Why a Blog?

Why am I blogging this experience?  I am 53 Years Old and since 1976, I have worked in Telecommunications.  I am currently an Executive with a LARGE American Phone Company and I’m responsible for managing technical support centres all over Asia. For several years now, I have become complacent with the politics and bureaucracy of working for a large company.  I truly feel that I am not really doing anything worthwhile.

For reasons I will explore I have decided to go back to school and get my Bachelor of Nursing Degree with an eye towards becoming a Registered Nurse after graduation.  Medicine has always interested me and for some time now I had thought of training to be a Paramedic.

For several reasons, that turned out to be impractical for me.  First, in order to be a full-fledged Paramedic in Victoria, Australia, you need to have a Bachelor Degree in Paramedicine.  It takes exactly the same amount of time to become a Nurse, and a newly-graduated Nurse makes considerably more in salary.  In addition, while there hundreds (if not thousands) of nursing positions, there are less than a hundred Paramedic positions in the State of Victoria and few of those are rural (more on that later).  So, my goal is to graduate Nursing School, do my Graduate Year in a regular hospital with an eye towards Emergency or Peri-Operative Nursing.

Let me dispel a myth here right away — I am not becoming a Nurse because I couldn’t become a Doctor.  I have absolutely no interest in being a Doctor.  Doctors in modern medicine don’t treat patients, they manage case loads.  The average Doctor spends less than 10 minutes a patient.  Becoming a Doctor means spending another 7 to 8 Years in school before ever getting close to a patient.  So, I will begin practicing no earlier than age 60.  Assuming I lead a VERY healthy life, I will practice for another 10 years.  Add to that, the enormous cost of medical school and the fact that, in Australia, a Doctor doesn’t make significantly more than Nurse, it is not an investment worth making.

So, now that I’m accepted to school and registered for classes for the first time in over 30-years, I’m a student again. And this is my journal.