Dont know if I love or hate my job

Hi Knufflebunny, how long have you been working in this job so far? It's normal to feel overwhelm at times when working in a new place. The great thing about your nursing specialty is that you help women with their health issues and help women prepare for their precious gifts-their babies! That's a wonderful place to work. My background is in med/surg/ tele and most of our patients are elderly with lot of co-morbidities, bed-bound isolation precaution patients etc. It's hard work, for sure-physically, mentally, emotionally etc. One way I think is helpful to counteract discontentment for any job or situation, is to be thankful. A lot of new nurses are having a hard time finding a job or have been searching endlessly for months or even till almost a year searching for jobs. Your work environment too is typically an upbeat atmosphere compared to high level stress environments like ICU, ER hospital settings. So I think, having a thankful heart and putting things into perceptive helps. And for me, I'm a Christian, so prayer is powerful-asking God to change my heart. I don't have control in changing the situation, but God can help me change my heart. Everything happens for a reason- good times and trying times- and all is meant to happen to work out for His glory and for our good, because God knows what's best. Last practical advice I can give, is to ask yourself the reasons what makes you overwhelmed with the job and if there is something that you can change to help you lessen your feelings of overwhelming. ( e.g. is it feelings of being unprepared or stress of pleasing others, or feelings of being inadquate in performing the tasks etc) If it's feelings of inadequacy, you can have more proactive approach, but equipping yourself with more knowledge about your specialty. Read and absorb nursing journals on topics related to your work and things that you deal at work. Perhaps you can ask an older, more seasoned nurse that you can trust, and ask to learn from her. Ask her/him questions. Read more on your companies policies and procedures etc. Continue to equip yourself in being more knowledgeable about the task. If you're feeling overwhelmed because feel not pleasing others, then need to step back and take a deep breathe, and just re-think. Most important thing in nursing and healthcare is patient's safety. We're their advocates and want to do what's best for our patients. When working on med/surg floor, prioritizing is key and sometimes to priotize would mean saying no to other task, so that the more urgent and important task can be done. Or sometime priortizing may mean having to call a doctor at a time that is inconvenient for them, but a must for our patient's condition. There's stress to that too in trying to please others, but if you know that you're doing what's best for the patient, and focus on that, compromising your nursing practice to please others diminishes and feelings of being overwhelmed or worried helps goes away. So yeah, I do hope you continue to press on. You're in a great field of nursing, continue to remember to have a thankful heart, and if you believe in God, pray and ask for wisdom in the plans He has for you and your family. God bless and best wishes to you in your nursing career. Feel free to ask if you have anymore follow up questions or if the things I mentioned were something slightly different from your thoughts.

Awwww...kufflebunny!! Sorry you're having a tough time. The fact that you moved your family and got the job you wanted let's you know you're in God's will!! It seems as though you're in you have good days and then you have bad days. I've been a member here long enough to know from these nurses that, it's a learning curve you're going through. Hang in there things will get better. In the meantime try to find the positives through out your day. Also, remember there are plenty of nurses who can't find jobs these days. It won't be this way always, keep your head up!!

No the feeling will not go away. There will always be a love hate relationship with any job. The good news is, you will get better at time management, gain trust in your skills as you gain experience etc. One day something will happen and it will click in your head that 1. you can do this and 2. you enjoy it.. Of course you will still have days that start off crazy and end crazy but you will be able to handle it better with fewer questions or help/back up from the more senior nurses on the floor..

Hang in there, being a new grad sucks It does get better !!!

Stick it out!! It took me at least a year to stop calling the unit after most shifts having forgotten something "crucial" in report/omg did I put the pit mu in ml, what did I miss? I had nightmares about multips coming in fully and not being able to focus/chart/coach/cope.

Somewhere around the year mark I realized that I wasn't bringing it home nearly as much. By the two year mark I could actually sleep like a baby before all my shifts. Now I go to work with a smile on my face and I cannot tell you how many of my friends envy the fact that I do what I love every single day. But yeah. The first year sucked. You have to tough it out and sponge up as much learning as you can and ask for help when you need it and double check EVERYthing for the safety of your patients and your own sanity.

Everyone feels that way at the beginning. I still have days where I hear about a bad case and think "oh I'm so glad I wasn't here!" And the only crazy emergency I've been directly involved in was a bilateral PE during a section and I was scrubbed in. I thanked my lucky stars that I wasn't circulating but afterwards I thought "wow, I better keep doing the OR checklists so that I can put my hands on ANYthing in an emergency.


Things you can do to make yourself more confident:

When it's slow, check equipment. If its really slow, volunteer to check every single room--mom equipment such as O2 and suction and your baby warmers. When you check your baby mask do at least a minute of PPV practice (timing breaths and counting out loud).

Volunteer to check the ORs--know where everything is for emergencies--extra bags, tubing, rapid volume infusers etc. On my unit when it's really slow we take out our rapid volume infuser and take turns setting it up. We also regularly take out our hyst and PPH kits and go through them just to put our hands on everything. Know where your difficult intubation stuff is. Practice a quick run to blood bank and lab. Know what routes are quickest to the OR and what obstacles to expect (are your hallways clear, especially at corners?). My old unit used to sometimes need to move stat cases downstairs to the main OR, if your unit ever does that, run the route and know which doors, which directions they open etc.

In short, drill whenever you can. You wouldn't believe how it helps with confidence