In this YouTube video, Christina Rafano addresses the common problem of bullying and negative comments that nursing students encounter, both in school and online. She begins by sharing a harsh comment she received and explains why such criticism is inevitable as one becomes more visible. Rafano then presents a detailed, six‑step framework for handling bullies: (1) allow yourself time and space to feel the hurt rather than suppressing it; (2) avoid tying the criticism to your personal identity, viewing it instead as an opinion about you; (3) resist the urge to rationalize or justify the bully’s behavior, recognizing you cannot control others’ opinions; (4) set clear personal boundaries and, when safe, confront the aggressor; (5) report the incident by “going up, not out,” directing concerns to someone with authority and sticking strictly to factual descriptions; and (6) accept that change may be slow and continue to practice the previous steps. Throughout, she intersperses gratitude for supportive comments, highlights a “Comment of the Week,” and promotes free resources such as a nursing study checklist and an upcoming video on exam hacks. The video concludes with an uplifting reminder that viewers can succeed in nursing school while staying true to their purpose.
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Stick to nursing. You suck at teaching. This girl is full of. I am not even gonna say that word. Please stop moving your hands so much. It's distracting and makes me want to run far away from your channel. That's what I have to say about that. In this video we are talking about how to deal with nursing school. Bul this unfortunately is a common problem in nursing school and just life in general. This is a highly requested video. I've received many emails and DMs from students wanting me to talk about this issue. So hit that subscribe button and click the notification bell and let's do this. So I receive comments like this pretty regularly now. Our audience has grown a lot this year and it's no surprise that some people have something to say about it. You've heard this before, right? The more you do in life and the more successful you become, the more people will talk trash about you. Everyone's gotta have an opinion about it. Did you experience this when you went to nursing school? I bet there was at least one person in your life who was like, are you sure you want to do that? You know, nursing school is hard. I just don't think you have it in you, man. I am telling you, every time you try to make a positive change in your life, someone has an opinion about it, right? So here is my step by step guide for handling that negative Nancy's and the bullies in your life. So take notes. You're going to need this because you, my friend, are going to be a huge success. The first step is to give yourself space and time to hurt and feel the pain. Too often we try to run away from it because hurt and pain just don't feel good, right? But here's what I have come to learn. The more you allow yourself to experience and feel hurt and pain, the less of an effect it's going to have on you. I love how my life coach, Brooke Castillo puts it. She says the worst thing that can happen is a feel. And she's totally right. We use our own emotions to beat ourselves up and cause us significant pain and suffering like anxiety, stress, shame, guilt and regret. But the more you allow yourself to sit with these negative emotions without trying to change them, the less power they have over you and the more you realize that they are just emotions and they can't actually hurt you unless you allow them to. The next step is to avoid tying it to your identity. So whatever the person said or did, avoid tying it into your identity. So for example, this comment that I received, stick to Nursing, you suck at teaching. I have a few choices with this one. I can make it mean that, yeah, they're right and I have no idea what I'm talking about. I probably should just quit. Or I can make it mean that I am just not a good fit to teach that person. So I'll focus on teaching and supporting the students who want my help. See the difference? You always have a choice to tie it into your identity and make it mean that you are a terrible person and will never amount to anything in life. Or you can choose to simply make it mean that they have a negative opinion about you and that's okay. Now, the next step is absolutely necessary but super hard to do. And that is to resist the urge to rationalize or justify their actions or words. We love to do this all the time. We say, oh, they were probably just having a bad day, or maybe something is going on in her life that made her say those things. She doesn't really think that about me. That gives all of the power to them. So anytime anyone says something bad about you, you'll need to come up with a reason or an excuse for why they did that. So for me, when I got this comment, this girl is full of blank. My gut reaction was to want to change her opinion about me. I started thinking, oh wait, she probably has never seen one of my videos. She has no idea who I am. She doesn't how much I love and care about nursing students and that I actually do know what I'm talking about. Maybe I should message her and try to help her through nursing school. Maybe I just need to show her that I'm a nice person. Friend. No, thankfully I did not do this. I simply deleted the comment. Because here's the thing. I can't change her opinion of me and neither can you. All we can do is learn to be okay with someone not liking us. The truth is, maybe she really does hate my guts and never wants to see my face again. I'm learning to be okay with that. You are not in control of other people's opinions about you, but you are in control of yours. And I'm choosing to love her and send prayers her way regardless of what she thinks about me. I'm choosing to believe that I am a nice person. And the reality is, I have helped thousands of nursing students. So instead of taking on and believing someone else's negative opinion of me, I am choosing to believe that I do know what I I'm talking about. So, friend, you get to decide what you believe about yourself regardless of what someone else says about you. So please resist the urge to try to rationalize or justify their actions. You cannot control their opinion of you. Now the next step is where you actually take action on this. But before we talk about that, I want to give a shout out to our YouTube comment of the Week, which comes from Danielle, which says Loved how you broke this down in simple terms, a year later and this post is still relevant. Thank you for investing your time in future nursing students. Thank you so much for your kind comment, Danielle. I really appreciate you friend. And I know that we're talking about bullying and all the negative stuff in this video, but it is so important to celebrate the positive things in life and to always be grateful. It's crazy how many comments we get from nursing students every day saying how much nursing SOS has helped you through nursing school. I am so, so blessed to be here and to support you through your nursing school journey. I am so, so grateful to have you here, friend. So keep those comments coming. They really make my day. Now let's talk about how to take action when you find yourself in a bullying situation. Set boundaries. If someone is coming at you, you have the choice to walk away. You don't have to interact with anyone you don't want to. Yes, even if it's an instructor or a nurse you're working with at Clinical, if someone is really being degrading and abusive to you, always have the choice to walk away. You can also have a conversation with the person and set boundaries. That way, tell them that you're not going to allow yourself to be treated with disrespect and work on a solution together. Yes, this is a super difficult conversation to have, but it will help you to learn and grow. And don't avoid it just because you're uncomfortable or scared. It might help a lot. And on the flip side, it's just super important, friend, that you don't overstep your boundaries and think that you can control someone else's opinion of you. They are 100% entitled to their opinion. So don't cross that boundary and think that it's wrong for them to think that way. That's on them, not you. All you can do is love them, have compassion on them, and pray for them. And the next step is to report it if it needs to be brought to someone else's attention. Now here's where things get a little tricky and I have two rules for you to follow. Always go up and not out and stick to the facts. So here's what I mean by these when you report a bullying situation, it's important to report it to someone who has more control and can make a change in the situation. This is most often someone who is in a higher position than the person who did the bullying, like your clinical instructor, the director of nursing, and the charge nurse or the nurse manager on the floor. You need to be careful not to gossip about it, which means going out laterally and telling other people who have no control over the situation. So when you report it, go up the ladder, not out. And the next rule is to stick to the facts. If you followed the first few steps where we talked about processing your anger, hurt and your pain and not making it mean something negative about yourself, then you will be in a much better position to follow this rule. The best thing to do is take all of the emotion out of it and and stick to the facts. What exactly did the person say or do? Be as accurate and as factual as possible. And then you need to wait and allow the change to occur and be okay even if it doesn't. Let's be honest friend, A lot of situations like this never really get handled, but if it keeps happening and you follow these steps every time, it's more likely to change. And you're going to learn how to handle them better and better every single time. In the next video, I am going to walk you through nursing school exam hacks to help you ace your next exam. So even if you're dealing with a bullying situation at school, at least you'll do well on your exam. So make sure to check that video out. And don't forget to download your free nursing school study checklist where I walk you through the strategies that I used to get straight A's in nursing school. The link is down below in the description for you to get it and make sure to like comment, subscribe and share this video with a friend. Now click on one of these videos right over here. Friends, you can keep rocking nursing school and go become the nurse that God created only you to be. I'll catch you in the next video. Take care. Bye.
