To avoid freaking out in nursing school, prioritize self-care (sleep, exercise, hobbies), master time management with dedicated study blocks, lean on your support system (study groups, instructors, friends, therapists), and manage anxiety with deep breathing and by remembering that asking questions and making mistakes are part of learning. Focus on preparation through consistent practice, use campus resources like tutors, and recognize that the intense period is temporary.
Practice your skills, expect the unexpected, don't be afraid to say ``I don't know, but I will look it up.'' to your instructors if they ask a question out of the blue. Give yourself self-care each day, whether it's an hour of exercise, turning your phone off, or a hobby.
Beginning a new career and starting nursing school come with a lot of emotion. For some, the overarching feeling is one of excitement but for others, nursing school brings forth intense fears. Despite how it feels, fear is a completely normal emotion when it comes to starting something new.
Gradual exposure: start with low-intensity contact (watch videos of nurses at work, read patient testimonials), then progress to brief real-world interactions (brief check-ins at clinic reception) and later to longer encounters. Move at a pace that raises anxiety mildly but not overwhelmingly.
Nursing is portrayed as the most difficult major because it uniquely combines heavy, interconnected academics with supervised, high-stakes clinical practice and emotional labor, all under continuous assessment and systemic constraints.
In the same way, Medical-Surgical Nursing, Chemistry, Maternal & Child Health Nursing, or even Psychology could be the hardest nursing classes for certain prospective students. Also, these are the most failed class in nursing school.
Other sought-after personality traits of a nurse include:
Essential components of hourly rounding, often referred to as the “5 P's”, include assessing pain, restroom needs, proximity of possessions, patient position, and safety of environment for patients every hour during waking hours (Brosey & March, 2015).
You should not feel like you cannot work as a nurse if you experience anxiety. Many nurses with anxiety deal with their situations in positive ways that actually make them better nurses. And given the variety of potential work environments, a job change may work wonders.
Nursing school pushes you through every emotion — fear, pride, stress, joy, frustration, excitement, and exhaustion. The most important thing is allowing yourself to feel what you feel without shame. Crying doesn't make you weak. It makes you human.
As new nurses are only beginning to apply their theoretical knowledge to clinical practice, they are not yet able to meet the demands of their new work environment. They also lack communication skills, teamwork experience, and the practical knowledge of more experienced nurses.
The 5-5-5 rule for anxiety is a grounding technique that uses deep breathing and sensory focus to calm the nervous system: breathe in for 5 seconds, hold for 5 seconds, and exhale for 5 seconds, repeating this cycle while also identifying five things you can see, five you can touch, and five you can hear, helping to interrupt anxious thoughts and bring you back to the present moment. It's a simple way to reset, calm your mind, and shift focus from worries to your physical sensations and surroundings.
Most of the student participants, regardless of academic year, shared similar fears pertaining to unintentionally making a medical error that would hurt a patient.
Nursing students may face challenges during clinical placements, ranging from a lack of learning opportunities or support to bullying or being used as 'an extra pair of hands' by staff in pressured healthcare services.
Often, regis- tered nurses make rounds on even hours and sup- port staff make rounds on odd hours from 6 AM to 10 PM (and every 2 hours from 10 PM to 6 AM). While making rounds, staff engage patients by checking on the “4 P's”: pain, positioning, potty (elimination), and proximity of personal items.
Status of the big-five personality traits of nurses. Results of this study showed that nurses had the strongest tendency towards the dimension of agreeableness, followed by conscientiousness, openness and extroversion, and lastly neuroticism, which was consistent with the results of Wang (2010) and Xia (2013) et al.
The patients have to be able to recite the answers to the “Five Ds of Discharge:” Diagnosis, Drugs, Doctor, Directions and Diet. “The patients need to answer all the questions,” said Tracy Stowe, R.N., B.S.N., manager, discharge lounge, clinical decision unit and float pool.
Teas for stress and anxiety relief
The rule is simple: Commit to doing the task for just five minutes. That's it. Once you get over the initial resistance and begin, even if only briefly, something shifts. Momentum builds, anxiety decreases, and your brain transitions from avoidance to engagement.
What are the signs and symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder?
Top 10 Happiest Nursing Jobs
Nurses tend to be predominantly investigative individuals, which means that they are quite inquisitive and curious people that often like to spend time alone with their thoughts. They also tend to be social, meaning that they thrive in situations where they can interact with, persuade, or help people.
The top 3 rarest personality types are consistently identified as INFJ (The Advocate), ENTJ (The Commander), and INTJ (The Architect), with INFJ usually being the absolute rarest (around 1.5%), followed by ENTJ (around 1.8%), and INTJ (around 2-3%) of the general population, according to Psych Central, Redeemed Mental Health, and Reddit.