male labor and delivery nurses

Thank you for the support.

I found this posting by accident and I just love it !

I am an L& D man nurse and I live day by day what it feels like to be different at work. But I have learned through out all my life, that being different is a wonderful thing.

I love my job! And that is the reason why I do it.

It all began with my first clinical rotation while attending nursing school in november of 2007. That clinical rotation was the most wonderful I had. I was always impatient for the next session. I felt in love with everything in maternity and it was instantaneously. In fact, my Instructor asked me if I had previous experience with maternity, to what I said, no. And she pulled me into one of the room and asked me if I would consider this field to what I replied, Oh yes!

I knew that L&D is what I wanted to do. I tried other "men welcoming fields" like pediatrics, psych, and was even fortunate to be assigned to the "palace of men in nursing", NEURO ICU for my preceptorship ( think destiny was testing me) but my heart, soul and thought was still in Labor and Delivery.

Later on, following my instructor advice, I went directly to the nurse manager and asked for an opportunity as an extern, whom to my surprise said, Absolutely, when do you wanna start? I was so happy. They never had an extern. And the fact that they were opening the position just for me was a good sign.

I started as an extern in may 2008, and of course was worried with all the myths. At first, I thought it was going to be difficult. But it was not. It was the best choice I ever made. Everyone was so welcoming!. The patients and the rest of the staff loved me. I kept working throughout my last year of nursing school and now I am staff RN in the same unit. I have been on the floor close to years and it feels wonderful! All the nurses, OR TECHS, nurses aids and even doctors are great with me.

I am not going to deny that I share some of fears that I read in some of the postings. And as off today, only one patient requested a female nurse instead. But I did not take it personally. Of course, it took me few hours to digest it. Later on I hear that it was her husband that got little funny about it because he "did not want that hunky guy in the room"... I laughed at the compliment..... But now, when I think back, realize that is more important that the patient/husband feels comfortable. Nevertheless, I expect more situations like that ( weather for religious, or just simply jealousy purposes). And I understand it because is part of the game, which I am very happy to play.

I was fascinated with all the postings I read here, that decided to put my two cents. So I opened this account just to reply to this thread.

In the end it all comes down to professionalism and caring attitude, and above all people do not care what gender you are as long as you care.

Particularly, I love women doctor and my PCP happen to be a woman who is been my doctor for the last 12 years and I do not see another man checking my things in the near future. It is fantastic, now that she is pregnant, she requested me to be her private duty nurse, while she goes on labor!

It is wonderful to read that there are other guys like!

Good Luck to the best to all of you!




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OBRNHUNK,
I am glad to hear that you found a home in L&D. You are right it is about professionalism. As far as the one request, our job is to provide an atmosphere of health, both physical and emotional, if that means finding a female then that is our job. It is definitely not personal. It sounds to me like he was just a little insecure and that is ok. Remember our patient is the mother, the baby, and the family...including the father (or sig other). We are breaking new ground and sexism seems to be prevalent (at least in my area, Billings MT). In time things will even out, you are a pioneer and I commend you.
I recently passed my boards and start in the ICU. Four years as a OBtech showed me what I want, now I need to fight to get there. Not my passion, but good experience to take to L&D when I get there.

Coming to you from the management side. I would LOVE to have a male L&D nurse or a male PP nurse. part of ripping the steryotype down is to let all nurses regardless of gender go for the jobs and the specialties they are interested in.

as for education and teaching with breast feeding. one breastfeedings biggest advocate, researcher, specialist, educator is a man. Dr Jack Newman. and yes he is a doctor but so what. he even developed a way for adopting mothers to breastfeed. maybe not fully but at least in some way.

so I say go for it. yes you may incounter some difficulty but so do women when we have to give a bed bath to a man or put in a foley. you just have to move on.

good luck!

Thank you for the encouragement tammki5g! I start in the ICU on the 21 but I am applying at every opportunity for my passion L&D. In the mean time, I will gain some great experience. I agree with you sexism is wrong regardless of gender. Also thank you for the tip on Dr. Jack Newman, I will look him up online and forgive him for being an MD Finally, thank you for being forward thinking! I faced sexism in school, in fact I almost didn’t make it through! I went to the state human rights board and the school caved they knew their instructor was in the wrong. (She changed my grade in the computer just b4 the next semester and I couldn’t continue with my class. I had to sit out a semester but the school paid me for it. (RN wages for six months)

I think male nurses are sometimes some of the best care givers, partly because they have to work so much harder to prove themselves. On our unit we have no male RN's but we do have one male scrub tech- and he ALWAYS get compliments from patients about how great he was during their delivery (mostly C-sections because they generally don't come in for vag deliveries). I think it is absolutely HILARIOUS when patients refuse to have a male nurse for their delivery nurse, however they have NO issue with having a male doctor. WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE PEOPLE???? I think it is a total double standard and completely ridiculous. I could care less what gender you are, as long as you are providing me with competent care that's all that matters. Some people are more comfortable with women, which is your decision, just don't pull the double standard and allow male doctors. OK, stepping off my soap box now

In the past my OB was an older man, really nice and comforting. I had to have a really uncomfortable procedure done and he made me feel a lot better about it. He's retired now and I've since moved away from that area so I no longer see him, now I see a woman OB...and truth be told, I actually preferred the male OB over her. I never even think about the fact that a doctor is male or female, seriously they're a medical professional they're obviously not thinking about anything but the issue at hand when they're looking at your nether regions.

However, I've never had a baby so I don't know what it's like and I definitely can understand some women who maybe just feel like they'd want a woman there with them...

I'd say go for it though...there's plenty of ppl out there (like me!) who wouldn't care a bit if the OB nurse was male or female.