The Associate-Degree Nursing Student (ADN) self-care practices will assist in determining success during the first semester of nursing school. Understanding the first-semester ADN nursing students' self-care strategies will help produce a future nurse as academic pressure can derail a successful graduate. What is not fully known is how the first-semester ADN nursing students practice self-care in the first semester? Also, how the academic pressures change self-care practices. The research questions, how do first-semester nursing students in an ADN program practice self-care and how do academic pressures change self-care practices in the first-semester ADN nursing student, guide the dissertation. A basic qualitative method is best suited to understand the topic of self-care of the first-semester nursing students to answer the research questions. A basic qualitative study explores the experiences and reality of the nursing students. The ADN first-semester undergraduate nursing student, the sample population, is derived from the larger population, the community college. The shared experiences among the first-semester ADN nursing students resulted in the thematic and data analysis. The self-care strategies emerged as self-talk, self-management, physical outlet and activities, and social support. The findings indicated a need for nursing education to address self-care strategies of the first-semester ADN nursing student to prepare the future nurse graduate. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]