Tag: nursing

Quarter life crisis : a financial or socio-emotional setback?

As I literally age where they say is the start of quarter life crisis (25 yo), it really does not have a huge physiologic in nature at all – hormones of course may be a contributory but nevertheless it’s from late teen-age years to early thirties.

How can we ever say that one is experiencing this crisis? It came from the same analogy of middle life crisis. Same group of people are expected to have at least one or more of the same situational crisis.

Here’s the list of what I think are possible things that could happen to most of my age group.

1. Career – getting a college degree does not solve most of the Filipino families’ problems nowadays. Yes, there has been courses/degrees that became such a fad and we know that just few years back that almost every family would have one of its members studying in the nursing school be it as the first or as the second course. And with that, the dilemma for having a career in the chosen profession or pursuing a different field is imminent because there are more nurses available compared to the jobs available around the nation. Is this a crisis? Yes, I think so it is. Not just for those who took up Nursing but also for those who have the urge getting that the return of investment should start rolling the moment we receive that diploma. We all know that getting a college degree is not just a way ordinary path for everyone but also an investment for some. Parents would work their bones out just to get their kids enter college. And as a young and idealistic person as we are, we would not want our parents to be just disappointed. So, the trend now is to jump in to a career where it is rather easy to land a job than pursue and strive for a chosen profession.

Call center is an industry that have helped most of the below middle to middle class families that has one member that graduated from college for the last 5 to 6 years. True, that it is a decent career to start – in the corporate worlds of BPO’s . This industry is where we can find lots of young professionals that are either underemployed or over-qualified.

Illegal recruitment is still happening in this day and age. With the power of google and social networking, young professionals have become vulnerable with some schemes of heartless people in doing such business. For the past 4 years, there has been numerous reports that more newly grads are getting victimized – these are through job-searching sites that are oftentimes frequented by the young people (please click here for more details).

The struggle is not monetary – it is the career itself. IT is the sense of fulfilling the urge of your profession. It’s like an itch that you just cant pass. It’s a situation where you would feel that you have no choice and just because you are just there. Another situation could be is that even when you have started to become successful and have started your way up then the  problem would be is to how to keep up. There are no theories or literature background under your belt so the higher the position you have the more there should be theories you need to learn or should have had prior to taking bigger accountability to the world you were not prepared to be in.

There are few people who I know personally that are very lucky to get a job in a field of their choice, of their background and of their profession. These are the few that are now working as a Nurse in one of  big government hospitals in Quezon City. The professional nursing skills are definitely has been honed tremendously. Now the struggle is not just occupational security but rather financial security. They may say that they love what they are doing, but there are also circumstances that may bring them into some crossroads that would make them choose between the job as a pension-centered and occupational security or just noble act without the financial satisfaction compared to those that are in the corporate world.

2. Relationship – this is the age where hormones are raging high and pressure from peers and society are just way up to the limits. The intra and inter-personal relationship plays on the higher priority for most of these age group. The struggle is also both extremes – it’s either you are able to pull one-off or just unable to break through.

Sometimes the more you try harder to find that one special someone, the more it is difficult for you to actually end up with a partner at all. The choice of exerting too much effort in enjoying the liberation and independence can sometimes miss one’s chance in trying to be self-aware that it is the perfect timing to have a mature and healthy romantic and sexual relationship. It will then integrate in the frame of mind that finding a partner is a struggle and it will then be taken as something that is you are either desperate of or something that is just needed to be accepted that there is nothing else to do about it.

There are of course people who were bound to  miss some steps and jump to the level of maturity of standing up and facing some good decisions. This for some may define their existence or perhaps is the chance to be able to feel that was never felt on the past.

The struggle focuses more on frustrations in maintaining friends. This is the stage where separation from friends are often due to everyone has graduated and will be starting to pursue individual careers, others are starting to have their own family and others may just struggle keeping up with others leaving. The frustration of having no friends and failure to establish a good romantic relationship will magnetize  the a big dilemma of involuntary celibacy which can directly affect self-esteem of the person at least for the most. It may not be a problem of course for the most of us are brought up that culture tells us that it is the norm.

3. The desire to have a family – this is also the period where it is expected that having one’s own family is a perfect timing. Career may have started to take off at these times and for some it may be a struggle to actually give in to the desire of having a family. There are lots of constraints that can aggravate the struggle – occupational and financial security, familial approval and the fear of giving up liberation.

These are just some of maybe not that commonly discussed but I believe that are really happening to people of my age. And truly I can say that this is both a financial and socio-emotional dilemma. There are big decisions that needs to be made most especially for career plans. As they have said – choose a job that you love and you will never have to work a single day. Is it wise to follow and pursue a career of the degree you have earned? Or just take any opportunity that may come along the way?

American Dream – Pinoy Nurses

The growing numbers of Filipino families that has one or more of its members that are new nurses or is taking up nursing has suddenly taken aback with the reality of achieving the great American Dream. Yes, we know all the crappy things that a novice nurse must go through before taking the very first step in becoming an actual and performing USRN. The backlog or “retrogression” in the US Immigration is the one that is believed that kills these young pinoy nurses to achieve this ambition. It creates this predicament – I would rather work now (probably in a call center) than spend more money, be a US licensed and end up waiting for the next 5 years in queue.

True, only about 20% of my nursing friends have taken and passed the NCLEX-RN exam and only 2 of them has priority dates. To rekindle that desire, the one that most of our parents felt about 5 or 6 years ago when they believed that nursing will save every pinoy household from poverty, let me show how much the current US nurses are earning  now.

Looking at this USRN salary table, if I will start working in the states today, I would be earning PHP 7,840.oo per day or PHP 156,816.00 per month with an average 40 hours work per week. So this amount I believe does not include the income beyond 40 hours, overtime and night differential benefits, and other income should I want to do part-time job.

After 20 years of experience, based on this table I would be earning PHP 221,616.00 per month in 40 hours work per week. I know, looking at these figures will surely makes us smile. The average salary in a private hospital here in Manila is around PHP 11,000.00 per month with more than 40 hours work per week.

So now we may know why our parents strongly imposed to us to take this career path. Not primarily because of the money alone, but of course there’s more stability of future and more chance of achieving the much coveted American Dream.