Why I want To Be A Nurse By: Lourdes Ocasio I walked off the school bus; it was a beautiful summer day. The sun was shining and the birds were singing, but inside my house it was dark, a cloud had moved over us. I slowly made my way to the door, expecting my mother to greet me but instead my sister opened the door, something was wrong, I knew instantly. When I walked in there sat my three year old little brother playing with his toys in the family room and my parents were sitting on the couch. I looked up at my mom, she had been crying. What is wrong I asked?
He is sick my mom said, “Your baby brother is very sick”. I just shrugged my shoulders and walked away, I had been sick before and I got better, so would he. I went upstairs to my room and made a get well card for him. It was made out of blue construction paper and had black writing on it; I finished it off with a panda bear sticker. Inside I had written how much I loved him and to get better soon. I proudly presented it to my mother; she took one look at it and began to cry again. I climbed on her lap and she said, “He won’t get better, we have to take care of him the best that we can”.
He has diabetes she explained but my naive eight year old mind just did not know what diabetes was. I did not understand. Whenever I was sick I went to the doctor and he always made me better, but this time even the best doctor’s hands were tied. It was this very day I knew what I wanted to do when I grew up…I wanted to make my little brother better, I wanted to be a nurse. Although; this was the first time that being a nurse crossed my mind, I was sure I was destined to become one. I have always felt a deep desire to help people whenever they needed it, and would stop at no end to help them.
Through my experience as a Surgical Technologist and through various jobs, my decision was solidified. My first trials with medicine and dealing with the ill began when I was twelve years old. I began to volunteer with a couple of my older cousins and take care of my great grandmother. She was a permanent resident in a local nursing home. It was this day that will always stick out in my mind. I walked in and immediately the musty stuck to me like a brick wall. It slowly began to invade me filling my nostrils and spreading its way through my body. The sickness was engulfing me and I felt as if I would not be able to let it go.
I knew that most of these people were sick, but I never realized how sick they were. We quickly began our task of inviting the residents to come and play bingo with us, as I walked down the halls asking each one that I met, I was saddened. Some of the people could not get out of bed and others were just too weak to leave their rooms. I knew that the couple of hours I was going to spend there with them were going to brighten up their day. For many of these people, the volunteers that they saw were the only people from the outside world they met; their families just stopped coming to visit them sometime ago.
After a few hours my mom came to pick me up some how I was not the same girl who entered the nursing home just a short time ago. Something had changed me; I now knew that being a nurse was the only way I felt I could help people. There are many things I have done that have helped me make this decision. Working as a Surgical Technologist at NYU, as a Medical Assistant for an Internal Medicine Practice and as a front desk Receptionist my medical terminology skills have sharpened as well as the anatomy side.
During my externship in Saint Michael’s Hospital in Newark, I was exposed to many different procedures. For example; I scrubbed in GYN, Podiatrist, Orthopedic, Cardiology and General cases. The knowledge and experience I have gained during my externships has made me feel even stronger about becoming a Nurse. A career in nursing takes a lot of hard work and dedication, with this in mind I know that becoming a Nurse is the only way for me to have a future that I will enjoy, because I will be doing the things in life that I enjoy most, helping others.
