Yesterday around noon, my cohort and I all started to receive emails notifying us that our CNA exam results would be posting soon. I laugh a little when I see the word “soon” because ultimately some of us did not find out until a little over six hours later. But I digress.
I did everything I could think of to try and pass the time. Have I mentioned I’m horrible at waiting? Seriously, I suck at it. I went for a walk, had lunch, watched some news, messaged some friends. I even ended up taking a trip to Starbucks to use my treat reward and play the latest summer boardgame. Bonus- they were playing 80s music! Winning! Unfortunately, my drink didn’t last as long as I’d hoped and there weren’t very many customers to do some quality people watching so back to square one.
Tip- Taking selfies with the face filters in Instagram does not pass very much time and may end up in embarrassing facial expressions.
Tip number 2- searching for funny pics to out-meme your brother only lasts too long.
I drove home and all of the sudden my text message alerts start going off. Several of them. Something was happening. Emails were being sent notifying us of our results. This was around 4:15. What would turn out to be over two hours later felt like five. At 6:01 I checked the website for results and read the words “Pass” and squealed. The wait was finally over and soon words of congratulations, confetti texts, and fun dance memes flooded our phones. We made it to the finish line and all passed. The relief was palpable. For a few, this will be their career and a noble one at that given how much work goes into it. For the majority of us, it’s a milestone because the next license we will achieve is RN. Checking this off the list felt so good!
For now, we celebrate and enjoy what’s left of summer, put the books away for a few weeks. Some of us will apply for jobs although some are already working in the field. This is license number one out of four for me. The next stop is CNA 2 class which begins Oct 1st and runs concurrently with my other prerequisite classes. It’s going to be a long haul but after some hiking and quality pool time, I’ll be ready to rock and roll.