Written By Richa Bhatia

Journey, path, whatever you would like to call it…I didn’t think that mine would lead me to the career path that I’m on today. If someone told me when I started my first undergrad experience that I would end up in nursing school I wouldn’t have believed them. Heck, if someone had told me even two years ago that I would end up graduating from nursing school with honors, I probably would have given them a blank look and gone my merry way. However, I have recently graduated from nursing school, studying to take the NCLEX and become a licensed RN. My journey would not be considered “traditional” or one that I fully chose to undertake myself. I had always grown up with this idea that I would become a doctor – very typical for a desi kid, trust me, I know. 

Things changed, though, in my first year of undergrad. I ended up realizing I was not a science girly, and I absolutely LOATHED having to take chemistry; it was actually the bane of my existence, and I ended up switching majors due to my hatred for chemistry. The bio and chem classes just weren’t clicking for me at that point, but I ended up taking a political science course, and I knew I had found something that clicked for me and that I enjoyed learning about. The switch from being a general biology major to a political science one was not easy, and I was also struggling a lot with my mental health, trying to balance work, school, extracurriculars, and a social life. Perhaps it wasn’t my best moment, but making that switch did some good for me, and I ended up graduating in 2020 with a degree that I had actually enjoyed despite all my struggles. The very same year, we were also hit with COVID-19, and as the world shut down around me, I was left wondering what I would do with my life. While I had abandoned the idea of going to med school, I was still considering a career in healthcare over going to law school. I minored in general biology and decided to take a few extra classes online at my local community college to complete the prerequisites for PA school. I started taking classes and studying to take the GRE, however, there was still one big problem…I didn’t have the clinical hours needed to get into PA school. 

At this point, I needed to do something to gather the clinical hours I needed, so I started completing virtual hours and volunteering at a hospital nearby. I quickly realized that this would not be enough, so I completed a pharmacy technician course, got PTCB certified, obtained my license, and worked in retail pharmacy. It was going well, and I was slowly but surely gathering the hours I needed. I decided that maybe this was the point where I could try applying to PA schools. I applied to a few PA schools, not getting into a single one – which I think I expected deep down because I knew my application wasn’t as strong as other candidates due to having fewer hours and a lower GPA than the average required. This was it; it felt like the end for me…I had no idea what I was going to do, and it felt like the pressure was on, and time was ticking for me to do something with my career. I realized I was still young and had time, but it didn’t feel like it, despite having graduated a year early and really not losing time in the year that I had spent working and putting into applying, taking the GRE, etc. I decided to start looking at other options for what I could do with my life; the need to get a start on my career and make something of myself was too much. 

Somehow, before I knew it, I was looking at nursing schools and began taking prerequisites specific to a particular university’s BSN program, which I hadn’t even known was a program that existed. Fast forward a few months, and I finished my prerequisites and got accepted into the accelerated BSN program I had found myself considering. I still wasn’t sure if this was what I wanted to do, but I felt like I had no option, so I packed up my life and moved to another state, signing away my life for the next 16 months. I saw it as a new adventure and was determined to get through it to prove that I could do something with my life; however, no one told me how difficult nursing school would be, much less an accelerated program. I was constantly homesick, struggling with being alone, and not having my support system with me physically. But I knew I had to push through; I won’t lie, it was a lot, and it felt like I had no life outside of nursing school. 

Then, a few weeks into my second semester of nursing school, I found some community at a nearby coffee shop where other students from different schools and programs came to study. I quickly became a regular and knew the baristas and the other regulars – in fact, I gained some great friends for whom I’m so thankful at that coffee shop. They made things bearable as I felt I didn’t fit in with my peers in my nursing cohort and barely had friends in my program. I was slowly getting the hang of things and surprisingly doing well. The biggest surprise was that I was enjoying what I was learning – it felt like this was a divine intervention. There were times when I was close to failing classes and struggled so much on a personal level, but I pulled through. 

I had something to prove, but more than that, I also found a passion that fueled me – the desire to become a psych nurse. I did a residence on a behavioral health unit, and it was the best time I’d ever had in nursing school; I knew all of my hard work had been worth it at that point because I had always been passionate about mental health and making a difference but this specialty gave me a purpose and sense of belonging, I finally fit in somewhere. Now as I’ve graduated, gearing up to take the NCLEX, I look at my journey, realizing that I came out facing every adversity and proved to myself that I can do whatever I set my mind to. But if anyone ever asked me why I chose nursing school, the truth is I didn’t; it chose me. It truly was a divine intervention. I ended up exactly where I was supposed to be, and I wouldn’t change that because I found my calling.