Sometimes, balancing a nursing career with family life can seem impossible. Whether you’re already a nurse or interested in practical nursing (PN), figuring out how to maintain your family life while you’re busy with a nursing career is a valid concern. However, there are a few things you can do to ensure you aren’t missing out on your family while you build your PN career. These tips from Prism Career Institute can offer helpful guidance for nurses trying to balance a fulfilling family life and a successful career.
Find a Routine and Stick to It
Allowing for flexibility is an important way to make time for everything in your work and personal life. To ensure you aren’t sacrificing one aspect of your life to tend to another, develop a schedule that works for you and stick to it. Determine your own priorities and identify those of your family to help with this process. For example, if you have young children, you may decide that you or your spouse should be at home with them while they are not in school. Organizing your time and setting aside a certain amount each day or week for your family is one small step toward maintaining a healthy balance.
Reconsider Your Work Schedule
In some cases, a busy work schedule just isn’t very compatible with that of your family. It can help to think about the kind of nursing work you do and find something that fits more naturally into your routine. For example, some employers may offer part-time nursing work or flexible shifts for parents, both of which can make it a little easier to live up to family commitments and enjoy life at home.
Another option is working as a home healthcare nurse. Nurses in this field typically tend to patients who are housebound but do not require critical care. Thus, they often have more regular daytime hours and can have most nights and weekends off.
Communicate with Your Family and Support Network
This is true with any job but especially for busy practical nurses. The best way to determine the needs of your family and figure out a solution is to engage in open communication and dialogue with your loved ones. Trading off child care duties with a significant other or family member, finding good, reliable daycare options, and planning family time and outings in advance can all help you to strike a balance between your work life and your family life. Through effective communication, you can determine you and your family’s priorities and deal with them more effectively.
Get Educated for a Career in Practical Nursing
While balancing a new PN career and family life may sound daunting, a quality education can help you to develop good habits and necessary skills to make doing so a lot easier. At Prism Career Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Cherry Hill, New Jersey, and West Atlantic City, NJ, our Practical Nursing program offers a foundation upon which you can build a successful career. To learn more about the PN careers that await you, contact us today.