Four years of school. Clinical experience. Studying. More studying. The NCLEX. It all should be enough. And yet, you know intuitively that it isn’t. Nursing is a job you can only really understand once you have done it. The first days, weeks, and months on the job are often shocking for newly minted RNs.

There is a reason nearly half of all new nurses leave the profession entirely after just five years.

We don’t think that will be you. That said, it can help you adequately prepare for your first days on the job. In this article, we take a look at what it takes to navigate your rookie year as a nurse successfully.

Note

Don’t panic! Your nursing program has already prepared you for the hard part. The tips that are provided in this article are designed primarily to prepare you mentally for the job ahead. Don’t stress. You’ve got this!

Communicate with the Hospital

All of the advice in this article is general to the profession. Your new employer will almost certainly have more specific recommendations and requirements that they would like you to follow before beginning your first shift.

They may need you to complete onboarding materials at home—training videos are ubiquitous. They will also need you to analysis company policies—which yes, may involve more training videos—and complete paperwork.

If you are looking for something to do before your first shift, they will be able to come up with some things pretty quickly.

Consider Looking for a Mentor

Mentorship programs may sound antiquated or—at the very least—like extra work. Both points may be true but the fact remains that across professional disciplines people who have connections with more experienced professionals at their place of work are more likely to stay with their jobs than people who do not.

Mentorship programs:

• Provide you with a sounding board. You’ll find very quickly that the job is full of stressful situations and surprising moments that your education never could have prepared you for. After a particularly grueling shift, you will probably appreciate the opportunity to have someone you can reach out to, just so that you can vent to a sympathetic audience.
• Help you learn the ropes faster. As with any profession, in nursing, there is the job as the manual describes it, and the job as it actually occurs. Having an experienced mentor will help you figure out that learning curve a little faster.

If your hospital does not have a mentorship program— or if you simply don’t feel like committing to something like that—at least work on developing relationships with other nurses on your floor. Having good friends on the job will improve your overall work experience.

You’ll want a support system at work. Even if you have a really supportive household environment there are nursing struggles that only other healthcare professionals will be able to fully understand. What does it feel like to lose a patient, and then drive home twenty minutes later? Your accountant spouse doesn’t know. Your coworkers do.

There are also practical reasons to be friendly with your coworkers. Having good relationships with the other nurses on your floor can be very helpful when it comes to getting shifts covered.

Develop Good Personal Habits

Good personal habits will help you manage the stress of your new job. This may require adjusting your lifestyle to produce sustainable mental and emotional wellness.

Good habits to prioritize include:

• Getting good sleep- It’s an old cliché, but it’s true. Good mental health begins with a well-rested mind. Shoot for eight hours a night.
• Proper nutrition- A balanced diet will give your body what it needs to stay strong all day. That will be particularly important during twelve-hour shifts.
• Limit screen time- Screen time can be soothing in brief bursts, but can negatively influence your emotional well-being over time. Focus instead on relaxation techniques that produce more sustainable stress relief. Spend time outside. Read a book. Exercise. These behaviors reduce the levels of cortisol in your brain, making it much easier to manage stress and accomplish feelings of wellness.

There are two basic categories of happiness that psychologists recognize. Hedonic—behaviors that produce brief but unsustainable moments of well-being, and eudonic. Habits that, when repeated, improve your overall emotional baseline.

Hedonic habits include things like alcohol, shopping, screen time. Eudonic habits include exercise, time outside, mindfulness, etc. While there is always a little room for hedonic behavior, eudonic behaviors will do much more to help you manage the stresses of nursing.

Prepare for the Schedule

If you are going to be working the evening shift, you will want to transition into that schedule the week before your first shift.

One of the complex aspects of working overnights is that it doesn’t just change your routine for the day of your shift. It also influences your schedule for the rest of the week.

Without adequate preparation, you could be going into your first evening shift tired, many hours removed from your last rest.

Night shift readiness might in this case mean getting up very early the morning before your shift, and taking a good nap that afternoon.

You might be tempted to rely on caffeine to push through as well. While a cup of coffee halfway through a long evening shift won’t be a terrible idea, you should do your good not to rely on it too heavily.

Excessive caffeine can:

• Produce anxiety and
• Interfere with your sleep schedule for the following day.

You probably won’t need it to stay focused—particularly during your first shift when your adrenaline will be high.

Conclusion

All of this said you should keep in mind also that your hospital will do plenty to onboard you. The actual first day on the job probably will not involve you doing much anything except maybe watching a few training videos and getting to know your co-workers. You’ll do more of the same for the next weeks to come, growing only slowly into your new responsibilities.

Nursing is hard, but it is also a job for which you should receive lots of support. If you do not feel like you are being adequately prepared for your early days on the job, speak with a supervisor or HR professional. The hospital should have more onboarding resources that they will be happy to share with you.