I think I've figured myself out...

After thinking, pondering, and asking myself many questions, I think I have finally found a new course for myself. For sometime now, I have known I have wanted a change in my professional life. When I moved back to Utah, I was pretty much set on becoming a nurse with the end goal of becoming a Family Nurse Practitioner. I decided to spend some time volunteering in a hospital to get my feet wet so to speak, and getting first had knowledge about the day to day of a nurse. And no offense to nurses (I admire them for what they put up with), but I really didn't like what I was seeing. I didn't much care for the second class status that nurses were deemed by the "doctor authority". I also didn't much care for the schedule, or lack there of, that many nurses had to commit to. Additionally, the programs for school here are so overcrowded that I was told I could possibly get into a program in 2010! This amongst a nursing shortage that is only expected to get worse.
So I went back to the beginning and rethought things. One afternoon I was reading the Wall Street Journal and came across an article about someone who was taking their daughter to see a Speech-Language Pathologist. Reading about their experiences and the help she received, a light bulb went on in my head. I quickly sat down at my computer and started a search on this career. It sounded very interesting to me, and it would incorporate both my love and experience of education and my interest in health care. The only drawback was that it would require me to get yet another Masters degree. It isn't really that much of an obstacle with such a clear goal at the end of it, but it is the time (2 more years) spent in order to get there that I found frustrating. I started researching the different universities here, and what they offered. The University of Utah has a great program, but it is very competitive with a long list of prerequisites. That would mean another year to year and half before even getting into the Masters program. More frustration was setting in. But then I happened across a university about an hour north of here that offers the entire program online. That means all the prereq's and the masters program can be done from home, and I would still be able to work and travel some! I would also be able to start working in a SLP setting once the prereq's were completed.

I am pretty motivated and excited. I am now trying to find someone to job shadow for a couple of days, just to see what the day to day is like. I will be applying to the program next week and hopefully start in May!

I can see myself settling in and enjoying this career for a long time to come. I am at my best one on one with people (children and adults), and I love science and anatomy. I think I could be very good at this job. I realize that its not all roses, but I have yet to find something that truly uses my talents and gifts, and I think this may be one of those opportunities that will give me that ability.