"The exhausting stress that comes with seeing patients in their most vulnerable state and witnessing things some people go their whole life without seeing is a necessary part of this rewarding career. Early in my career as an emergency nurse, I was working a night shift when patients from a bad car accident were brought in. Right away, three emergency response teams brought in two pediatric patients and an adult patient that were badly injured. Given that we were a team of two physicians and three nurses that night, we immediately went into triage and stabilization mode. Given the severity of the injuries to the pediatric patients, it was essential to not let emotion take over. To do this, I kept their health and well-being in mind and went to work. This mindset helped our entire team stabilize a patient for air transport and the other two into surgery very quickly. Looking back at this situation over 10 years ago, it taught me so much about stress and crisis management that I still use to this day in my career."

Think of a specific time you had to manage a stressful situation on the job as a registered nurse, describe how you handled it, talk about what tools or resources you used, and explain what the outcome was. If possible, talk about specific coping techniques you used to help you through that particular situation to prove your ability to handle the mental and physical toll that working as a PICU nurse will no doubt involve.