New Grads: How was your day today???

I currently work as a new grad RN for Kaiser Permanente in Hawaii for Med-Surg/Oncology. I have been on orientation for a month on day shift. My preceptors have dubbed me competent to be on my own, so I worked a week without a preceptor. I survived. I learned I need to chart more along the way, work on my time management/organization and if I have to double check and triple check my orders. I am learning everyday how to be a nurse. The floor is a great floor to learn and the staff is very supportive to my learning and teaching.

I started evening this week, but I got pulled from orientation to cover day shift. Will return to evening/night orientation soon so I can learn the flow for those shifts. Excited and nervous for the day I am officially on my own.

Hello,
just got done with my orientation for days. started nights. have 2 weeks of orientation on nights and then i'm on my own. i had 4 months orientation for days and 2 weeks for nights. I look back when i started. i cant believe how far i've come. things have gotten better. i still have a lot to learn, but feel i can function instead of being scared all the time. I've had a lot of great mentors. nurses with over 40 years practice. wanting to precept me and show me how things should be done. i'm truly grateful. i still have days where i go, "by god, what have i done. getting into nursing. i just want a simple desk job." things get better with time. good luck everyone. keep your head up!

Well, I am starting my fourth week on the floor tomorrow. About a week and a half ago, I had two patients code on my one on each consecutive shift. Although I was scared as hell and shaking like a leaf, I held it together, did what I learned to do in the immediate stage and called for help. I stepped to the side when the code team arrived and started giving report. At that time I felt like I was shaking and the like the room was spinning. When I heard the overhead speaker say "Adult Code Blue room ..." I felt like I was in a dream. But when people were asking questions I wasn't aware of anyone else in the room, just myself and the person asking questions. After all was said and done, everyone told me what a good job I did. We shared a moment in the nurse's station and I showed them my shaking hands. And then the shift continued. The weird thing is, a couple days later the nurse manager said, "You have a very calm exterior but we wonder what's going on inside." I don't know how to process that because yes, I was able to hold it together like a professional, licensed nurse - however I was very upfront about how nervous I was with my fellow nurses. Now, being calm is a bad thing? I'm confused...

Did I log on under a different name & post this?? I know the delirium is setting in, but didn't know it had gone this far!!!

Despite all of this, I still know that I do have a passion for my job.

Student2Registered: I totally feel your pain. Although I have an assigned preceptor, she's out on vacation a lot right now, so I end up with different people each day. For the most part, it works out for me. I like to learn difference people's styles and hints for doing things. However, some days are better then others, and some preceptors are more patient with others.

I also can't understand how I did so well in nursing school, but feel like a total idiot on the job. The unit I'm on hired 8 newly graduated nurses within about a month (I am the second to last one hired). The other new nurses (who only have about 2 weeks of experience on me), seem so confident and do the job with ease, while I feel like I'm struggling just to get all my meds passed in a timely manner! Then, they hired another new nurse two weeks after me, and I think she's already up to the same patient load as me! (again, making me feel like a total idiot).

At the end of the day, the preceptors I work with say "Great job today", but I wonder how much of that is just a line that they say to everyone. I just don't know. Some days I think I'm doing ok, other days I can't even get my assessment charted until after my shift is over.

In addition, I also moved out of state to take this job, so new hospital, new state, new home, new career. Thank God I still have the same husband to support me and help me get through all this! :wink2:

"The other new nurses (who only have about 2 weeks of experience on me), seem so confident and do the job with ease, while I feel like I'm struggling just to get all my meds passed in a timely manner! Then, they hired another new nurse two weeks after me, and I think she's already up to the same patient load as me! (again, making me feel like a total idiot).

At the end of the day, the preceptors I work with say "Great job today", but I wonder how much of that is just a line that they say to everyone. I just don't know. Some days I think I'm doing ok, other days I can't even get my assessment charted until after my shift is over. "

This is exactly how I felt before I quit. There was one other RN who was hired about 2wks before me but she had not taken boards yet. She was very confident and calm. She worked night shift and I worked days but we saw each other at shift change and sometimes she would work days. She did charge about a wk after passing boards (about 1 month after she started) and she was fine with it. Her extreme confidence made me feel even more like an idiot. I know everyone learns at a different pace but it is NO fun being the last one.

Today was pretty okay. I've been at my Mulitcare/LTC for a month now. I'm off the buddy system and am a full time float during the night shift. I don't really mind floating because I get to learn all of the units, patients and co-workers. Tonight I was on our vent unit. This unit is usually a 12 hour shift so I was confused why they had me doing 11p-7a there. I got there and everything was beeping because of the vents. I'm so used to my "quiet" units. Luckily on this unit there are 3 RN's and 2 LPNs so I'd had a few people to turn to. I ended up just doing 12a and 6a meds. I was slow on my 12a meds because I had to orientate myself to the floor and I took time counting the narcs and making sure I had everything I needed. Plus it didn't help that all the 12a meds were mostly blood sugars. Unfortuntly on one blood sugar I flicked the test strip up getting blood and got a couple drops of my blood on my face. It got on my lower lip and forehead. I felt like an idiot. I went to my cart and got a alcohol swab and wiped my face up. I didn't feel this would be an incident report. I was done with my 12a meds at 2, which I was kind of annoyed with myself with. I personally could've been done in a way shorter time then that. But I was glad to be safe than sorry. The rest of my time I busied myself with talking to the RN's, doing my med cart audit, flagging my 6a meds, taking my break, ect. 5a rolls around and I get my cart together. Most of my patients are gtubes and so I made sure new pole sacks were in the rooms. The RN that was monitoring me did the b/ps and blood sugars since there were so many and I wouldn't be done with the med pass at 7 if she didn't help. What a time saver that was! I was done at 7 on the dot. I also got splashed in the face by a gtube residual when i forgot to clamp the damn line. Number#2 on my rookie mistake list. Luckily there was only 2 mistakes. Pretty good for me. I ended up getting out at 730 this morning after the narc count that I'm oh so freakin' slow in. It's definetly not one my favorite floors due to the heavy med pass. But I did enjoy myself and it was nice to have so many nurses around to turn to. Tonight I have no idea where I'll be put. Probably the rehab unit. Bring it on!!

I am a new grad who accepted a position in the MICU. However, I am part of a New Grad Residency and I am spending the first 4 weeks on a Med-Surg floor. Last night was my second night on the floor and I was assigned my own patient. I took report, got my meds together, did my initial assessment, checked labs, checked the chart for new orders, etc. My patient only spoke Spanish so I had to get an interuptor.

Anyway, I has to pass my meds by 2100 and 0600, as well as do guclose check and give insulin sub-q. I also had to change his IV site (first time doing an IV since nursing school) and got it on the first try. I also drew labs for the first time. In addition to giving meds, I had to do hourly roundings and urine output.

Since I am the new grad on the floor, I went around and asked all the nurses can I do their blood draws or start IV's for them. We were short staffed last night, so they really appericated the help. I got to do blood draws from a couple of central lines and PICC's. I also got to do a lot of heparin flushes. I helped one nurse by doing a straight cath (I've only done foley's), so it was something different. But I am learning so much and I take the opportunity to seek out new learning opportunities.

I also did my 24 hour chart check and added new orders per the chart. I gave report off and asked the oncoming nurse to give me feedback.

I'm learning so much and I'm LOVING it!

This week I dropped my first NG tube and changed my first ostomy bag! Ah, it's the little things....

Well, I was two months out of orientation and starting to feel a little more confident when our hospital started a new med scanning system 2 weeks ago. Ugh! Now I feel like I'm back at day 3 of my orientation.

At least before I felt like I could talk to the patients and families. Develop a rapport with them. Now I feel like all I do is scan and pass meds.

The only comfort I'm taking from this is that the more experienced nurses feel like they're drowning too. It also hasn't helped that we have one PCT on the floor and almost all my patients have been total care.