Here's a little info about what Travel Nursing actually entails and how we navigate it with a family.
Reasons Travel Nurses are needed:
Most hospitals go through times where they are more busy than normal, they wouldn't be able to staff for these busy times all year around, so they use a travel nurse. Or hospitals could have an influx of nurses who are out on maternity leave or possibly aren't able to get the staff they need locally - these are some of the reasons that there is such a need for travelers.
Travel Nurse Companies and Contracts
There are many travel nurse companies out there, these companies are essentially the "middle man" between hospitals and nurses. They arrange the assignments and get the rates and so on. The nurse is technically an employee of the travel nurse company and not the hospital.
Contracts are typically 13 weeks long. Although, a lot of times you are able to extend if the hospital still has the need. (& if you're good at your job and the unit likes you.) We have extended eleven times in our 5 years of traveling.
Housing
Typically, the travel nurse company will have a place that they house their nurses - extended stay hotels, rental houses, air BnB types, etc.
However, there is an option to get a stipend and the nurse finds their own housing. This is the option that we have always taken - since we are a family traveling along with the nurse and also have more than two pets.
Our Why...
You may be wondering why we, personally, wanted to take our young family and travel the country, away from everything familiar.Short Answer: money
Travel nurses can make more money, especially for a nurse 1 year out of nursing school. We had been living in my parents basement while Bryan was in school and found that even if we had wanted to stay put in our hometown, it was going to be a major struggle for us to move out, into a good part of town on one income. Almost impossible. We took a major step of faith and moved 1,100 miles away from our hometown on our first assignment.
Long Answer: We wanted to explore! We wanted to see different things, to give our kids an adventurous spirit. To not follow the straight and narrow, but to take the road less traveled.
For me personally (Bethany), it was a big step to move so far away from everything that was so familiar. I struggle with anxiety and the uncertainty of travel nursing was huge!
We wanted to give our kids the opportunity to experience different parts of the country and see things that both of us had only read about in books or seen on tv (Grand Canyon, Hollywood CA, Great Salt Lake, Yosemite, Yellowstone, and so many more!).
I think Bryan had always had travel nursing in the back of his mind as something he had wanted to do. He would talk about it and communicate with different travel nurse agencies and I would say, "How fun! That would be great." But never really thought that we would follow through with it. I'm so glad he led our family with his adventurous spirit and brought mine to the surface, so that we could partake on this journey.
Travel Nursing is definitely not a lifestyle that I think everyone could do or should do. It's full of uncertainty. As much as we have loved theses past five years, there have been many times where it was super stressful, with lots of unknowns. As the years and assignments have passed by we have learned and been able to handle the stress better.
God has been the major helper in our learning process and how thankful we are for Him! Our faith has been a constant in each move, each assignment, each 1000+ mile drive! Without God's guidance and our faith in Him, we would not have been able to continue (without many, many panic attacks).
But if this travel nurse lifestyle is your cup of tea - Let me encourage you - it is a great adventure! It is doable (even with a family and zoo!) and not just doable, but you can thrive!
Have questions or want to be connected with a great recruiter? Comment below!
-Bethany
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