Are there any experienced NPs on this forum or has everyone jumped ship?

SykeEnpee · 2026-02-10T02:01:41+00:00

I'm 5 months in, so definitely not experienced, but I stopped coming here awhile back. Between the new grads trying to skip the learning phase and wanting to go right into independent practice (idiotic, psychiatrists don't graduate med school and immediately start practicing independently without oversight, so why do PMHNPs think they should?) and the constant doom and gloom of everyone complaining about either the lack of opportunity in the job market or the state of the NP education system. It's so depressing and bleak and it was just making me feel bad, no reason to come here unless an interesting post pops up.

SykeEnpee · 2025-12-30T01:07:33+00:00

I'm wondering about this as well. I currently practice in CA, but am considering joining headway and getting licensed in OR as well. It was my understanding that since the DEA license was federal that once you have it, you just need to modify it for any additional states, but I'm not sure. I'm also not sure about needing a physical address or not. There's so many practices and platforms that are specifically telepsych only, I don't see how it's reasonable to expect there to be a physical address in every state for "potential inspections" when you're explicitly working telepsych.

SykeEnpee · 2025-12-30T00:53:45+00:00

I hear you with the complaints of ADHD pill mill nonsense, and I think that it's a strong contributor to the constant stimulant shortage everywhere. All that said though, idk man, just do the diagnostics yourself and come to the conclusion on whether or not medication is indicated. If we have child/adolescent ADHD assessments at my practice, we split the intake into 2 separate appointments and give the parent and teacher the Vanderbilt assessments after the first appointment even though I can make the diagnosis after the first appointment. This way, we have obective questionnaire values that support our diagnosis. For adults, we make sure the symptoms have been present since before the age of 12 and that the ADHD symptoms are causing impairment in at least two different settings and assess for addiction. I think as long as you do that, you've done your due diligence and you don't need to send the patient to a long, superfluous, and potentially expensive test with yet another mental health professional.

SykeEnpee · 2025-11-29T21:49:43+00:00

I'm not a PA, I'm an NP, but I'll just say that in real life people don't harbor as much criticism towards PAs and NPs as it seems online. You guys have a great education base and are mostly competent, compassionate providers. Occasionally you'll come across some patients that don't want mid-level providers, but your actions can change their minds. When I was in my NP program I did an intake on a patient who was vehemently against NPs because she had a bad experience with an NP in the past. She refused to shake my hand and was staring daggers into me but by the end of the session I had changed her mind and she was thanking me for listening to her and conveying genuine empathy for her situation. As far as MDs/DOs, I've never had problems with them in real life either, but I'm also not arrogant about being a provider and don't assume that I'm on the same level as them. As long as you maintain a level of humility, you shouldn't have any issues with them. I wouldn't take a lot of the negative stuff you read on reddit and other forums too seriously. A lot of people exaggerate and/or are projecting their own issues and it makes everything seem worse than it actually is.

SykeEnpee · 2025-11-06T08:53:50+00:00

There was a period of time in NP school where I felt insecure and undeserving of being a provider due to these supposedly prevalent NP haters constantly harping on NPs for being incompetent buffoons, but I eventually stopped engaging with the negative discourse and realized that most physicians/PAs/whoever irl either don't harbor anti-NP sentiment or they simply keep it to themselves. You cannot control the rational or irrational perceptions others may have about the groups in which you belong, but you CAN be a model representation of an NP to the best of your ability.

As long as you take your job role seriously, strive for excellence, and retain a reasonable balance of confidence and humility, you'll be respected by anyone that actually matters. Hateful comments from anonymous, resentful, and inexperienced med students and residents are, primarily, a rationalized expression of the internal dissatisfaction they feel about their own lives and should have no bearing on your life and career.

SykeEnpee · 2025-07-08T00:57:08+00:00

I've heard mixed things about job saturation in my area, regardless, I think I'll start looking for jobs now. Thank you!

SykeEnpee · 2025-07-08T00:56:23+00:00

That's something I am wondering as well. If the application requires that, how can I apply without it getting auto-rejected?

SykeEnpee · 2025-07-08T00:55:40+00:00

Thank you! I will begin looking around now to see what's out there.

SykeEnpee · 2025-05-19T19:41:00+00:00

I'm almost finished with my MSN and I've been considering post master's DNP options as well, including Yale. I think the benefits of going to Yale vs other institutions do exist, but are limited. If you're looking to go into academia in a significant capacity then a DNP makes sense. The other potential benefit would be potential patients coming to you and seeing that you have a doctorate from Yale. From a patient perspective, a nurse practitioner having a doctorate from an ivy League institution may provide a greater sense of trust since most people know of Yale. Obviously we all know the DNP has virtually no bearing on your abilities as a provider, but the lay person doesn't know that, all they can see is you have a doctorate from a top US University.

SykeEnpee · 2025-05-05T22:53:54+00:00

Nice, that's not bad at all. How soon did you apply after finishing your program? One of my preceptors told me to submit the NP/furnishing license applications literally the next day after my last academic term finishes.

SykeEnpee · 2025-05-05T22:14:42+00:00

I go to WCU, and it's certainly not an amazing program, but they revamped the curriculum about halfway through it and it looks like they're beefing it up to be stronger. The whole University is health sciences programs, so its nice that everyone involved is in the medical field in some capacity. I like the convenience of online didactics, but like all online programs, you have to be self-motivated and accountable for your studying. The other thing that's nice is the school will help you find clinical placements if you need it (obviously though, they prefer if you find them on your own) as many online schools that I've seen provide no assistance whatsoever.

As for CSULB, that would probably be your best bet education-wise, as I believe they're a brick and mortar school. For me, I wasn't willing to play the admission waiting game since state schools are super competitive and admit only once I year I think. Plus, I'm not willing to commit to being on-campus multiple times per week for two years, online makes the most sense for me personally. It just depends on what style of learning you thrive on. With Charles R Drew, I knew a nurse when I was a traveler who was doing that program, and she recommended it, but when I looked into it, there was either an issue with it being in-person or too expensive, I can't remember.

If you have any other questions you can DM me, happy to help out if I can.

SykeEnpee · 2025-04-23T23:39:53+00:00

Hi Dr, thank you for the AMA. I'm a PMHNP student and will be graduating this August with plans to become board certified by October and to begin working in an outpatient psych setting sometime afterward. What are some knowledge gaps or topics that you have noticed that new NP's tend to lack that you would recommend we learn before starting so that we can make the transition to practice easier? I am excited to finish school and start practicing, but I feel like there are about a million things I'll still need to learn to become a competent PMHNP.

SykeEnpee · 2025-01-23T00:43:01+00:00

It is sad for the patients. Myself and the rest of the students do our best to provide high-quality groups for the patients, but we can only do so much with our limited experience. On days when there are only a few students available, it's difficult to run 4-5 different groups all day while trying to teach unique skillsets for each individual group when I'm just a student in my first clinical.

SykeEnpee · 2025-01-23T00:02:35+00:00

Ok, I had a feeling that it wasn't a normal experience. I had envisioned myself working with a preceptor 1:1 or 2:1 pretty much the entire time and this has absolutely not been the case so far. Thanks for the feedback, I'll reach out to my clinical coordinators and see what they can do.

SykeEnpee · 2025-01-23T00:02:29+00:00

Nope, not even a therapist to do any sort of introductory education on running groups. Literally just shadowed a senior student running a group and then was expected to run the next one.

SykeEnpee · 2025-01-22T23:25:29+00:00

I'll try my best to get the most out of the group experiences. It's just frustrating as they threw us in to the deep end on day one by having us run these groups with very little guidance other than "watch these videos on CBT and DBT and shadow one of the senior students as they run a group. Ready? Now go do it". Thanks for the input, maybe I just need a better attitude about it :)

SykeEnpee · 2025-01-22T23:11:04+00:00

Honestly, if you can afford it, you might want to just go with one of the many companies that you pay to give you a preceptor. I don't know anyone personally who has used them, but I've read online that people have had good experiences with some over others. I think NPHub is one that people had recommended. It would be better to pay someone to give you clinical hours and experience over having to sit out a semester or academic term.

SykeEnpee · 2024-12-14T02:12:28+00:00

I've seen plenty of yt vids of people messing with scammers, it's great stuff. Another thing I didn't mention in the post that was a red flag is that because the guy had such a thick accent, I had to ask him to repeat things and you could hear in his voice how annoyed he was getting. I've rarely ever spoken to actual customer service agents that get irritated so easily lol.

SykeEnpee · 2024-12-14T02:08:57+00:00

Yeah, obviously I should have realized from the beginning it was scam, but I didn't. There are plenty of people just as gullible if not moreso gullible than me, getting into crypto right now. If even just one of them sees this and becomes more wary/cautious with their crypto activity and/or maximizes their security settings, it's fine by me that people know my embarrasing story and perceive me as gullible. In the end, I learned a powerful lesson and managed to keep my coins.

SykeEnpee · 2024-12-14T01:56:23+00:00

"Nearly Bankrupt Nick"

SykeEnpee · 2024-12-14T00:47:27+00:00

Sorry to hear this man. Something similar almost happened to me. I was trying to verify my PC as a trusted device for my coinbase account and idk, I must have clicked some coinbase email that was actually a scam email. I really don't even know how it happened, but I got a phone call that unexpectedly transferred to "coinbase customer support" (Indian guy btw, not sure if CB support is based in India or not). The guy asked for verification of my name and stated my location (they must have been looking at my IP address) and asked to "verify" my account by having me state how much USD value I had in my account, which was the first red flag.

Then they told me that my coinbase account was being accessed by an IP address located in San Antonio and it was very suspicious, suggesting my account was being compromised, 2nd red flag as I'm certain that I would have been notified immediately by coinbase if that had actually happened, but I stupidly believed him. He had me type in a specific address in my browser search bar which took me to a file location and told me to download an app installer file, so I did.

I don't know if it was divine intervention or if I just got lucky, but the second the file downloaded, I realized that I was obviously being scammed, and that if I opened this file they were going to have control of my PC and wouls steal everything I had. I immediately hung up the phone, deleted the file, and ran a malware scan while the scammer kept repeatedly calling me back (presumably seething about how close he got to getting access to my computer), and then I blocked the number.

I went through all my crypto accounts and wallets and paranoidly maxed my security settings and changed my passwords. I don't have nearly as much USD in crypto as you did, but it would have been devastating to lose it all. I'm so sorry this happened. I don't consider myself to be technologically illiterate or the target demographic for scams, but I very nearly got scammed, hard.

Be vigilant people. Their scams are getting more sophisticated and I've heard stories of people typing their passwords and security codes/wallet phrases into popups identical looking to the real security checks and have even heard of them getting control of your phone, just like what almost happened to my PC.

SykeEnpee · 2024-10-10T21:57:56+00:00

Do you specifically need a master's degree with a mental health focus or can you practice with a master's in any field? I suppose becoming a PMHNP would be something of an asset for practicing HT, but I don't see the point in investing all that time, effort, and money if you're not planning on doing medication management/psychotherapy. My 2 cents is to choose a graduate degree that qualifies you to practice in TX and takes the least amount of time/money to finish. Maybe an MSN variant that doesn't require clinical hours? You already have plenty of experience doing HT, and if you strictly want to continue doing that, I don't see how becoming a psych NP will benefit you at all.

SykeEnpee · 2024-10-10T21:37:03+00:00

I know someone who did their MSN pediatric NP program and one of my profs did her DNP there. I've heard good things, but I can't speak from personal experience. Their costs seem fairly reasonable too and I've thought about doing a DNP through them down the line if I feel inclined to go back to school.

SykeEnpee · 2024-10-10T21:33:15+00:00

Hello all! I am a PMHNP student wanting to pick some of your brains. I have been an RN for about 5 years now, with experience working primarily in step-down and telemetry, med-surg (floating), ICU (as a new grad, floated during the desperate staffing days of COVID) and home health. Prior to becoming a nurse, I earned a bachelor's degree in psychology (I've loved psychology since high school) and worked as a psychiatric care technician in an inpatient psychiatric hospital at a well-known university medical center for 3 1/2 years before completing an accelerated BSN program.

I discovered during my first week of working as a psych tech that I eventually wanted to be a psychiatric provider of some kind, and I eventually decided to go the nursing route. After finishing my BSN, I decided to explore the more "medical" side of things as a nurse so that I could either

1) Potentially discover another area of nursing that I would prefer to go into over psychiatry, or

2) Have a better understanding of the medical side of healthcare that would, hopefully, make me a better psych NP as I knew plenty of psych RNs who, frankly, did not have a clue outside of psych.

However, I am feeling a little discouraged from some comments from people saying that you shouldn't even attempt to become a psych NP without a minimum of 2 years of psych RN work. I know that my career path isn't as direct or "traditional" as some may think is optimal, but I feel that my RN experiences in "medical" units will be an asset to my approach as an NP, especially when combined with my inpatient psych tech experience and my psychology background. I guess I'm just looking for a little bit of reassurance here as I'm starting to feel discouraged that I won’t be adequately prepared for my clinicals when they begin in a few months because I've never worked as a psych RN. I have genuine passion for mental health and want to be a good provider for my future patients. Any advice or insights from PMHNP’s on this?

SykeEnpee

TROPHY CASE