Ever get spooked on night shift?

Specialties Private Duty

Published

Specializes in Pediatric Private Duty; Camp Nursing.

Ugh, I do overnight duty, and I sometimes get so spooked around here! I spend the first two hours monitoring my ct. from the kitchen via baby monitor, before turning her and putting on the bipap (she gets weighted as part of her PT for the first two hours w/o bipap, so I don't have to be in there personally.) This house is huge, modern, with all hardwood floors. There are large windows without coverings everywhere, so it would be easy for people to peek in. This house has been making loud settling noises with the changing of the seasons, and sometimes it sounds like tables are slamming in the next room! I'm assuming the floor planks are doing that. I'm no believer in the supernatural, but sometimes it sure is creepy in the wee hours of the night! :eek:

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Has happened to me several times. I had one client that I had to convince that it would be better for them to lock their front door at night! I have also worked at night for clients who got strange phone calls and had prowlers around and about. Just enough to keep a person on edge.

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Specializes in Not specified.

Securing the residence should fall under the Proctection/ Safety portion of the clinical framework for patient care and nursing practice. We lock the doors because it decreases break in and violent crime. You have a responsibility to protect if not youself, your patient.

I always got spooked working nightshifts in houses, esp around 3 am and 4 during the witching hour. Shudder. get a bat. or a broomstick.

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Specializes in Private Duty, L&D.

honestly, i have never gotten spooked working night shift....not yet anyway! my patient is a night owl who sleeps all day and is up all night so even tho i work night shift, he's not asleep and nights he keeps me busy running.

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Specializes in Home Health, PDN, LTC, subacute.

No 'cause they had a Rottweiler!

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Specializes in school nursing, home health,geriactrics, Tele,ICU.

I just started working noc about 3 weeks ago and its hard, but whats creepy is my client father, who comes into the room at the wee wee hours and stands there without me even notice or hear him come in. i asked him not to do that because he startles me every time. it is creepy to me.

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I just started working noc about 3 weeks ago and its hard, but whats creepy is my client father, who comes into the room at the wee wee hours and stands there without me even notice or hear him come in. i asked him not to do that because he startles me every time. it is creepy to me.

When he continued to do this after you asked him to stop, that would have been the cue to find another case. He is trying to catch you sleeping so he can fire you from the case, or he is trying to catch you doing something else so he can fire you from the case, or he is just flat out some kind of sicko looking for a way to rock your world. My advice is to leave that case and be very clear to the agency why, in writing.

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Specializes in Hospice / Ambulatory Clinic.

Oh I had a case that I only went to once that the mom got up several times in the middle of the night and came in her underwear to critize how I was turning the patient and to tell me I should to ROM at 3AM in the morning.

I also once was doing a hospice case that I worked for about 2 weeks. We had classical music playing and some of the music they played right before she passed was really creepy.

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Ugh, I do overnight duty, and I sometimes get so spooked around here! I spend the first two hours monitoring my ct. from the kitchen via baby monitor, before turning her and putting on the bipap (she gets weighted as part of her PT for the first two hours w/o bipap, so I don't have to be in there personally.) This house is huge, modern, with all hardwood floors. There are large windows without coverings everywhere, so it would be easy for people to peek in. This house has been making loud settling noises with the changing of the seasons, and sometimes it sounds like tables are slamming in the next room! I'm assuming the floor planks are doing that. I'm no believer in the supernatural, but sometimes it sure is creepy in the wee hours of the night! :eek:

I have never been spooked on the job, and I take care to protect my safety as well as my client's. I double check the doors and make sure the house is secure. One thing that night nurses never consider--safety driving to the job. I bring my large dog with me. She loves to go for the drive and is happy to sleep in the car during my shift (during cold nights she has her vest or own warm up suit.) My devoted dog protects my car, greets me with a smile and wagging tail when the shift is over at 7am, and her reward is a walk around the neighborhood or an excursion to the dog park.

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Specializes in Home Health/PD.

I usually don't get spooked, but last night I got so freaked out until I figured out what the strange noise was, then it made me laugh. I was sitting in the living room (ct has g-tube, no vent so no need for me to be in there) it's about 5:30 am and i hear this loud what sounded to me like breathing, and i couldn't figure it out. the kid definitely wasn't breathing as loud as i was hearing. finally figured out it was the parents alarm clock (parents are out of town) sounding like waves, but i thought it sounded like some creepy man breathing very very loud. lol. thank goodness it wasn't anyone!

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Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.

That would have freaked me out, too! (the "loud breathing" noise). The only time I was scared was when I went outside around midnight and saw a man scoping out cars who quickly said something about wondering "if the car was for sale" and quickly left.

In the area I work the sound of police helicopters is actually a pretty frequent occurrance, and the street itself has never had an incident, so I feel pretty safe. The family has a watchdog, and I have taken pains to befriend him, unlike some of the other nurses who he still regards as an intruder. He is a wonderful dog and I think he regards me as a person he would be likely to protect. He is of the breed most often used in K-9 teams, too. I'd never really been a "dog person" but he changed my view on that.

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I worked on one case where I always had this feeling someone was watching me. Everytime I would lean over the child to suction him, it felt like someone came running up and was looking over my shoulder. I would also hear footsteps even though everyone was asleep and would always think I would see someone out of the corner of my eye. Creeped me out! I was afraid to walk around anywhere in that house! So one day, I finally asked the family about it. The mother told me her husband's grandparents had passes away in that house before they lived there and that another nurse had reported things like this before too. So I'm guessing all the creepy stuff that was happening was the ghosts of the husbands grandparent...weird that I picked up on it before I knew it was an issue.

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