An article on the most important lesson I learned during my first year as a nurse. Physical distress can augment our stress levels and a full and overfull bladder is often ignored by nurses as being prioritizable into their workload. As we are always looking for ways to improve nursing care, I found it is okay to take time to use the bathroom so we are not stressed out, pee laden nurses making bad decisions because our bodies are eliciting a stress response to us ignoring our physical needs. It's okay to pee at work. In fact, quality nursing care depends on it.
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Along with all the other goodies I learned in my first year of nursing, my favorite lesson was the bladder lesson. No, I did not get a terrible infection or end up with measurable kidney damage, but I learned a lesson on stress. Physical stress. The kind that interfered with my still immature nurse-brain. I call this my first critical thinking moment of my career. And it happened at home.
At 30 years old I had gone back to school, or rather, completed my 12-year associate's degree. I felt like I had the advantage of maturity knowing how to work and work hard. I had been at it since I was 15 and knew how to think fast and multitask like a madwoman. The technical and physiological information from nursing school had made sense and I felt like I was born to be a nurse. At my first job in a nursing home, I had 20-60 patients at once and I found that although it was difficult, it was manageable with organization and spontaneity. I got it. At least that is how I felt until I physically started breaking down.
I was exhausted. I told myself it was because I was on my feet all day. Or that I was just tired from hearing everyone's problems or seeing constant hopeless cases and it was mental fatigue. And I couldn't kick it. Supplements? Nah. Diet changes? Ha ha. Nope, I was consigned to being one of those nurses that leave the field after the first year because I just could not hack it.
Then my husband asked if he could say something. We were learning to "communicate" again because nursing school had taken its toll on our marriage. In our new found language, he noticed that every day when I came home, I was running to the bathroom like it offered a foot rub and chocolate. He asked me what my relationship with the toilet was like I was having an affair. I told him I just needed to pee. And then the light turned on. I hadn't gone to the bathroom since I got up that morning! If I was my own patient, I would have sounded the alarm; bladder scanned myself, cathed or encouraged fluids!
So I started to pay attention. Yep, I certainly was getting the signal to need to go. So I did. I treated myself with my own nursing interventions and started feeling better. I realized I was causing personal physical stress by ignoring my bladder. After taking time to go when needed, my workplace suddenly felt more relaxed, my mind was clearer and I stopped feeling so exhausted all the time. My new mantra became- "Feel stressed? Go pee."
As I matured in nursing, I looked outside my problems and began to see what other nurses were dealing with. Watching a very harried nurse run from room to room, I asked if I could hang her next IV bag so she could go to the bathroom. As she ran jubilantly down the hall to the restroom, she asked, "How did you know!?" The nursing students I have following me around like little ducklings also benefit from my bladder revelation. It is very satisfying to tell them it is okay to pee.
The moral of the story- Respect your bladder. If you need to go, go. We make crappy decisions and judgments when we are stressed and if going to the bathroom can reduce the physical stress on our bodies, it is more important than refilling someone's coffee or charting.
