Worn Out!

zudy · May 15, 2002

Dear tms, Hate that it's so terrible for you!!!! My first year out of school was EXACTLY the same!!! I was in an icu where all the old nurses loved to eat their young. I stayed one yr just to prove they couldn't run me off. I wish now I had left sooner. I have worked with so many great people since that experience. There are good units and nurses out there, out 23 yrs this icu was the only place i worked like you described. So hang in ther, look around, maybe you could transfer somewhere in house. ( I personally would check out the ER, but then I am predujiced!!!)

l.rae · May 15, 2002

do you have an EAP? start there before you quit...but start looking. When I've been in that situation I have always found something better. GOOD LUCK LR

Nancy45 · May 15, 2002

I could have written your letter myself 10 years ago when I was working ortho/medsurg. I started there after 4 mo as a nurse. I was really enthusiastic since I did so well in nursing school, top of the class. Well, I am really glad you have this place to come to. Please keep posting. Of course you will make mistakes, you are a new nurse, and they don't teach you everything in school! I agree with contacting your EAP if you have one. When I was in your situation I forgot about the eap, and I just quit after 4 months. It was 12 hour nights. I really liked the work too. Then I got a job with agency and a big pay raise. There are plenty of different places to work.

I would have done better to fight back to keep this job, though. I loved the work and pts. and the experience is invaluable. I wanted to work in the hospital. It is the fastest way to learn nursing. Is is possible to change floors? Since then I have seen newbe after newbe get discouraged and disillusioned and crushed, but in the end, I wouldn't give up the experiences I have had. Maybe some of the nurses who made it in the hospital can give us some tips. I think one of the things I did wrong was to be too trusting, too open and just too nice.

fedupnurse · May 15, 2002

Transfer or go to another facility. It isn't worth risking your netal health. Those people will never change. Don't put yourself thru it. Life is way to short!!!

Good luck!

colleen10 · May 15, 2002

Oh TMS, I really feel for you.

I went through the same kind of thing a few years ago. It wasn't in a hospital but an office environment. But it was exactly the way you described. As you can see all ready this type of environment will really take a toll on your mental and physical health. I remember every morning waking up and laying out my clothes to get ready for work and just crying because I didn't want to go and subject myself to that abuse. I'm usually a bubbly helpful person but my personality while working at this place did a complete 180. I was mean and grouchy and tried my best to just hide at my desk so as not to bring any attention to myself. And I ended up bringing that attitude home too.

Most of the attitude was coming from management level people and they weren't going anywhere so there was little that could be done to correct it.

The best thing I did was leave and find another job. And the great thing with nursing is you will probably be able to find another, better job quickly.

Do yourself a favor and get out now. Don't feel like you have to stay just to prove something. There's nothing wrong with you.

Good Luck and remember "Mean People S--K!" :roll

whipping girl in 07, RN · May 15, 2002

If it's really that bad, try transferring within the facility. Go to your manager and tell him/her that med-surg just doesn't seem to be a good fit for you; could you in-house transfer to another floor. More than likely there are openings on nearly every floor. If you can, visit some of the other floors before you talk to your manager so you can get an idea of where you'd like to go. Don't whine about how you are being treated unfairly, so-and-so said this to me and chewed me out for this mistake, etc. You don't want to get yourself labeled as "someone who can't get along with her co-workers."

Some of the nurses where I work have made it their goal in life to make the new nurses feel bad, and there will always be competition between the shifts. If a mistake is made, and the person who made it is not on the same shift as you, for some reason, it just makes it SO much worse. It IS a pain in the @$$ to have to either work around or fix someone else's mistake. If your co-workers (either on your shift or on the next) fix all your mistakes, you'll never learn from them. I had a patient a couple of weeks ago who went for a heart cath on the weekend. Cath lab didn't fill out the pre-op form, so the nurses I was working with said not to worry about filling out the post-op form, just make sure I address everything in my nurses notes (which I always do anyway). Well, I came back to work Tuesday night and the post-op form was hanging on my locker, with a big note from one of those busybodies that like to make newbies feel bad, saying, "THIS FORM MUST BE FILLED OUT FOR ANY PATIENT RETURNING FROM SURGERY OR CATH LAB." Then one of my co-workers told me it had been hanging there since Monday, for all the world to see. The patient wasn't even in ICU anymore. So I filled out what I could remember (without the chart), wrote "see nurses notes" for what I couldn't, and send it to the floor where the patient was to be put on the chart. Now, I could have gone to my manager and said that this woman was picking on me, that so-and-so said I didn't have to fill out the paper because cath lab didn't fill out their part, etc, or I could do what I did, which was not take it personally and learn from my mistake. Of course, that is not the first mistake I made, it's just the most recent that is just so durn nit-picky that I'm still annoyed by it!

As for getting your schedule changed...yes, it does suck, but you are the new person. If they are going to change someone's self-schedule, it's going to be you. Think about it, if you had been working there for 10 years and turned in your schedule, and the new girl also turned in hers, and they couldn't accomodate both of you, would you really be happy if they gave her what she wanted and changed yours? I don't think so. Seniority does have it's privileges. Right now I'm new, work nights (which I love) but sometimes have to float to days (which I don't really like) but I do it without complaining (too much) because I know it's part of paying your dues.

Good luck!

VickyRN, MSN, DNP, RN · May 15, 2002

I think it is very disturbing that relatively new grads (8 mos experience in your case) are now being burned out in their first year of hospital practice; whereas before, nurses burning out in 5 or 6 years and fleeing the hospitals was the "norm." Says alot about hospital environments nowadays. I say it flows from the top and management creates the unhealthy, caustic, nurse-eating, horizontal violence on these units by understaffing and overworking the nurses till all care, consideration and compassion is beaten out of them. My advice to you--GET OUT!!!!

Thank God for the nursing shortage; you are not as stuck as you think you are. There should be plenty of opportunities out there for the picking. Just GET OUT, before that place destroys you and burns out yet another good nurse.

Agnus · May 15, 2002

Get out. GO someplace else. you might try a diffrent unite but you might have to go to a whole new facility. No job you hate is worth it.

Huganurse · May 16, 2002

The only reason I see that they are getting away with this is b/c you let them. Sorry, but you need to stand up for yourself! Remember to pick your battles. Some battles are not worth the fight. Good luck to you.

boobaby42 · May 16, 2002

Those people, making your life miserable, must be soooo unhappy themselves with life in general. That's all I can conclude, having gone thru similar stuff myself. It's a shame and pt. care suffers too. Such a shame.