Beaten Children

[Meerkat]

I just need to VENT. I'm new to psych nursing and so far I love it...but I have a question for you experienced psych nurses.

I'm on the children's unit, and they come in for all manner of behaviour problems. At first glance you would think they were just little terrors. But when you get a full history and these little ones tell you stuff like "That mark is where Mommy's boyfriend whipped me", or "She made me drink a bottle of hot sauce" ...I mean...how do you get thruit day in and day out, hearing what people have done to these kids???

It's like witnessing these children's futures unravel before your eyes, and being powerless to stop it. The day they go back home it starts all over again, and that's when we get (and I HATE this term) 'frequent fliers'. Sure, a few here and there get prosecuted...but mostly it just seems like after some months, the abusers get custody again. Please, someone tell me how to cope with this. I feel helpless.

[GooeyRN, ADN, BSN, CNA, LPN, RN]

There are so many sad situations in child psych. It is truly saddening when one of the kids comes up to you and tells you that they DON'T want to go home w/ their parents, out of fear. Some of the situations would really upset me. I would usually vent to coworkers about it and it helped me feel a little better. I still wonder what happened with a lot of the kids.

[NPAlby]

Thanks for the compliment! I'm glad to hear your considering talking to someone. It sounds like you need an outlet for all that you've seen and felt recently.

Like I mentioned before I'm working on my own issues. I think there's a definite personality type that goes into nursing and in particular psych. I came into psych wanting to learn all I could about schizophrenia and anxiety disorders but the real lessons have been about limit setting and how not to be judgemental. Those are skills I've definitely needed practice on and use on an everyday/everywhere basis. Amazing the things we can learn about ourselves from our work. I love psych!!

Good luck and feel free to vent.