From Caring for Patients to Becoming One: The Story of a Nigerian Nursing Student

We interviewed a Nigerian Nurse (anonymous) who shared the story of her medical condition, which began in Nursing School. She spent years learning how to care for patients. She knew about burnout. She understood the importance of rest. She had even started a podcast where she spoke about stress and burnout in nursing school.

But what began as an intense desire to excel eventually became a frightening journey involving hospital visits, unexplained physical symptoms, medications, declining self-esteem and a diagnosis of functional movement disorder.

For Nurse X, nursing school taught her lessons that could never be found in a textbook.

The Pressure to Become an Achiever

Nurse X describes herself as a B student. Not because she lacked ambition, but because she constantly felt she had to work harder to achieve the results she wanted.

“I want to be at the top of my class. I want to read, I want to know, I want to feel that feeling of, okay, I’m an achiever.”

Her nursing programme required classes from Monday to Friday, usually from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., followed by clinical postings and examinations. She would read months before examinations.

When classes ended, she would often remain in school to study before returning home to continue. The problem was that she rarely allowed herself to stop. There was always another topic to cover. Another examination to prepare for. Another reason to keep going. And eventually, her body couldn’t take it anymore.

Her Body Began to Respond

One evening, after refusing her friends’ suggestion that she take a break because she still had a lot to study, Nurse X went home feeling unusually weak.

She was breathing heavily. Her heart was pounding. She could barely move. Her roommate, who was still awake studying, noticed that something was wrong.

Nurse X could not speak properly. Her roommate checked her pulse and realised that it was extremely fast. “It was just a lot that night,” she recalls. “My heart was beating so fast.”

She eventually went to the hospital and had an ECG. The result showed sinus tachycardia. She was given medication to reduce her heart rate. But the mystery was far from over.

Her Face Started Twitching

The following day, Nurse X noticed something different. The left side of her face began moving involuntarily. This was not an ordinary facial twitch. Her entire face could pull towards one side.

For someone with medical knowledge, the possibilities running through her mind were frightening. “I’m a nursing student, and I have the knowledge that, oh, you have to check yourself.”

She began undergoing investigations, from blood tests to ultrasounds to ECGs, but they couldn’t find anything. It wasn’t stroke like she earlier presumed.

She visited different hospitals and was prescribed different medications. But the twitching continued. And as the physical symptoms persisted, her confidence disappeared as well.

“I Felt Like It Wasn’t Me Anymore”

Nurse X’s self-esteem dropped significantly. She became increasingly conscious of the movement in her face and worried about people noticing it.  She didn’t want to be pitied or looked at differently.

It got so bad that, she began wearing a face mask even when she was alone with her roommate. “I don’t want her to see me. I don’t want that face of pity,” she says.

There were moments when she felt like she had become a completely different person. “It’s like I’m reborn into a different person.”

She was also struggling to eat. At one point, even one egg was too much for her. “I could only take water and pap.” Her roommate had to encourage her to eat so that she could take her medications.

The young woman who had once been focused on passing examinations was now focused on simply understanding what was happening to her body.

What is the diagnosis?

Nurse X’s search for a diagnosis took her to different hospitals. Getting specialist care was not always straightforward. At one point, she was told that there was a long wait to see a neurologist. She could not imagine waiting months while her face continued to twitch without knowing what was wrong. 

One day, during her clinical posting, Nurse X decided to discuss her symptoms with a consultant she was working with. At first, she described the symptoms as though they belonged to someone else. The consultant raised concerns about the possibility of a neurological problem and recommended further assessment.

The conversation frightened her. She left the ICU in tears. She dreaded the possibility that something serious could be happening to her. She approached the matron, explained that she was actually the person experiencing the symptoms and asked for help getting evaluated.

She eventually saw a cardiologist and later a neurologist. The neurologist’s assessment led to a diagnosis of functional movement disorder, with stress identified as an important factor in her case.

For Nurse X, the diagnosis was difficult to process. After spending so much time searching for a physical explanation, she now had to confront the role that stress and burnout may have played in what she was experiencing.

The Irony of the Podcast

Perhaps the most striking part of Nurse X’s story is that she advocated for the very thing she didn’t do. During her second year of nursing school, she had started a podcast about nursing school.

One of the major themes was burnout and stress. She talked about how students could manage the pressure.  She advised people to take breaks and shared things they could do to relieve stress.

But she was not following her own advice. “It was an irony,” she says. “I was giving the advice on how to manage burnout and stress… but I never practiced it.”

The Moment Her Perspective Changed

After living with the symptoms for months, numerous hospital visits as the patient, medications with terrible side effects, she still had to continue with school and write examinations.

But this time, she sat down and asked herself a different question. What if she stopped living for everyone’s expectations? What if she stopped trying to prove herself? What if she simply took care of herself?

Her answer changed her perspective. “With or without nursing, with or without school, school will go on,” she says. “They’ll write their exams, they’ll finish whatever they want to do, and I have to live for myself.”

It was not that she suddenly stopped caring about her education. She still wanted to finish nursing school and make her parents proud.

But she no longer wanted to lose herself while pursuing it.

She Still Wants to Be a Nurse

Nurse X’s experience did not make her abandon nursing. Instead, it changed how she understood herself within it. She learned that being committed to a profession does not mean being consumed by it.

Taking a break does not mean being unserious. And perhaps most importantly, she learned that healthcare workers are also human beings who need care.

Her symptoms have reduced over time, although she says the facial movement has not completely disappeared and can still be triggered.

She has also become more intentional about not allowing stress to control her life.

Conclusion: Lesson for Nursing Students

Nursing school can be demanding. The workload and the examinations are real. The pressure to succeed is real.

But Nurse X’s story raises an important question: At what point does the pursuit of excellence become self-neglect?

Her experience should not be used to conclude that every unexplained physical symptom is caused by stress. New or persistent symptoms require proper medical evaluation. But her story does remind us that knowing about burnout does not make us immune to it.

You can be the student who teaches others about self-care and still need someone to remind you to rest. You can be ambitious and still need a break.

You can want to be the best and still recognize that your wellbeing matters more than proving that you are.

Before you are a nurse, a student, an employee, an achiever or anything else, you are a human being. And the person who is working so hard to build your future deserves to be cared for too.