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Career advice/new career?
RightfulSin
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Ok, background. I am 32 years old, and I have never really held a career position. I have had management in previous positions, retail related. I have recently felt the need for furthering what it is I do with this life. I earn enough money to cover what it is I need to pay, such as bills and the like, but I feel very unaccomplished. I have been told in about the recent year by many people who know me (people such as step-mother, two cousins, friends, and an aunt) that they are surprised I have not pursued anything in the medical field. I have in the past just kind of "shrugged" it off, but I have been reminded of this several times recently by some of the previously mentioned people and this combined with the unaccomplished feeling hit something in me.
Things I like to do in my down time:
- Some of the usual like watching tv, not a huge amount, but the big shows like: walking dead, Games of Thrones, what have you.
- I like cooking and baking, usually making most of my own food.
- I also enjoy some single player video games, I like single player because they have a pause in the vent anything comes up.
- I have also been reading some of my cousin's books. (she's a nurse working on her bachelor's) And I find it rather interesting how it lays out how things in the body work and work with each other.
But any ways, ya, I do desire to go back to school, and I do wish to pursue a career. I am just not sure of what in the medical field I would pursue. A number of the people have said EMT, others have said even go nurse or w/e. I am mostly ok with pursuing it as far as restraints. By that I mean that I have only my own responsibilities. I am not married, don't have children, and I am not that social of a creature (when I hang out with friends it usually is only once a week (I only have a few close friends, not tons)). I have never been bothered with the human body, in the sense that I do not have an aversion to blood (I have in the past killed/butchered my own meat); yes I know that is different but might share a parallel.
My step-mother says EMT "because of the way how I care" and my cousin who is a nurse could see me being either because I'm "smart, capable of retaining lots of information, and caring". So there it is. I am just wondering about what I should do with this. For the record, they are stating this as opinion, not any sort of pressuring. I am also wondering because I have heard this from them and I can honestly say that it never occurred to me until recently, but having heard them say that, and thinking about it, and I say that I keep thinking about it.
So there it is, I am presently working somewhere, but I do not see it has a career, or want it to be for a life choice. I am seeking something that will feel accomplished, right now I just feel that what I do does not matter. Thanks.
Things I like to do in my down time:
- Some of the usual like watching tv, not a huge amount, but the big shows like: walking dead, Games of Thrones, what have you.
- I like cooking and baking, usually making most of my own food.
- I also enjoy some single player video games, I like single player because they have a pause in the vent anything comes up.
- I have also been reading some of my cousin's books. (she's a nurse working on her bachelor's) And I find it rather interesting how it lays out how things in the body work and work with each other.
But any ways, ya, I do desire to go back to school, and I do wish to pursue a career. I am just not sure of what in the medical field I would pursue. A number of the people have said EMT, others have said even go nurse or w/e. I am mostly ok with pursuing it as far as restraints. By that I mean that I have only my own responsibilities. I am not married, don't have children, and I am not that social of a creature (when I hang out with friends it usually is only once a week (I only have a few close friends, not tons)). I have never been bothered with the human body, in the sense that I do not have an aversion to blood (I have in the past killed/butchered my own meat); yes I know that is different but might share a parallel.
My step-mother says EMT "because of the way how I care" and my cousin who is a nurse could see me being either because I'm "smart, capable of retaining lots of information, and caring". So there it is. I am just wondering about what I should do with this. For the record, they are stating this as opinion, not any sort of pressuring. I am also wondering because I have heard this from them and I can honestly say that it never occurred to me until recently, but having heard them say that, and thinking about it, and I say that I keep thinking about it.
So there it is, I am presently working somewhere, but I do not see it has a career, or want it to be for a life choice. I am seeking something that will feel accomplished, right now I just feel that what I do does not matter. Thanks.
"If nothing is impossible, than would it not be impossible to find something that you could not do?" - Me
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Don't be an EMT or Paramedic based on what peoples notions of the professions are. Before you do anything in healthcare - especially field care, do a ride along. It is 100% guaranteed not what you think.
Edit: Healthcare work basically requires you be a nurse to advance in pay at a certain point. It's a consequence of serious inbreeding in the industry. Hundreds of jobs that all have pay top out well below the starting pay of a nurse. Thousands of doors open if you are a nurse. Spending all the hours in school to become a paramedic is better spent getting 50-65% of a BSN done.
It's a really weird frustrating shitty industry built around creating scarcity of labor. It also happens to be a very rewarding industry that is stable.
I wouldn't assume butchering your own meat is a good measure of what may bother you. It really can vary.
I advise you become a nurse.
And then the other thing that was pointed out to me, and I don't want to be too graphic here, but... imagine the worst wartime post-combat scenario involving human beings you can come up with: you may be called over to handle something that looks like that at any given moment, and you will need to be able to take that all in and then THINK, figure out what you need to do and actually do it. Someone's life will depend on you doing so.
Depending on your Bachelor you may need to take quite a bit of extra classes just to meet the min for Nursing schools.
This is where I'm at now (and I have a biology degree), and I have nowhere near the time to take them all 6 or so I'd need at the moment.
Be aware that depending on when you took your undergraduate courses originally, they may not count because they would be too old/not current enough
Honestly though, you need to determine if if it is what you want or if it is something that sounds like it might be fun/pay well etc.
reading your post it seems more like the latter which to be perfectly honest is not the best reason to go into a medical field.
i can go over prerequisites etc if you want over pm
My wife just said screw it and took the PAX for a local college nursing program and did really well on it. She really is just using the RN program as a way into a more specialized field that she wants.
But now that she is in the program she has become interested in being a wound nurse.. She is kinda weird and likes all the stuff that would gross out a normal human being
― John Quincy Adams
but even nurse is really hard work with a lot of learning for years which might not be your thing. just an interest isn't enough, you need to really know you're pursuing this.
so do ride alongs. but don't get too hung up on doing healthcare related things just because people encourage you. like, take the compliments as general compliments.
you are obviously unsatisfied with your career right now. make it a thing where you consider everything else as an option and go for what suits you, don't make it an either or thing. it's not nurse/emt or your current job. my SiL for example started med school, moved to a nursing related education, and ended up in epidemological research and prevention. same interest, whole different focus.
also, a very good first start is enrolling in a First Aid course. it's a confrontation with the kind of things you will deal with, but in a format of a low time commitment. plus some employers pay for it!
My father-in-law was a plane and helicopter pilot for many years, a number of those spent flying a Careflight helicopter. He also flew medivac choppers in Vietnam and Desert Storm, and he said he saw worse stuff with Careflight than he ever saw in war.
Second, and I cannot stress this enough, what a career seems like from the outside looking in has absolutely no bearing on what it is actually like. Not even a little bit. Worse is someone not in that field telling you what it will be like for you. Shadowing is worthless. Ride-alongs are worthless. Sure, if you can't tolerate the sight (or smell) of blood, then you might discover that during a ride-along.
My best advice is to start working in the field. Not volunteering. Not following someone around. Work so that you have responsibilities that will color your experiences. It's one thing to watch the excitement of trauma, it's entirely another to have the outcome be in your hands (even partially) and weigh on your mind for the rest of your life. Discover what you actually enjoy and what you can't stand doing. Based on that, consider the career path that best suits it. Bearing in mind, once you actually start doing it, you may discover that it's not at all what you thought it was.
I am an orthopaedic surgeon, so I am best able to provide experience and advice related to being an MD. However, I can provide some information on being a surgical PA, nurse (OR and floor), radiology tech, cast tech, and various office positions.
EMT-B certification is next to worthless where I live. You can either be a (not very) glorified taxi driver while making less money than you would driving an actual taxi and doing zero clinical work whatsoever, or you can be an ER tech at a hair above minimum wage. You can also get to be an ER tech as a CNA or MA, or even with no certifications whatsoever depending on the hospital. MA's would at least be trained on drawing blood and a few other areas that would make accruing useful clinical experience easier, but that would also take longer. At any rate, I used to be certified as an EMT-B and I tutored EMT-B students at my local community college for a while after taking the class, and I couldn't recommend it to anyone unless they were certain they wanted to become an EMT-P (there are no EMT-Is in my state). I can also say that none of the EMT-Ps who taught the course would recommend becoming a Paramedic unless you wanted to be a firefighter. We discussed possible options ad nauseum when students were testing, while I was still weighing options vis a vis medical school or other healthcare careers. The most interesting part of the EMT-B class I took was actually the required shadowing I did at a local ER, which was far from worthless. It did a great job of showing how uneventful and boring it is in a small ER less than 15 minutes from one of the largest level 1 trauma centers in the region, and giving me a more realistic idea of what you'd encounter actually working in such an ER.
This is also good advice. Again, the goal is not to target your end career (so wage is less important), but to start working in the field to gain insight. If you decide on nursing, for example, an ADN is two years and a BSN is 4 years. Working part-time in an ED or on an ambulance during that time will be invaluable.
Let me put it this way, prior to medical school I thought shadowing/volunteering was super important. Compared to being a lay person, shadowing opened up a lot of closed doors. But let me tell you from experience, doing it is a world of difference from watching some one else do it. What you think you may like or not like based on your shadowing experience is not predictive of what you will like or not like doing. So much so, that every admissions committee I have sat on (medical school, residency, and hospital), shadowing experience is not even considered. If you have it, fine. If you don't, fine too.
I'd also add to plan to move if you're going into nursing. The key to advancement is good experience, which you'll only get as a newbie in places people don't want to live, since good areas get the most qualified applicants. A friend of mine that's a nurse anesthetist now went to North Dakota for a few years to get ICU and ER experience before coming back east, where she was able to slide into a nice position near her original home.
There's an old tongue-in-cheek adage about the medical field that says there are three things you should look for in a job:
Pick one. If you are lucky or senior in your field, pick two.
If you're looking for a two-year degree that pays about $20 an hour (MLT instead of MLS) it might be something to look at, and the classes and experience will greatly help you if you ever decide to become a nurse or other health professional. Lotta memorization though.