psych unit. Like that's where I was. I had never played chess before, but one of the patients taught me how to play chess. And that's always one of my fun little stories that I get to tell people. Or like I did for my community health. semester I got to go work with the Spokane Cares Unit out in the community and work with the social workers here and the fire department and go do house calls with people and that was a really cool different experience to have because it wasn't nursing like I didn't really do nursing experience there but I got to go be out in the community and see the other outreach programs that we have and maybe I talked to people about their medications but other times I would just get to talk to people about being people. And so I really think nursing school provides so many different opportunities for you to kind of find your niche, but then just experience things you normally wouldn't get to experience. Yes, and that dovetails beautifully into something else you wanted to talk about and that is uh empathy and nursing and meeting people where they're at. What did you want to share about that? Yeah, so I think that's so important. We talk about how like nurses are like the most trusted profession. You're going to hear that like 50 bajillion times in nursing school. And I'm not even joking. You're going hear them say that all the time. Like nursing is ranked the number one trusted profession in the like world basically. And I feel like that comes a lot because we all have this natural innate empathy that exists. But you're also going to find those nurses who have been nursing for maybe a little too long, who have lost their empathy and lost their ability to just meet people where they're at. And I think that's something to just always keep in mind is meeting people where they're at. I was used to say as a teacher, like students are just a victim of the circumstances life put them in. It's the same thing with adults. It's the same thing with infants. It's the same thing with whatever age range you work with and whatever mental ability you work with. They are just victims of the circumstances life put them in and a lot of their behavior is learned behavior. I mean, anyone who works on a med surg floor can say, we have a ton of behavioral patients. that's just very common. You have medical that goes with mental, like those are connected together. Um, and I think we get burnt out so much on our hospital units. Nursing school also does that to you. Um, you hear a lot of biases that appear in nursing school, appear in the units you work with, appear with the nurses you're working with and that kind of impacts and shapes you. And like, I guess this is the part of this whole podcast that is seeing that there's other perspectives and things that have impacts on you. And we're trying to shape you in a positive manner. Um, and I feel like. We lack empathy the longer we do this job because you do get burnout and that's normal. And ah you and I talked about this and I will out myself, I'm going to be sick this week, quote unquote sick because you just need those mental health days and they're a thing because you start to notice that empathy go away. And when you start to see that and you start to get apathetic, that's important when you take that stuff back and you go, do I need to change my unit? Do I just need to be sick this work day and take some extra time off? Because you're human and It's important that like we are meeting patients out there where they're at, but we're also meeting ourselves where we're at and having that empathy for ourselves. And I think that's something we really forget. And I want to emphasize in this podcast for me, is that act of not just being empathetic with yourself, being empathetic, like, or towards others, being empathetic with yourself, the site of taking, giving yourself grace, giving others grace, that burnout is going to happen. You're going to hear people from everywhere and those nurses who have been on those units for 30 years. who are just like, that person's just drug seeking or that's just like, they're just so annoying and they'll be bullying others and talking bad about patients and that's gonna exist. And I think as us, that new generation coming into nursing, it's so important to take what they say with a granosol and also kind of ignore them. And also if you're brazen, like I am, push back on them a bit and say, hey, like, what's your deal? And have that empathy because it's something that I'm noticing. goes missing the longer you're in this job field. And I think it's something that we need to do better at as nurses is making sure that that empathy stays. Mm. You bring to mind The Pitt right? Everybody's watching The Pitt these days. season- Oh, I won't ruin it. It really sucked how everybody died in the finale of the second season, but it's okay. It's fine. Yeah, the bomb was not great. Anyway. Yeah, it was awful. It was awful. Uh, no, but I just- Yeah, okay, now how do I do this without ruining it? Because I did want to go straight to season two finale. Well, this is no secret. Like, you see it. You see it in- You know, we're looking at as close to real life as you can get. Inside an ER, it's been, know, everybody says it time and time again, you you got ER docs telling their families that didn't understand what they were going through, nurses, providers, hey, just go watch this show. That's as close as I can describe to you exactly what I'm going, hmm, what I'm going through. And you know, Dr. Robbie is, you see it in season one, you see it in season two. He's borderline, he's not just borderline burnout, he's borderline, you know what mean? And it's brutal to watch, but it's also looking at it from the inside. Like, yeah, you see it, you see that burnout. And some of the things he says in that season two finale, you know, about, cause he's trying to go on this sabbatical. I'm not gonna talk about, know, again, I don't wanna give anything away if you haven't seen season two, but he's trying to, and he's talking with one of his, best doctor friends there, you know, in that ER and they're having this conversation and talking about like, and he's like, you know what? No, like some of the best things I've ever done in my life, I've done here. But the theme that keeps coming up both in season one and season two is, you know, he's almost coming at it from, and you'll see it, you'll see it in those with burnout. He comes from a standpoint of like, well, you know, uh Not that he's overtly saying this place will fall apart if I'm not here But that is what he's implying in many of the things he says and some of the other characters some of the other people in his life are like hey this place has existed before you and it'll exist after you despite these amazing things that you do and yeah, we'd love to have you we need you and does he need this place and there's this whole conversation about all of that and yet Sometimes I feel like those that are in burnout A, you stay because of comfort, right? Like in getting borderline burnt out for me in peds oncology. Same thing, like you stay because I'm comfortable, I'm scared to try something new. That was my reason for maybe not changing things up. But for other people, it's like, you know what I mean? I do so many good things there. Yeah, great, amazing, yes. And yet, are you also maybe causing some harsher things to happen as well? of your attitude, you know, that apathy that has sunk in and not saying you have to quit, maybe you find a different field, maybe you find a different way to change things up or to add a new, you know what I mean, start teaching, start doing whatever you know, whatever you think might be passionate for you, start doing a little bit of that on the side so you can at least just mix things up because here's the other thought, if I stayed in Pied Zonk, man, I can tell you right now, you know, I would have made still difference in my patients, I loved it and all the things. If I was there for these last six years, since I left that field, I can guarantee I'd be a little bit more cynical than I already was becoming. I can guarantee I probably would have been rubbing my peers a little more the wrong way and God forbid, it might have even started affecting my patient care. that's what I, those things, looking at those things six years ago was what made me ultimately go, I need to face my fears. because I cannot become that person. And guess what I was also doing? If I had stayed in that role, I was keeping a position from someone else who is newer, fresher, or has a more reinvigorated, and I hate saying this, but having a more reinvigorated passion for that field than I did in that moment. I started out that way. But you go down that road and you lose a bit of that, and guess what I'm holding back? I'm holding, hmm, I'm holding back. someone else who can fill that role better than I could in that moment. And that is hard to say, and yet it's 100 % truth. All right, well, let's talk about dream units. Let's talk about dream units, talk about dream jobs, right? I got my dream job. I got my dream job at a nursing school, and that's how it always goes, right? No, of course it isn't. And I knew how grateful I was, because God forbid I go somewhere I didn't want to go to start with. Is there an issue there? the audacity of having to go somewhere you didn't want to be. oh, that never happens to anybody. my goodness. I, I really want to emphasize this. Um, there is such a hate for med surg units that exists in nursing. Everybody hates them. Um, or not everybody hates them, I'd say, but you go into nursing school and everyone's like, I don't want to be on a med surg unit. That's where like. you hate your life and it's just absolutely awful. And then you do clinicals and the meds are units are chaotic. I won't lie. And you're like, I don't want to do it. I want to go ICU. I want to go labor and delivery. I want to go into the OR. Like you want to go straight into those things. And the reality of it is you're probably not going to go straight into those things. ah And I want to be real with that. Like, it's, you're going to feel so disappointed. Like it is, it's, it's hard and it's a little humbling because you think, I worked this whole, like I worked my butt off to get through nursing school. And this comes back to that grade thing, right? Like I'm a straight A student, why didn't I get the ICU job? ah It just really is difficult. And you see a big move towards residencies right now too. Like most hospitals are requiring their residency to be completed your first year. And guess what? Most of those residencies are on Med Search floors. You're not really gonna see too many pop up in those specialty units. So yes, you have a driving force and you really wanna get onto those specialty units. ah But you're probably not, like just gonna be real with you, you're probably not gonna start. on a specialty unit unless you got an in, unless you got somebody else who works there, unless you really, really row or have this extensive resume, or if you just luck out and there's an opening and you're able to get that residency. I know a lot of people do nurse tech jobs at my hospital, and a lot of them were able to utilize that to get onto those specialties. That's amazing. That's incredible. But for the vast majority of people who graduate nursing schools, you are unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you view it, gonna end up on a med surg floor. I am a great example of that. I work on a med surg for right now, a medical respiratory. Um, I went and chose that unit because I've worked on it before as a CNA and does a nurse tech and I love my staff and the staff is incredible. You're going to find your people on those med surg units. Like it's going to be scary when you first start and you're going to be like, I have this mindset of maybe I don't really want to be here. Um, but you're going to find your people and you're going to find it's way better than you think it is. A med surg gets such a bad rap and it is exhausting. It is chaotic. There was a lot of behavioral. is busy, busy, busy. Um, I was blessed also to start immediately out of residence or like out of school with a day shift residency, which is also like a unicorn position. You don't get day shift. You usually start night shift, go to day shift, work your way through the world. I wish it was all sunshine and roses and you could start where you wanted to in nursing, but unfortunately it's kind of one of those professions you do have to earn your keep a little. You got to work your way through it. I'm blessed to those people who got to start where they wanted to. And I love that for you. I unfortunately was not able to relocate. wasn't able to go. magically to somewhere else that offered me a residency in my dream unit. And so I had to come to terms with the fact that I was gonna start med surg even though it wasn't somewhere I wanted to be. ah And I'm a year into it and I can tell you, you'll survive, it's great. It's actually more fun than you think it is. It's stressful, it's chaotic. med surg can be really hard. uh It's one of those units you don't know if you're gonna walk into a day where you get to have a full YAP session with your besties and that's all you get to do that day. Or if you're going to be running and getting like so many steps in. I will say on average, I get like 13 to 14,000 steps by the end of my day, which is wild. They like to separate my patient rooms though. So I commonly am running around. It's not as bad. really, I mean, Eric knows he's worked with me before. I would love to be on Mother Baby or Labor and Delivery, or I would love to, I'm also looking going like ICU ED route and going life flight. Or on the flip side, I have begun starting to think about becoming a clinical instructor because also that might be a really good route for me as a former teacher. Whatever your route is that you want to go to, like it's not the end of the world to start somewhere you don't want to because you're still getting skills. You're still learning a lot. You're still getting like these absolutely like some of them are niche hands on skills. I work on a respiratory unit. I deal with all of the respiratory equipment. I deal with also chest tubes. I deal with aspera drains, which if you don't know what that is, go Google it. They're kind of cool. I deal with these very niche things on my unit and it's something I didn't expect to learn about or like get involved with because I was like, I'm going to go labor and delivery. And that didn't happen and that's okay. ah Because you have to kind of come to terms with that because, and flip your mindset, because so many people are going to be like, you're starting on a med-surg unit? Oh, that's so unfortunate for you. But guess what? You're starting as a nurse. Like you're starting on a unit, you have a job and it's really cool because all these people are so excited to have you there. You're fresh, you're young ish. You're ready to do the thing and you are still having that learning curve that occurs and you're learning how to be a nurse still. Um, and med surg is okay because you're learning so much. Like there is so much more than you think you're going to learn on a med surg unit. Um, And it teaches you also a lot of empathy and bedside manner skills that I think is really important, especially if you've never been a CNA, that you don't necessarily get when you go straight into a specialty because now you've got a more transferable skills. Like you have a broader base to go to. And that really makes you able to get jobs in the places that you want to be because you can say, I have these experiences now. If you're somebody who really wants to go ICU, try to get onto a cardiac. tell the floor, try to get onto a respiratory floor because then you have that experience with the respiratory equipment. You have that experience with learning. my gosh, EKGs, things like that. Um, I don't, I don't do that. I don't do telemetry. I couldn't read it. I can't tell you what someone's heart form is. I don't know any of that stuff, but I can tell you respiratory equipment. I can talk to you about that, which is something I never expected to have. Um, and you still see a lot of those things that you thought you wanted on your specialty unit, like on your floor. Like I work on a respiratory unit. Have I had postpartum moms? Yes. Have I had pregnant moms? Yes. I have had those on my unit. They come there all the time because guess what? MedSurg covers everything. Those special niches you want come to your unit. Maybe not NICU. I'm not going to get an infant on my unit. That'd be a little weird. ah But you still get those transferable skills to go into what you want. And I think people need to like be more excited for MedSurg. Like, yes, it's hardcore and it gets such a bad rap. Also, recognize it might just be a stepping stone in your nursing journey and that's okay. Most med surg nurses and med surg floors understand they are the stepping stone. Some nurses get into it and they love it, but it comes back around to that. You don't know until you try it and you don't really get much of an option with where you go when you graduate. So just try it. What's the worst that can happen? You actually love it? Who knows? Or like, God forbid you finish your residency and then you start applying other places. Like, there's nothing wrong with that because you're still learning and you're still growing. And I think there's a lot of, there's a lot you can learn from going somewhere you didn't plan on going. Oh, so good. And I'm gonna piggyback off of that and add to that. I'm gonna give you a little secret everybody and that is that you know you talk about medsurg being so busy and so crazy and there's so many things and I'm not denying that in any way shape or form but what I will add to that is that guess what some of these other nursing areas that you are planning on going to sure you want to go to the ICU you only have two patients wonderful you're still busy um Mom, baby, mom, baby, my gosh, even within our own community, we had a labor and delivery once, uh labor and delivery nurse once say that the mom, baby nurses were glorified waitresses. ah So um let me tell you, we are also just as busy. um Rarely will you see a bunch of mom, baby nurses sitting at a nurse's desk, holding babies and loving on them and just talking and talking and talking. No, that is, I think that sometimes we have unrealistic expectations of what various specialties are, especially if you didn't get a chance to nurse tech in them or CNA in them or do, know, see any sort of whatever while you're in nursing school. And so just keep in mind that wherever you go, I think it's more about like what you're saying, Kennedi, keeping an open mind, keeping an open heart, learn what you can learn from there. And if you fall in love with it, stay. And if you don't go somewhere else. Kennedi. oh You're just preaching it today. ah Before we close in our traditional manner, was there anything else you wanted to talk about that we didn't touch on? Not that I can think of, no. I love it. And you will think of it as your head hits the pillow tonight, you'll be like, Eric, dang it, we didn't talk about this, that, or the other. And I'll be like, OK. So with that, you chose three very unique and amazing words, which we heard back in that previous episode that you used to describe nursing school. What were they and why did you pick them? So the first word I chose was adventurous. So nursing school and nursing, I apply it now that I've graduated, is very adventurous. It's one big adventure. And you literally do not know what you're going to get each day, especially with your clinical days. You're going to go in and you're going to be like, today I'm going to be on the cardiac floor. Like, I'll probably get to see a bunch of cardiac stuff and be really specialized and talk to the doctors. And maybe, yeah, you'll get a code and you'll get to see your first code as a nursing student, which I hope you do. I'm a nurse and I've never seen or experienced a code yet. So like, that's going to be a moment for me. hold, I'll hold the flushes, but you never know what you're going to get when you go in. And it's just one big adventure and you're just kind of along for the ride. You could get a code. You could be sitting there holding the hand of a family member as their significant other passes. You could be just handing out sandwiches and warm blankets in the ER that day. You could be doing so many different things and it's just you never know what you're gonna walk into. And it's just one big adventure that you're along for the ride. The whole part of nursing school, so just enjoy it. It's kinda like you're kayaking or paddleboarding a river and then all of a sudden you hit some rapids every now and then. You'll be fine, you'll make it through. It's an adventure. Just have fun with it because it is fun even amidst all of the wild things that you experience. So that's my first word. My second word plays into that of it's chaotic. Nursing school is chaotic and I feel like we don't discuss that enough. ah It is chaotic. Again, it goes down to that you never know what you're gonna get. uh Some days you're gonna feel like you're on top of the world and other days you are not gonna know what the heck is going on. And that's okay. Inverse the chaos, it sucks. Some days you're gonna have a mental breakdown. That's normal. Find your friends, find your people, go outside and touch some dirt. ah but it is chaotic and I feel like we should just sit in the reality of that a little bit. And then lastly, think also plays into this serendipitous. If you don't know what the word serendipity means, it means finding something good without looking. Nursing school and nursing is that. You are finding something good without looking because even through all of the stress and the chaos and the late nights and the mornings you come to clinicals at 5 a.m. and you have no idea what's going on and you're so sleep deprived, you're still finding something good out of it even when you're in the suck of it and you just get to embrace the things that you weren't expecting and finding those little bits of joy throughout the whole thing. You know what I love about this, Kennedi, is that, you know, I have people pick three words and then you describe them at the end. And I don't know how many times it is that we get to the end of someone's episode or episodes. And I'm just like, these are the three things, like this is the thread of, you know what I mean? Like that just existed throughout both of your episodes. And it's not necessarily even a conscious thing. And I just love the fact that, you know, all of those things you touched on and amplified even greater throughout. So great words, great rationale. Nobody listened to them. Nobody listened to anything that came before this. I don't know why. They're rude. Whatever it is. They're in a rush. They only want the one piece of advice that you want to give them to hold onto for the rest of their lives. No pressure. What would that one piece of advice be? My one piece of advice for both nurses and nursing students listening to this is don't forget that you're human too. You put so much time and energy into others, into your job, into your family, into your career, into school, but that's not all of you and it's not all of who you are. You're more than just a nurse and I think that's really important to remember. is that you are more than just your career path. You are more than the time and energy you put into your patients, into your job, into what you do. You are a human. Take those breaks. Take that space. Let yourself cry. Have a meltdown. Because when you get through nursing school, when you get to the end of your work day and you get home, you're more than just a nurse. and go outside, look up, look out, look away from the things that demand your attention or right in front of your beady little eyes. Just bringing that back around full circle in canady. Just absolute pure gold, thank you so much. uh I knew this would be a delightful time and yet it somehow proved to be even more delightful. So thank you so much for you and Captain Dingus taking time out of your days to come hang. Thank you, this has been so much fun, I've really enjoyed it.