Sometimes things don't turn out the way you expected them to. When i graduated from nursing school I always thought I'd end up working in a hospital. I wanted the experience of working alongside seasoned nurses (even though they're said to eat new nurses for dinner), and see different things. But I ended up working in homecare, and I went from seeing patients in their home, to doing coordinating of nurses' visits in the office, to doing case management from my dining room. While the mother and housewife in me is thrilled to be able to stay home with my 15 month old and get laundry done while working, the nurse in me every so often wonders if i'm really happy. Some days i feel like i work in a call center. I case manage about 60 patients, which means i field phone calls for questions like "I need to see a dentist who takes my insurance" to "my aide didn't show up today" or "my mother's incontinence briefs are the wrong size". In between those phone calls I check up on my patients monthly, review their medication, make sure all their services get authorized, and generally try to keep my bosses happy. Since my homecare agency partners with a managed care company, I have two supervisors and two directors to answer to, which can get stressful. But then I stop to think about why i'm working in the first place. Yes, i want fulfillment. But i think i get that from my family and my hobbies, so i don't need to get it from a career. it might seem old fashioned, but i think my values allow me to be happy even if my "career" isn't what i thought it would be.