Mary Katherine

My 2017 was a long year. One filled with changes, hard work, tears, and many lessons learned. To set up this story, I have to go back to 2014, my first year at college.

I came into VCU as a freshman wide-eyed to try to get one of 60 spots in their Nursing Program. My journey to VCU was an easy one, considering my dad had gone here for undergrad before he pursued Medical school at MCV. Wishing to follow in his footsteps of pursuing a medical career, I saw that dream within reach when I received this email :

I was beyond excited. Not only did I get accepted into their program after applying once, this meant that within 4 years of college, I would graduate with my RN BSN!!! I became overwhelmed with excitement, to think I would have that title at the age of 22.

I started the nursing program my second year of college, fall 2015. I met the other 59 students I would be spending the next 3 years with, and found some of my closest friends during this time.

After my first semester of nursing, I was certified to work as a CNA. Once I learned I could, I eagerly applied for jobs. I got asked for an interview and offered a job in MCV’s Transplant unit and Cardiothoracic Surgery unit. I chose to take the Cardiothoracic unit’s offer, excited to begin working in the medical field.

Going into my junior year, classes got more difficult, more specialized, and I took the dreaded Pathophysiology and Pharmacology (Which i passed both parts!!). I loved it, every aspect of it. Taking classes with others as passionate, as driven, as eager as I was to start our careers.

My second semester of Junior year was not one of my best semesters. I began trying to take on more than I could handle. I was (and still am) an active student leader for an organization called Christian Student Fellowship at VCU, along with trying to juggle relationships, and personal life mishaps with nursing school can be extremely overwhelming.

As my semester continued, I came to a realization regarding an assignment for one of my courses. In my Nursing of Women’s course, we had a group of assignments called HESI case studies. These were online patient case-scenarios with practice questions following the case. All of which allowed multiple attempts, and answers and questions easily available online for review. We had many of these assigned in several of our other nursing courses. For many of our other courses, at the beginning of the semester you were assigned an allotted amount of HESI case studies to do or topic case studies to complete, and were typically told to complete these on our own time, but before the final exam. For my women’s class, I had thought it was under the same direction. I was wrong. Our professor had assigned dates for certain case studies to be due via our syllabus. And had missed them.

I quickly did the math, and realized that without credit for those assignments (which were worth 5% of my grade for the course), I would not obtain a passing grade of 79.5% in the course. I met with my professor, hoping to receive any partial credit toward this late homework assignment that I completed. The sum of our conversation resulted in her hands being tied due to the due dates being stated in our syllabus. My heart was broken, I was devastated at the idea that these homework assignments would cause me to fail a course.. I tried to study as much as I could for the final exam, and hoped that would be enough to account for something. I got a 96% on the final, but unfortunately that still wasn’t enough. I was sitting at exactly an 83.2% after the final exam, and when she added those 0′s, it dropped to a 78.2%. I was so close to passing, but not quite.

After i realized I was not going to pass my course, I reached out to my nursing advisor to set up an appointment to discuss what would happen as a result. When I went in, I was reminded of a course I took a year back.

Spring 2016 I took a course called microbiology. For some reason VCU only has one professor for micro, and he is HARD. Since I was in the nursing program while I was taking micro, when I didn’t pass, that counted as my first strike, out of two, for not passing courses. Even though this wasn’t a nursing course, it counted against me due to me being in the program when I took the class. So moving forward to Spring 2017, when I got the word that I had not passed women’s, I realized that’s two strikes:

im out.

Thankfully, I was told about their readmission process. I would have to change my major, take 9 credits, get a student academic evaluation, write a personal statement regarding dismissal and a plan for success if readmitted, and a reference from a professor I was taking from my semester out of the nursing major. It was also emphasized that I would have to get all A’s if I wanted a good chance to be readmitted.

So with that, I walked out of the nursing building into an anxiety-filled summer.

I have never dealt with anxiety before, until this moment. There would be nights I would lay in bed, kicking myself on how I should have read the syllabus more carefully, should have studied harder, should have done the case studies sooner.

Nights I would lay there and just have all of these thoughts rushing through my head, unable to sleep, hours on end. I wasn’t giving up by any means, but I was beyond disappointed and exhausted.

My dad called me one day during the summer, and told me he had a package coming for me in the mail. I went to the stoop of the condominium building I live in, and opened an amazon package containing a book titled,

Anxious for Nothing by Max Lucado

This book, that I am still reading, has been such a blessing throughout dealing with everything I had been facing. Anxiety is not something I have really ever dealt with to this degree, and this book provided a lot of relief when I felt overwhelmed.

Some of my favorite quotes include:

“Anxiety and fear are cousins but not twins. Fear sees a threat. Anxiety imagines one”

“Anxiety is not a sin; it is an emotion. Don’t be anxious about your anxiousness”

“Your anxiety decreases as your understanding of your father increases”

The best I could do, was trust in God. All I have to say, is without God I wouldn’t have been able to move forward as quickly as I did. I couldn’t do it without my faith.

During this time, I tried to do my best to lean on God and the support system that surrounded me as I continued into the readmission process.

Going into the semester in which I had to change my major was hard. Taking classes of a major I wasn’t familiar with, much less wanting to be in was hard to accept. All I wanted was to be back in nursing.

With that, I worked hard. I put forth the effort to obtain all A’s, something I’ve never done. I always, have had a semester with AT LEAST 1 B (damn you BIO 101 with Carr), but never straight A’s. So with that as my goal, I didn’t give up..

I got a reference from a professor who has history as a nurse, and went back to teaching. I received a promising student academic evaluation. I worked hard, and achieved my 4.0

I got denied my readmittance.. 

I was heart-broken. 2/3 done with a Baccalaureate program for nursing. I was going to be graduated this spring of 2018. Once dismissed, my vision to graduate became spring of 2019. Now denied re-admittance, I don’t know exactly when that date will be, but i’ll keep you posted haha ;)

But, one thing I do know, there will be a graduation date.

I could never give up on this. Nursing is more than a career, it’s a passion. One that will leave your life changed, in hopes that you’ve touched the life of another. I’ve never felt God so present in my life. I am more than sure that this is what God has planned for me, but just in different timing.

I am looking into other programs in the Richmond area to continue my education for Nursing. I’ll get there. I won’t ever give up.

I am a firm believer that God has a plan for me. One better than I could ever make for myself. I have to trust that. I can’t wait for the day that I am standing in my scrubs, RN badge on, and am able to look back and go, “ah, I see what you were doing there God. Thank you”. I look forward to that day.

I will be a nurse. One day. In his timing. And i will be better because of it.

Never give up on your dreams. Ever.