How to tell you've worked too many shifts in a row

badphish · Jul 20, 2009

i did 2 months of 36 hrs on 36 hrs off 2 yrs ago. would never do that again. i feel sorry for my patients during that run, they got the bare minimum in care.

i remember a few shift where me and my partner were awoken in the sitting in the ambulance by the oncoming crew we were two exhausted to get out of the truck, and needed the extra ten minutes of sleep.

blondnursey · Jul 21, 2009

i once (stupidly) did 21 fourteen hour shifts in a row.

.i fell asleep AT THE REDLIGHT IN PITTSBURGH...

and then i got so ill i had to take a full week off....

NEVER NEVER NEVER GOING TO DO THAT AGAIN.

my limit is now 8 days in a row.......

what was i thinking $$$$$$$$$ :madface:

CoffeemateCNA · Mar 27, 2010

. . .when you wake up the next morning and realize you parked your car in the neighbor's front yard. :uhoh21:

franciscangypsy · Mar 28, 2010

Most I've ever worked in a row (12 hr shifts) was 6. Never, ever again. I was so tired, if a pt had coded I'd have probably handed them the ambu bag and said, "well you wanted to do this, worked hard for, so you can just ventilate yourself...."

Shudder. I don't like working three in a row. After I had two nights working, then one off, and then three on -- with the worst pt load I'd had in awhile -- I couldn't muster enough energy to have sympathy for my (remaining) dying patient. And I dreamed about work all six of the days. It was horrible. I felt like a horrible, uncaring nurse. Never again. Not if I can help it.

diawc · Apr 1, 2010

you know you've worked too many....

When you wake up in the afternoon, yell at the kids (who just got home from school) to get to bed right away because its way past their bedtime.....and not even remember the conversation

Poi Dog · Jun 28, 2011

When you drive by a pasture with cows and tell yourself you bet that the grass is super soft and would make a nice bed. :smokin:

RN Student 55367 · Jun 28, 2011

You reprogram the telemetry monitors and now have Mario scrambling over the QRS complexes and hopping over the P waves for extra credit
Your patient bradys down from a steady sinus tach to the 30's, and you run up the hallway yelling, "oh, hell no you are not making me fill out all that paperwork this late in the shift!"
Your coworker trips and falls running to the same code, and all you can think is, "great, I'll end up with 2 of her pts when she goes to the ER."
You are hauling your now dead pt to the morgue, your coworker's went to the ER, leaving 2 nurses on the floor with 28 patients, and you hear another code go off for your floor, and you jump out of the elevator and run...leaving the corpse in the elevator as a present for the next person who pushes the button....
You have a conversation with the admin rep that sounds like this...."I lost my patient...no, I mean really lost them....no, they were dead, they can't find their way back to the unit...."
When you hear a scream, you know someone found your deceased patient.

#6, that is sooo wrong. LOL

beckster_01, BSN, RN · Jul 1, 2011

You start walking down the 7 flights of stairs to go home and wonder (briefly) if you are going in the right direction...

Poi Dog · Jul 1, 2011

When you grab a facial wipe for your face and realize that it is a Clorox wipe and not a Pond's one...

LaylaHendrix23 · Jul 3, 2011

When you clock out and then get half way down the hall and ask yourself, "did I clock out?" Then you turn around to go clock out and get halfway back down the hall you realize...oh I did clock out..oops!

Then when you turn around to walk back down the hall and leave you stop dead in your tracks and ask yourself AGAIN..."did I clock out?" After standing there for a few seconds I finally remembered clocking out and could go home.

I literally did this the other morning!! Too many night shifts! It sounds pretty confusing..but thats how I felt, very confused!!! lol

~Mi Vida Loca~RN, ASN, RN · Jul 3, 2011

You reprogram the telemetry monitors and now have Mario scrambling over the QRS complexes and hopping over the P waves for extra credit
Your patient bradys down from a steady sinus tach to the 30's, and you run up the hallway yelling, "oh, hell no you are not making me fill out all that paperwork this late in the shift!"
Your coworker trips and falls running to the same code, and all you can think is, "great, I'll end up with 2 of her pts when she goes to the ER."
You are hauling your now dead pt to the morgue, your coworker's went to the ER, leaving 2 nurses on the floor with 28 patients, and you hear another code go off for your floor, and you jump out of the elevator and run...leaving the corpse in the elevator as a present for the next person who pushes the button....
You have a conversation with the admin rep that sounds like this...."I lost my patient...no, I mean really lost them....no, they were dead, they can't find their way back to the unit...."
When you hear a scream, you know someone found your deceased patient.

I should NOT be laughing at your last 3 but man tears are flowing. I think I am a weee bit tired myself.

beckster_01, BSN, RN · Jul 3, 2011

When you clock out and then get half way down the hall and ask yourself, "did I clock out?" Then you turn around to go clock out and get halfway back down the hall you realize...oh I did clock out..oops!
Then when you turn around to walk back down the hall and leave you stop dead in your tracks and ask yourself AGAIN..."did I clock out?" After standing there for a few seconds I finally remembered clocking out and could go home.

ALL the time...lol. But I'm already known for wandering the unit looking lost, going to do something then forgetting what I was going to do 5 seconds later, so its nothing out of the ordinary :)