The past 10 months as a nurse has been one full of certainty and fear. My anxiety has been so out of control and my love and passion for nursing is gone. Now it is more fear as I realize I may need to find a new job but not knowing what to do.
I know how bad it hurts when the feelings of living change, and you have to change the way you are living to match up with it, and you make mistakes, and it hurts. I’ve experienced it. 
I think you should wait till covid is not around before getting a new job, unless you need the job desperately enough that you would run out of money for food and shelter without a jo, and then you should go ahead and get a new job. But I know there is no way to make it not hurt to switch jobs. Changes are going to hurt, no matter what. You just need to live through the pain, and be kind to others.
Wow, to have such a long life journey come to this point where you crest the hill and realize – damn…this was not what I expected…it is such a deflating thing…to feel like you worked ALL THIS TIME…to get here, to fight through years of school and finances and life and discouragement and hardship and – yes – anxiety…and to have it let you down, to feel like THIS WHOLE SEASON of your life was wasted…that’s so tragic, friend…I’m so sorry…and then to face the anxiety of – can I even get a job? Will I ever be able to find something that brings me joy? Will I even be able to get out of this into something that can financially suit me? There are so many uncertainties, so many MORE anxieties that pile on top of this…not to mention the fact that your daily grind is WEARING YOU OUT and that there’s nothing to fill you back up…it just feels like you’re running on empty, and there’s nothing left for you to give…but yet you still have to keep going…
It is the daily ache, the daily anxiety, the daily wearing down of your resolve that is beginning to take the hardest toll…
So brutal…
I don’t know if this will help, but I wanted to add that I face a lot of anxiety about wasted time myself…I HAAAAAAATE feeling like I’m wasting time. I actually had some anxiety attacks thinking about deciding where to go for college because the FEAR of – what if I make the wrong choice and waste 4 years of my life and totally fuck my chances at being happy?! And that fear happens on almost a daily basis – I’m married and have 3 kids now, and when I have free time I think – oh my gosh, what if I make the wrong choice? It feels like free time is so rare that if I spoil it – will I ever be able to recover from that failure? Will I be able to find rest, find happiness, make it through the day, if I get this choice wrong? I know it might sound dramatic, but that’s what it feels like to me in those moments…my anxiety can be so overwhelmingly loud that it’s all I experience.
One of the things that I’ve come to see amidst all of this crazy raging internal battle though is that there is no wasted time…I believe in God, but even if you don’t, I feel like “life” has a way of redeeming our pain…of telling a story through our failure…of using things that feel wasted or discarded to us to bring hope and light and goodness into the world…I don’t know how at the moment, but I hold this deep belief that this tragedy may become something really beautiful in your story and in your life…and for you to be a person that not only can become a nurse, but care enough about your heart to risk it all to pursue joy…I mean, I think there’s something really brilliant in you…and while you might not have all the answers now, I just feel like you have it in you to live a good story through chaos and uncertainty. I am proud of you for deciding you are worth the risk. And I believe that the journey will be one to retell and inspire.
-Nate
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