Being a nurse blogger is such an amazing thing! I really love what I do so much. But some days it is more challenging than you may think. So let’s take a look behind the curtain.
A Day in the Life of a Nurse Blogger
Recovering from the nurse-work hangover from your 12-16 hour shift yesterday
Hydrate
Word vomiting all of your post ideas and content from the last few shifts
Checking your comments on social media, and seeing someone took what was meant to be a lighthearted nurse joke wayyyy too seriously
Randomly looking at another nurse site and seeing a company stole your content you poured your heart and soul into and didn’t credit you
… and then another nurse or nurse blogger comes to your rescue and publicly calls them out
via GIPHY
When you start to add up all the time it takes to create relevant content, make it look nice, and post it everywhere so people can find it!
… and someone tries to pull the whole “you’re a nurse, you should write this stuff for people for free!” line and shame you for requiring compensation for your 20+ hours/week of work
via GIPHY
and then getting yet another email from a company who wants your blog posts and will gladly pay you in “exposure and free products”
Then, you get an email from a nurse who was on the verge of quitting but didn’t because of something you wrote
When you create the perfect image for your new post and it gets a bunch of likes and shares
Seeing another nurse blogger do something awesome
When you see someone recommend your blog on their social media
When you realize you’re able to write on your blog and help nurses all over the world learn from your mistakes and hopefully empower them to provide better patient care
A special shout out to all of you nurse bloggers out there. It’s not easy working as a nurse and trying to run a successful and helpful nurse blog. It takes a ton of time, financial investment, and constantly being plugged into the ever-evolving online world of blogs and social media marketing. It’s also tough having a foot into the world of business, because learning how to be a successful nurse is nothing like being successful in business. I’ve been burned before by trying to help out companies who were just trying to get the most out of me for the least amount of money, who lied and manipulated… and I didn’t realize it until it was too late. I was just trying to be that helpful nurse and person to them, when I was just being used.
You work for hours and hours, trying to create helpful and relevant content for your fellow nurses, and sometimes it can get pretty tough putting yourself out there… getting people who are mean/rude, who think you need to be all things, trying not to offend but speak about important topics, being true to yourself, and spending money in certain areas only for some people to complain, and others to steal.
But, there’s also so much to gain from putting yourself out there, putting in the time, and creating something really great.
I personally am not scared of nurse blogger competition – the more the merrier. The better our nurse blogger world is, the more our profession is elevated. Whether it be from just encouragement and support, to practical clinical help, to creating resources, to connecting with nurses all over the world who are engaged in the latest evidence-based practice at their facility.
Brittney Wilson BSN RN (AAK The Nerdy Nurse) and I are creating a seminar about how to practically start a nursing blog, avoiding some of the mistakes we made, and some important things we’ve learned along the way. Stay tuned for more info on when this will be! And if you won’t be able to attend in person, no worries – we’re working on creating online learning modules to compliment this as well.
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Great post! Thanks for putting it together and sharing the range of emotions we all experience!
Thanks, Kati, for helping me get my OldfoolRN blog off the ground even though my content is certainly not very relevant today. I’m more into entertainment and writing things down before my dementia obliterates them, nevertheless people indulge in my foolishness in increasing numbers. Oh and don’t worry about competition for sponsors from me – the only thing I could endorse would be hearing aid batteries and denture cream (I like Polident.)
This is great! Thanks for blogging how we all feel. I love the animations- showing exact emotions. I was laughing throughout. Looking forward to reading more from you. PS sorry for the competion. I didn’t even know about that and all the other things you have to go through. Thanks to you for keeping it up!
Great post! Thanks, Kati, I was laughing throughout.
Thanks for your great information, I am looking for LPN blogs. Please make one blog about how to become a Licensed practical nurse.