Sunday, March 1, 2009

Sunday, March 1, 2009
Day 1, not really . . . but let’s just call it that

My NCLEX exam is going to be scheduled for sometime in May. My last date of eligibility is May 26, 2009. I have decided to take the exam sometime a week before this date to be on the safe side. Just in case I arrive at the testing site and find that they are closed for some emergency and my test has to be rescheduled. I just want to make certain that there is sufficient time between my actual testing date and eligibility date. I am probably just being paranoid, but I feel like I need to think about things like this.

My study plan is not a particularly formal one. It consists of knowledge deficits and reinforcements that I know I need. In between all of this, I have to find time to be a mother, wife, work, and take my graduate classes. “Overwhelmed” is an understatement, but I truly believe that I am going to pass this time. Why? Because I am going to do everything possible to prepare myself for a passing score. Not just that but things are different from the first time I took the test.

For example:

1. I have three months of medical-surgical hospital staff nurse experience under my belt. It’s not a lot, but it is extremely significant in that the medication names are not all like Chinese to me as they were before. Also, there are procedures like blood transfusion, central lines, narcotics, etc. that I now have a visual reference of what they look like and the procedures involved. These are experiences that I never had in nursing school.
2. I have six months of nurse midwifery graduate school completed. This means that even if I got every other question wrong, there is no way that at the very least that I would get the maternity health questions wrong. I pray that the exam gives me lots of those questions.
3. This is my last chance to take this exam! Fear is a BIG motivator. My thesis advisor explained to me that it took her 10 years to complete her PhD. She said that she was sputtering along, but it was not until she received a letter from the University indicated that she only had X amount of time to complete it (or of course all her time and effort would be lost) did she finally pull things together and get it completed.

Last time when I studied, my goal was doing 100 questions a day. This was the advice given to me by my former classmates who had taken and passed the exam. I achieved that for the most part. Some days, I only answered 75 or 90 questions. There were many days where I answered well-above 100. It all depended on what I had going on that particular day. Nevertheless, I did answer a lot of questions.

I can admit now that my problem was that I did not always understand the answers. So, I need to invest some serious time in content review. I also fell terribly short on pharmacology, respiratory and metabolic imbalances, cardiology, and developmental theories like those of Piaget.

My study plan is to come at this like a gorilla-war. That’s a funny expression, I know. But it is the only way I can think to describe my study plan. I am not simply answering 100 questions a day. I also have:
• Audio content review on my MP3 player
• Illustrated books and flip cards that help me to visualize content
• Nursing journals, particularly “Nursing Made Incredibly Easy” whose articles I review frequently. These journals are available online as well. I just ordered Nursing2009 and am awaiting the first issue.
• Reread Nursing Medical-Surgical textbook cover-to-cover
• Questions and studying their rationales

I will continue to answer 100 questions a day. I find the question flashcards particularly helpful. We have a desktop and it is not always practical for me to sit before the computer screen with the CD-ROM clicking and answering questions. The flashcards are portable. I can answer questions while lying in bed, while waiting in the card, on my lunch break at work, or any other time where I have some minutes to spare.

I also feel as though I need to actively look for more question sources. Meaning, I am finding eerie similarities between the Saunders, Mosby, and Lippincott, Williams, and Wilkins. I suspect that they are all owned by the same parent company. So, my advice to anyone reading this and currently studying for this exam would be to use these publications, but to also actively search questions outside of them as well. You may want to try NCBSN’s Online NCLEX-RN review or Kaplan Q-Bank. Once I exhaust all the questions I currently have at hand, I may explore those other question sources.

These study techniques take into the account that I utilize all my senses to learn. It depends but at times I can grasp certain content quicker if I am listening to it, looking at pictures that explain it, or reading it. Of times, there is no particular logic to it. It just depends. So, I am working on covering all of those bases during my studies to make certain that at the very least the information enters.

I think that diet, exercise, and stress levels have everything to do with how we live our lives. Up until this point, I have failing grades in all three areas. My life has been so hectic that I am always a sneeze away from a nervous breakdown with going to graduate school full-time, working full-time, and my household responsibilities. We often times eat on the go and do not include exercise as apart of our normal, everyday schedule.

I do not know what type of changes I am going to make, but I am going to try to improve my diet, exercise, and decrease my stress levels over the next three months. I will definitely start taking my daily vitamin and mineral supplement, whose bottle is just sitting in a cabinet.

I tried taking Ginseng and Ginkoboloba thinking that it would improve my memory and stamina (energy levels). About a week or so into this therapy, I began to experience vertigo. I felt as though if I stood up, I would just fall down and die. I stopped taking them and the vertigo subsided. So, no herbal aides for me. I am just going to have to go after this the old fashion way.

Writing this blog helps to relieve stress. There isn’t anyone that I know who is currently actively studying who I can identify with except for the people who post on www.allnursing.com. It is a lone process. My husband listens, but he does not really understand. He does figure that it must be a difficult test if I did not pass after all the study I did the last time. I told him that this time I would be doubling that study time.

There is a park nearby my house where my husband goes to play basketball. They have a walking track. I think that I will go with him, walk, and listen to my MP3 play simultaneously.