Queasy...

[shibby]

Hi! I'm new here...and I am extremely distraught.

I'm a senior in highschool planning on attending college for Nursing next year...and I was wicked excited until today.

We had a blood drive at school, and I was volunteering as an escort. I was talking to one of the donors and distracting him while a Nurse put the needle in his arm...then I looked at the needle and fainted. BAM! I hit the gym floor pretttty hard...the vice principle ran over...and I woke up on the floor with about 20 people looming over me.

Is a weak stomach something people can get over, or should I just start looking for a new career? AH. Help, please.

[november17, ASN, RN]

So far, the odor of gangrene is the only thing that's gotten me.

Incontinent patient with gangrene and a GI bleed. The patient had a bowel movement. I went to clean it up. You can only imagine what that combination smelled like. What made it worse was that the family member in the room had been spraying this potpourri scented air freshener.

And then the nurse that was helping me said, "Don't pull on that foot too hard, it might fall off." Her saying that just made everything worse.

I got the job done, excused myself, went out in the hall and puked in a trashcan. I was trying not to, but it was like a little midget in my brain was pounding my vomit center with a hammer.

The worst thing is that now whenever I smell potpourri, it makes me think of the way gangrene smells. My brain just makes that association now...I can't help it. It turns my stomach just thinking about it.

I should probably mention that this happened to me several years ago, my third day on the job as a CNA.

I currently work in a vet clinic and I also almost fainted the first time I saw a routine surgery

I can understand that. I observed surgery on a human and it is so barbaric!! I have no problems cutting up a piece of meat. But it is completely different watching someone split open a live human and then proceed to treat their internal organs like pieces of meat. It was a colon resection, and all I have to say is that guy's butt probably REALLY hurt the next day.

The only other grossout thing that I see a lot that I have not gotten used to yet; When someone has been NPO for a long time, has a bowel obstruction, or has really severe diarrhea. They get these clear or brownish snotty/jellylike globs of poop instead of formed poops. That never fails to gross me out. I mean, I can deal with blood, stool, urine, oral excretions, snot, whatever. But those jelly poops always make me feel queasy.

[Scrubz]

The only thing that get to me sometimes are some of the smells you encounter. I could watch just about anything and it not affect me at all: blood, guts, bloody guts, someone puking their guts and blood out while getting their legs amputated during an open heart surgery.. Haha, you get the picture..

[Scrubz]

eeewwwwwwww!!! Measure it? I haven't gotten to that point, yet. That'll gross me out, for SURE!

I/O = everything going in and everything going out..

[november17, ASN, RN]

I/O = everything going in and everything going out..

Like those suction containers....you have to get them up to eye level to see how much is in there before you pour it out. All full of phlegm and spit. Yuck.

[Scrubz]

Like those suction containers....you have to get them up to eye level to see how much is in there before you pour it out. All full of phlegm and spit. Yuck.

Yeah, those can be pretty nasty sometimes.

[penn.nursing10]

Hi! I'm new here...and I am extremely distraught.

I'm a senior in highschool planning on attending college for Nursing next year...and I was wicked excited until today.

We had a blood drive at school, and I was volunteering as an escort. I was talking to one of the donors and distracting him while a Nurse put the needle in his arm...then I looked at the needle and fainted. BAM! I hit the gym floor pretttty hard...the vice principle ran over...and I woke up on the floor with about 20 people looming over me.

Is a weak stomach something people can get over, or should I just start looking for a new career? AH. Help, please.

my senior year of high school in AP bio we somehow got into the discussion of accidents we've all had...one student was describing an injury during a bike accident and i felt sick just listening to him because i suddenly started to imagine all the things i was going to see...i paniced!

then, this fall I started nursing school and I was asked to observe a surgery...an exploratory surgery of the abdominal cavity and removal of a tumor from the small intestine...i obviously accepted enthusiastically but inside was freaking out! once the surgery started i was so amazed at how the doctors and nurses were helping this patient by navigating though things i have never seen that i couldn't tear my eyes away.

long story short, dont worry yet. the more exposure the less you react. plus, when you start to learn what everything is and how it all works it's much less scary. you dont look at it as 'oh my God, that person's hurt' but more as 'okay, how am I going to help fix this?'

anyone agree?