[cheerfuldoer]

The lack of support among nurses in the work place today -- as well as in other career fields -- was created by the Baby Boomers of yesteryear! Yes, I'm afraid that the kids we are having to work with today are the 'experimental kids' birthed by the Baby Boomers who taught them -- BY OUR ACTIONS -- that if they didn't eat each other, they would be eaten. These 'kids' are now the product of our own doing! People's attitudes towards life and work today did not begin on our jobs as nurses, but began from the cradle on up loooonnnngggg before we even got to college. The Baby Boomers spit out those eager beavers and threw them to the wolves to be raised by childcare institutions so they could 'provide the finer things in life for those little rugrats'. Why??? Because we were trying to instill in our little rugrats that TIMES HAD CHANGED and they were going to be the ones inheriting the AFTER AFFECTS of everything we -- the parents -- worked hard to put into law. Today, we can sit back and watch what we created. These 'kids' are now the employees that we Baby Boomers have to work alongside of...smart mouths and all! Can't blame the 'kids'. They were ours to mold and shape with manners so that one day when they left our nest to establish their own place in the world, they would be able to offer the world -- WHAT???

BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU PRODUCE FOR ONE DAY YOU JUST MIGHT HAVE TO 'EAT' IT -- OR SHOULD I SAY, WORK WITH THEM!!! And by all the 'this versus that' threads going on on this BB, I'd say we are all "too full to pop"!

[DougD1]

Can be Very true, or not. Depends on the personalities involved, and I hate to say it, the "Cattiness" factor. Wish we as nurses could stick together and take care of our "Young." Seen too many instances where the young were eaten to satisfy the "Totem pole."

[micro]

wasn't my doing!!!!!
but that is my tongue in cheek response

actually renee, gotta agree pretty good take on situation.............

lol micro

[mccracmd]

As a nursing student fixing to graduate, I can tell you from my experience that nurses are a breed that eat their own young. Don't get me wrong, I have had some wonderful preceptors but a lot weren't simply because they don't want to take the time. I work and know nursing is a busy profession but are we too busy to teach those who may one day care for us or our parents.

[judy ann]

Nurses not only eat their young, but each other. I have said I would love to return to the nursing that I knew 10-15-20 Years ago when nurses respected each other. Sure we stood up and gave The Doctor our chair, but we helped each other, and we liked each other. Today we no longer help each other, and we no longer give the doc our chair, but it is a great competition to make the other guy look bad so that "I "can look that much better. If I give a compliment to a co-worker, she feels that i'm setting her up for something and is on her guard! I don't backbite, but, Boy, have I been backbitten! I'd almost rather work with a roomful of surgeons and cardiologists than some of the average nurses I know. And, as all of us know, that is no compliment to either group! And yet, I still love nursing. Figure that.

[hooverrn]

Well I finally found the place I was looking for, and wil put my 2 cents in. I find that nurses do not support each other. Instead there is the rumor mill that can get quite mean. I have seen staff's, no clicks that were so mean that people would get fired over the mean things said and some times done.

[micro]

and yet i still love nursing, figure that

[mario_ragucci]

Nursing is my vocation, and I am in this all the way all ready. Mario has never felt so right about a career. And being in my "mid-thirties" I know what a whim is, and is not.

This medium has enlightened me to several nursing perspectives, including "back biting", "bullying" and plain-old, generic hatred. I tell ya, I didn't expect to see it in nursing, but, you can't turn tail and run from your passion.

We are all different people, coming from all different backgrounds. There are more women in nursing, so, for me, I'll have to "watch" and "be still" because some nurses can be fragile to motion.

Unless your cared for (at work), how you gonna care? Unless your confident, how are you going to have a pleasant additude? These qualities come from your self (and environment), and are not mentioned in any school. Stress is manageable; folks are supposed to know how to be cool with each other. Maybe nurses under stress think it's "okay" to bite their fellow nurses heads off one day because we can grow another head. Biting off heads is not cool, and should not be considered "collateral" violence.

In the USMC, I remember how you were considered a "boot" until you had a little "time and grade." But folks wouldn't eat you, because, you were still a Marine, and everyone has to be a "boot" once. It was fun to "order" the "boots" to do push-ups straight out of "the rack", or to carry the heavy equipment, because they had "over-disciple" from Parris Island, like we all did. After awhile they catch on, and realize, we're all one unit. A nurse is a nurse: A loving and caring factor; A common thread which goes through us all, I thought :-)

Nurses, from what I read, don't look for humor in a new nurse: they look for a kill. Looks like some nurses will try to break each others spirit, rather than just play around. And some are on the "up and up", growling at each other, berating each other, hurting each other...why?

Isn't there camaraderie amongst us?

When old flowers go to seed, those seeds fall, and new flowers grow, and they are beautiful just like the a flower ever was. Sometimes the Spring time is really cold, and the flowers are late. But they'll come.

[lisadavis]

i think nursing is like sounding the fire alarm in a crowed building, everyone scrambling for the exits all at once running down whoever gets in our way. nursing as not yet become a "CAREER" in the eyes of the world, we are looked upon as sex kittens, battle axes and stepping stones to MD's. how many times have you heard, "why didn't you just go all the way and become a doctor?" we are all trying so hard to get to the top, to make something of our lives and our chosen profession we don't care who or what we destroy along the way. some of this behavior is inherently human and some of it is very female(even if we don't want to admit it) then on top of all this we have bosses, administrators etc that rule by the motto, "divide and conquer" if everyone keeps fighting amongst themselves no one will notice how the 'bosses' are screwing them. these problems have existed for a long time and will not be solved overnight but if we all try to do our own little part to act professional maybe someday we will be .

[T.Bird]

I am just plain old tired of LAZY nurses that don't beleive in teamwork or sharing the work load in an equitable manner. Example, the other day I worked a 12 hr shift where I had the worst patient load on the unit and we were short an Aide. Instead of sending the aide to help out with my patients who required complete care (and I mean complete) the charge nurse used the aide to do all the work for her own easy patients and never once offered to help me. I didn't have lunch until 4pm. The whole time I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off the charge nurse, aide and another RN were on the internet looking up funny jokes and laughing all day. I even had to answer the phone a couple of times and it was a personal call for guess who?? I was so angry I couldn't say a word for fear of becoming verbally abusive. I am sick and tired of taking the hard assignments while the same individuals sit back and pick their noses. I am not affraid of hard work and these people are taking advantage of it HAVE HAD ENOUGH By the way I've noticed that those older nurses who eat their young have no trouble with hard work, I'll take them over some lazy supposedly friendly but useless younger nurse any day. Anyway, at the end of the shift (when I was still transcribing orders) she had the nerve to say to me "Sorry I didn't help you, but I just felt like being selfish today"
Well, I felt like being selfish the next day so I just called in, and lazy nurse #1 and lazy nurse #2 had to work short. I had never done this before, but damn, it felt soooooo good. I am looking for work elsewhere because where I work now, this is the norm and not the exception. Thanks for hearing me out, I feel better now