Confess! Whats the craziest force of habit you've done in the "Real World"

Nurses Humor

Published

I have heard some of the craziest things nurses have done out of force of habit in the "Real World". Aka out of the hospital.

I've heard that some sign their checks with first initial, last name RN.

Someone ran to aisle four in the grocery store because of a "code blue! clean up! Code blue!"

Knocking on the door before entering, any door, your front door.

Answering your cell phone "Nurses station"

Admiring someones veins.

Holding your invisible steth when leaning over.

Wheres the weirdest place you've fallen asleep?

Confess!

Specializes in NeuroICU/SICU/MICU.

My husband snores loudly, and has occasional sleep apnea. I'm always checking his breathing and airway. He also has amazing veins (which he let me practice IVs on when I was in school). I palpate his radial pulse when we're holding hands, which he hates. Also I can't watch medical shows with him, because I yell too much :clown:

Specializes in Geriatrics.

I'm guilty of signing LPN on credit slips, checks & kids homework. I also tend to diagnose potential patients in the grocery store. Assessments on family members, running towards a "crash" sound thinking "darn now I have even more paperwork to do" when at home. Asking daughter when her last BM was, what it looked like and the size, also is she hydrating enough.

Knock on any and all doors, whether coming or going (just recently going into a stall in a public restroom)

Wash hands before and after going to the bathroom

Try to stick pens in shirt pocket when I'm wearing street clothes and scrawl weird things all over my chest -- or my rear end if I'm aiming for the back pocket

Admire veins

Write "LPN" on checks, bills, etc.

Answer home phone with official facility greeting

Specializes in PACU, OR.

How could I have forgotten that? Gentlegiver, I am guilty of interrogating both of my kids about the frequency, texture and quantity of their BMs!

And Mazy, I am forever groping my left breast in shops in search of a pen that isn't there...!

I admire veins all the time haha.

And, now that grocery stores have hand rub, I use it out of reflex!

Specializes in Acute Care.

I've been taking Tai Chi lessons, and part of it involves something called push hands, which is you and a partner... pushing hands to learn certain movements. I found myself palpating some incredible veins last week. We're talking the kind you could slam a 14 in withour a tourniquet. It was awesome. Got some very strange looks, though.

Specializes in OB/GYN, L&D, Inf Prevention, CM, QI.

Have definitely written "RN" after my name away from work, answered the phone at home by saying my department and my name instead of just saying "hello" and once, in 1988, I fell asleep at a Def Lepard concert after working 5 twelve hour night shifts in a row then driving 7 hours to see my fiance. I don't recommend that to anyone!:eek:

Specializes in Emergency.

I'm always afraid of answering the land line with the usual greeting I give while at work... so I just don't answer it anymore.

I operate solely on 2400 time now. I admire veins. When I was a tech, I used to pick up shifts on the cardiac floors and I would come home and hear the tele alarms in my sleep. My unit now doesn't do tele, but now I wake up in the middle of the night hearing bed alarms or freaking out because I haven't done my hourly rounding.

Specializes in Med-Surg, HH, Tele, Geriatrics, Psych.

I have signed checks and receipts with RN at the end. Haven't we all? I look at veins too! I diagnose people in my head when their color is "not quite right".

The job I have had for the last 11 months is in a secure facility, which requires unlocking and locking every single door that you walk into and out of, so after a particularly grueling 3-in-a-row, I find myself coming home and trying to unlock and lock every door at home I come across (without keys). It is so annoying! We also carry heavy radios on our hips, and sometimes I feel the weight of the radio on me after I leave work. I embarrass myself by slapping my hip and starting to panic, thinking I brought my radio home, LOL! :D

Specializes in PICU, NICU, SICU, CCU, ER, RN Paralegal.

When anyone asks me to hand them something, like scissors, I slap it in their hand like I'm in the OR!

A mom I know who is a nurse and I were watching our kids play after school. Her son who is quite active started playing pretty rough with another little boy on the playground. It seemed like they were wrestling and her son had the other kid pinned. When she saw this she called her son's name and said "Scott let go of the patient immediately" it was hysterical! I think she had just finished her shift at the hospital.

Specializes in Trauma Surgery, Nursing Management.
When anyone asks me to hand them something, like scissors, I slap it in their hand like I'm in the OR!

Oh thank GOODNESS I am not the only one who does this! My husband laughs at me when I do this. On trips, he asks me to pull out a bottle of water for him from the cooler, and I slap it into his hand! And when we are fishing, he asks me for a tool, and I do it again! Thankfully, he is an EMT, and understands my slapping things into his hand. When I ask him if it gets on his nerves, he just says, "No way, at least I know it is in my hand and don't have to look away from what I am doing." He shoulda been a surgeon!

+ Add a Comment