I am writing this totally heart broken and at my wits end.
I started my career as a nurse receiving compliments on what a good job I did. I felt that I was one of those people that had to do my job well and couldn't settle for any less. I had to chart well and provide the care that patients and families were more than satisfied with. They had to know they could count on me and that I was going to be there for them.
After 15 years and multiple hospital settings I have come to realize that it doesn't matter. Over the years, I have witnessed that many of hte units are run by managers and assistant managers that couldn't handle floor nursing and yet their demands on their employees are unrealistic. The people that they choose to be in charge and manage the floor are picked based on friendship and loyalty rather than hard work.
I have worked side by side with techs who run the unit and force nurses to do their work while they find time to sit on the internet or phone and then get out on time while we are stuck over finishing our work. I have walked into many patients rooms to pass pills only to find they had no water, haven't been turned or need urine emptied from urinals or pans that are overflowing. I can't tell you how many pans I have see stained with urine or feces because they don't get rinsed. How often patients are tied up in lines and cords.
I find myself picking up the slack and doing all of the jobs that countless others do not. Why can't people untangle lines? Why aren't pans rinsed from urine or feces? Why won't the techs do tech jobs and make sure people have water or that other needs are met?
In the end, what you get is punished. Punished because you couldn't get your work done. Punished because you couldn't meet everyone's needs and a patient or family felt you took too long to get to them and there was nothing you could say or do to make it right when you knew in your heart that it wasn't your fault. Instead, the blame is on the fact that there is too much for you to do or there is a major imbalance of productivity amongst workers.
The reason for the nursing shortage? Overworked and not appreciated and abused. You can't stick up for yourself, you can't tell them why you couldn't get things done - you can't say nothing. 15 years and nothing to show for it. I have tried nearly every hospital around and I find the negative complainers and the staff that knows how to socialize are the people that are respected and appreciated. It's not about the people that are out there busting their tails. Everyone knows there is a shortage and why but no one does anything and the biggest culprits are the administrators of the hospitals. The majority of those couldn't handle floor nursing or hardly ever experienced it at all.
I leave behind a lot of families and patients that thought I was a great nurse. But when you can't please one in a hundred or more you are a bad nurse. People don't understand the level of demands on a nurse. It is a downright abusive field with little to no appreciation surrounded by many people who are disappointed with their jobs and their choice in the career.
My final blow: After 3 years of sweating to please my last employer and taking the abuse of never hearing anything good - only bad. I went back to agency and went back to a hospital that I worked at 3 years ago. I knew that this hospital had a bad reputation for poor bedside care. Half the staff of any unit could easily be float and agency. The regular staff on the floor was made up of mostly young girls in tight spandex and inviting clothes working on socializing with doctors and hanging out at the desk all day long. Call lights were on non-stop but these girls would not answer them. The techs were busting their tails here. The agency nurses were working but the in house floats were sitting and socializing too. I ended up with a patient with a very bad attitude that was a complainer and law-suit happy. She was furious that for 4 days not one person followed through with obtaining her records from another hospital. It fell on me. I also had a patient admitted with respiratory distress which she shared a room with and could see I was busy. With her personality, she was angry at the moaning of the elderly lady who couldn't breath and was determined to get me to stop and cater to her to get on those records. When I got my respiratory patient stablized, I did just that. Turns out that the other hospital never received any fax requesting the information. This lady hated every person she had contact with at that hospital and wanted to call an agency to get them shut down. I'm sure you know the type by now. So....guess what. I was told today that I was not welcome back because of her complaint. I would literally pull a chair up and sit next to this lady and let her vent. I gave her my heart and I got booted. The nurse that she had the next day was a guy that sat around socializing and didn't care one bit about her. He was regular staff and he was NOT going to go out of his way. They all get to keep their jobs but the nurse that took the time out to take care of her is out the door.
I need a job or I wouldn't take the abuse. But, I know for a fact that this hospital is never going to get it. They were like that 3 years ago and now they have more floats and more agency staffing them. This is a big and reputable hospital.
The hospital I worked at for 3 years was dumping more and more tasks on the nurses and they were all unhappy and complaining. We lost good hard working techs and they were replaced with people who didn't want to work or nursing students who were tired when they came to work and were kicking their feet up taking it easy. Management loved those people.
I suffer from spinal degeneration and pain and I never get to sit down. My job is harder because they are not pulling their weight.
There is nothing left. I still owe for my loan and I am scared to death to take another nursing job. I know it is not going to be any different. I hurt. I lost my insurance and after all that I worked for I have nothing to show for it but bills and a destroyed ego and heart. I feel as though I am the misfit. I am the one who isn't right. I am wrong. I can't even bring myself to waste time on another application since I don't want anything to do with this career any more. I am going to lose my home, my vehicle and everything else.
I have noticed that the field is being taken over by young graduates who are more worried about looking sexy and socializing than working. Patient satisfaction has gone down the tubes and the senior skilled nurses are getting nowhere in this field. There is nothing anyone can do. We all know it is happening but we can't do anything about it.
Specializes in Critical Care; Cardiac; Professional Development.
You are so right, what you have experienced is far worse than anything most people (except for those who have lost a child as well, as my parents did*) will ever endure.
OP does have some good points about some problems in nursing (I've been one for 10 years now, so I should know), but she is also suffering from burnout. Therefore, try not to take her comments personally.
I wish you well and think you will become a good nurse.
DeLana
*My brother died suddenly at age 41 of a ruptured aortic aneurysm.
I am so sorry for the sudden loss of your brother. My kids are having such a hard time adjusting to their loss as well. Thank you for your compassionate response. I am grateful for it.
This thread is not about me and perhaps in my grief I tend to think most of the world is. I wrote the OP an apology yesterday by private message and offer the same to the rest of you. I am interested in what challenges lie ahead in nursing, thus my having opened the thread in the first place. Coming from a place of despair myself, I have little to offer right now in way of support and probably should have kept quiet. It is hard for me to look at situations that have the potential to be improved still and see them as hopeless. I wasn't what she needed at the time and learning to recognize my skewed view of the world with the loss of my child so fresh is a challenge for me. I sincerely hope she finds what she needs and I am sorry if my replies yesterday increased her level of distress.
Rock on nurses. I'll leave you to it and get back to studying where I belong.
Everything here has been helpful (except for paying my bills). Not so much in the support because I knew it would be out there, but the insight and advice of each person is so impressive. Go figure.....all coming from nurses. People just don't realize the intelligence and strength inside of us.
gentlywind, you probably should follow these posts because you might find yourself here one day. All I could say to you and the other poster was that I was NOT in the mood. When I came to this board I was broken down and fighting the tears and desperate just for support. Not even advice. I just needed the reminder that I am not crazy and I am not alone. I knew that someone without the experience would chime in and that was why I haven't come to a chat board for support in years. Years ago I went to a nurse forum for support and this topic created so much heat that I haven't even considered doing this. I was desperate to remind myself that I was not alone. The people that turned it into a war did not have the experience that the rest of us had on this topic. The moderators were wise to pull it for a cooling off period.
The truth of the matter is that when someone is in this state of mind, they are not in the mood for the conflict, especially with someone who hasn't experienced this.
I have read each and every reply and every single one of them has helped. I received a PM today that really hit home about what I want vs. what is right for me.
In reply to some of the suggestions:
When it comes to agency and picking and choosing, the reality of the problem is that the units that are usually in turmoil need agency nurses. We become the scapegoats and usually the turmoil turns the agency nurses into victims. 99% of my agency jobs went well because I was not part of the politics and could control me presence. I did my work and was appreciated. I was appreciated for having the most important trait an agency nurse needs and that is being able to adapt in new environments with no training. Maybe travelling will widen my choices. Now that my kids are grown, I am starting to think about it. All I want to do is get some bills paid up so I can take a look at a real change.
Also, I think Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome is right on. Nursing is a constant area of no gratitude. Patients and families rarely let anyone know how they felt about good care and most of the good things we accomplish go unrecognized. As soon as we do something wrong or are even involved in something wrong, we will hear about it. We are set up for failure from the beginning of our shift to the end.
I have learned that "high-paced floor" means they are understaffed for the acuity and are not going to do anything about it. "Hit the floor running" means while you are teaching good health practices to your patients, you will not be getting a meal break, drinking water or going to the bathroom. For you new nurses getting ready to interview, you might want to keep this in mind. Those are poor excuses for a poorly managed floor.
Med-surg might seem easy, but you will have more patients than you can safely manage.
Try step-down or ICU because you will have less patients.
Look for longevity when it comes to techs and experienced nurses. If you have a lack of long term techs on the unit, you might be facing a big struggle in team work and productivity. Most of my good techs were "lifers" - they weren't going to school. This is their income and their job. The techs that were on the floor for years were more often than not very reliable. Some were burned out, but I had good luck with them because I cared for them and they would appreciate it and I would get more out of them.
Try not to get stuck into needing your paycheck so you are able to make a change. I was a single mom of 3 and lived check to check. I had to work. I didn't have choices. It doesn't matter how many nursing jobs are out there, they are no different. I see new nurses starting out stressed and unhappy about their jobs.
So, I feel a little better than I did yesterday. I am very scared. I went from having control over my career to having none at all. I have to go to work but can't bring myself to do it. I just wanted to try to pay up my bills this year and make a change. It is PTSS. Not burnout.
Specializes in LTC, assisted living, med-surg, psych.
You may very well be right about post-traumatic stress. I wonder sometimes if I've got it, even though I'm very happy with the job I've held now for over two years. Whenever I'm feeling overwhelmed at work, or just going through a bad patch in life, I start having dreams about being back at the hospital. In these dreams, I'm forced to work there by circumstances that I never quite get figured out before the dream ends, and it's always the same: I'm being pulled in fifteen different directions, running behind, and constantly in fear being screamed at by this one manager who used to belittle me every chance she got. I'm desperately unhappy and all I want is to get OUT of there before something terrible happens to cost me my license and my livelihood..........but in the dream, it's like I'm paralyzed, like being in the Hotel California where you can "check out anytime you like, but you can never leave".
Needless to say, it's always an enormous relief to wake up and know it's not for real and that I don't have to work there ever again if I don't want to. I think if I were ever in a position where I did have to go back to acute care or leave nursing, I'd pick the latter. I'd rather be a Wal-Mart greeter.......sure, you don't make as much money, but then neither are you apt to kill a customer or get slugged by a family member if you've got eight people coming in the door at once and you don't have the time to hand one of 'em a cart.
You have my sympathy and my prayers, BrokenRNheart. I wish you well in whatever you decide to do.
"there is absolutely no agenda in addressing these horrific conditions.
plenty of publicity about the shortage, but no one seems to care why such a shortage exists."
So true. Nothing is ever going to be done. It is getting worse and worse. You know it's bad when brand new nurses look the way they do IN orientation - SCARED.
I'm so lost. I thought I had job security but I am realizing I never should have joined this nightmare. They should give people tests to subject them to what their lives will be like before they ever get them sunk into debt for this career. Hustling new grads through is not the answer. They are trying to rush people into the field instead of address the problem.
What if! What if we all got together and demanded that the government do something? Why isn't anything being done? Because none of us know what to do? All these nurses that know the truth and we can't do anything.
Specializes in Alzheimer's, Geriatrics, Chem. Dep..
I wrote the OP an apology yesterday by private message and offer the same to the rest of you. I am interested in what challenges lie ahead in nursing, thus my having opened the thread in the first place. Coming from a place of despair myself, I have little to offer right now in way of support and probably should have kept quiet....Rock on nurses. I'll leave you to it and get back to studying where I belong.
Hey gentylwind, that's awesome that you were able to reach out, apologize, but don't feel like you have to be quiet either if your reality is different. You're all right. I'm just glad that you could see where the OP was coming from too! And I'm glad you shared about your loss - that's important for US to know in responding to YOU.
So, I feel a little better than I did yesterday. I am very scared. I went from having control over my career to having none at all. I have to go to work but can't bring myself to do it. I just wanted to try to pay up my bills this year and make a change. It is PTSS. Not burnout.
I'm glad you feel a bit better. Hang in and don't go away! k?
You may very well be right about post-traumatic stress. I wonder sometimes if I've got it, even though I'm very happy with the job I've held now for over two years. Whenever I'm feeling overwhelmed at work, or just going through a bad patch in life, I start having dreams about being back at the hospital. In these dreams, I'm forced to work there by circumstances that I never quite get figured out before the dream ends, and it's always the same: I'm being pulled in fifteen different directions, running behind, and constantly in fear being screamed at by this one manager who used to belittle me every chance she got. I'm desperately unhappy and all I want is to get OUT of there before something terrible happens to cost me my license and my livelihood..........but in the dream, it's like I'm paralyzed, like being in the Hotel California where you can "check out anytime you like, but you can never leave".
Needless to say, it's always an enormous relief to wake up and know it's not for real and that I don't have to work there ever again if I don't want to. I think if I were ever in a position where I did have to go back to acute care or leave nursing, I'd pick the latter. I'd rather be a Wal-Mart greeter.......sure, you don't make as much money, but then neither are you apt to kill a customer or get slugged by a family member if you've got eight people coming in the door at once and you don't have the time to hand one of 'em a cart.
You have my sympathy and my prayers, BrokenRNheart. I wish you well in whatever you decide to do.
Ha ha - actually during one of my "vacations" from nursing I did apply to Wal-mart - and got rejected ...
I have had those dreams of being back at work, like yours - er, nightmares ... lol - mine is definitely PTSD. Some of it self-induced because I reached way over my abilities and also my stress-tolerance level ... but also because of some of the factors Broken is talking about (shudder).
California Nurses Association did something where they were able to get patient acutities/nurse:patient ratios enacted into law - and now Maine is looking at doing the same thing. We could do something, if we would do something ...
...there is absolutely no agenda in addressing these horrific conditions.
plenty of publicity about the shortage, but no one seems to care why such a shortage exists.
ptsd/ptss?
w/o a doubt.
a consult w/an effective psychiatrist, will deem you traumatized.
and a whole bunch of people need to be held accountable.
I have come to realize over the years that it is the ultimate co-dependent environment. And what gets me is this.... now we have to assess our patients for abuse in their personal lives....while we are abused at work.
Talk abour irony? It was bad enough you can't eat, drink or pee....but we are abused and supposed to be teaching people how to get out of abuse...ya, come to us....trust us....we can help. How can we help when we can't even control it in the most important part of our own lives....our jobs!
It's a womans' field. For some reason it is ok that we be abused. That's why you don't see many males in this field and they rarely stay in a floor nursing setting. They move up and out.
I have suffered more abuse in my career than any part of my personal life - ever. My career has knocked me down to nothing and I am scared...scared of how much damage it has caused me and scared of having to do it another day. I know there is no way I can kid myself into believing that I can manage a 12 hour assignment without the potential of making someone mad because I didn't do something for them. Didn't do something for them. That is what is driving me nuts. No one is doing anything for me. My whole life is about doing for someone else but I feel like a total loser. I don't feel like I did anything right. I feel like everything I do is wrong. I prioritized with this but it should have been that.
The thing that hits me the hardest is to have taken the fall for 4 days of care that the patient wasn't happy about. I put myself behind.....dropped what I needed to do, pulled a chair up to console her and I go down. The management doesn't care that this lady was upset about the 4 days before me....I didn't make her happy. Yet the lady claimed it wasn't even me she was mad at. I can't even begin to imagine what I could have done differently to not be feeling like this right now. I remember all that I did that day and ever day. How hard I worked, kept my chin up, didn't let patients know we were busy. I am the kind of person that when I am in the patients room I give body language that I am not in a rush. I give them my all until I leave that room and always ask if there is anything I can do before I leave. Always remind them to call me if they need me. All I can think about is being burned for 4 days of care before me.
I'm very sorry about your situation. I can definitely empathize with you. I started off in med-surg right after I graduated nursing school in 2001. It lasted for 6 months. I felt like I had made a mistake by going in to nursing, I felt hopeless. I was struggling to keep up with the work everyday. And like you, I too was being reported to the hospital administrators for mistakes that weren't even my fault. I was always getting the finger pointed at me for things I had no control over. I even had a supervisor nurse tell me he didn't agree with me being reported, but he did nothing to help me.
Well, I found another job and left that place. I went in to psychiatry. I like it, but it does have its stressful moments too. But it is 100% better than what I started out doing. I don't ever regret leaving the "well-known" hospital. I would never go back to doing that kind of work (med-surg). I have been in psych since the summer of 2002, and with the same psych hospital. I just started working part-time last November. I work 2 or 3 days a week.
I just know in my heart that I won't ever go back to a hospital and work again doing direct patient care nursing. If I leave where I'm currently at, I'll find a job that isn't in nursing. I know money is important, but so is your happiness and well-being. I hope it all works out for you. I don't even know you, but my heart breaks for you because of your situation, and the fact that I've been there before. God Bless you.
Specializes in LTC, assisted living, med-surg, psych.
I am astonished at the amount of human anguish I'm hearing through the posts in this thread.
I am equally astonished at the strength of my own reaction to them, how keenly I apparently still feel the pain of the circumstances that forced me from my last hospital job. I'd thought I was well over it, yet I'm still angry inside at having nearly lost my sanity and my health over a job I put my heart and soul into for three years, and yet I was never smart enough, fast enough, thorough enough, willing enough to take on more and more and more...........and I finally broke.
BrokenRNheart, you have touched a deep nerve here. You have also opened a dialogue that speaks to the heart of the nursing shortage, and perhaps this can be where the healing begins---for you, for me, for every nurse who has ever been mistreated and made to feel inadequate despite her best efforts.
Thank you for starting this thread. You are a brave woman who deserves much better than what you've been dealt. :icon_hug:
You may very well be right about post-traumatic stress. I wonder sometimes if I've got it, even though I'm very happy with the job I've held now for over two years. Whenever I'm feeling overwhelmed at work, or just going through a bad patch in life, I start having dreams about being back at the hospital. In these dreams, I'm forced to work there by circumstances that I never quite get figured out before the dream ends, and it's always the same: I'm being pulled in fifteen different directions, running behind, and constantly in fear being screamed at by this one manager who used to belittle me every chance she got. I'm desperately unhappy and all I want is to get OUT of there before something terrible happens to cost me my license and my livelihood..........but in the dream, it's like I'm paralyzed, like being in the Hotel California where you can "check out anytime you like, but you can never leave".
Wow, I've had this happen to me also. I still have nightmares at times because of my experience, (and I've been gone from that position for about 6 years now). It's terrible. I'm just glad I can wake up and know that it was a nightmare, and that I'm really not back there again.
Everything here has been helpful (except for paying my bills). Not so much in the support because I knew it would be out there, but the insight and advice of each person is so impressive. Go figure.....all coming from nurses. People just don't realize the intelligence and strength inside of us.
...
99% of my agency jobs went well because I was not part of the politics and could control me presence. I did my work and was appreciated. I was appreciated for having the most important trait an agency nurse needs and that is being able to adapt in new environments with no training. Maybe travelling will widen my choices. Now that my kids are grown, I am starting to think about it. All I want to do is get some bills paid up so I can take a look at a real change.
Also, I think Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome is right on. Nursing is a constant area of no gratitude. Patients and families rarely let anyone know how they felt about good care and most of the good things we accomplish go unrecognized. As soon as we do something wrong or are even involved in something wrong, we will hear about it. We are set up for failure from the beginning of our shift to the end.
...
So, I feel a little better than I did yesterday. I am very scared. I went from having control over my career to having none at all. I have to go to work but can't bring myself to do it. I just wanted to try to pay up my bills this year and make a change. It is PTSS. Not burnout.
I'm glad to hear that you're feeling better. Believe me, I can relate so well, having experienced some horrific conditions in nursing (starting with basically getting fired from my first job for not brown-nosing the mgr... next med/surg with 8-12 pts per day - counting new admits - resulting in 12-hour shifts turning into 15-, 16-, 17-hr shifts... insubordinate aides, backstabbing coworkers, pts and families from hell... I could go on, but this isn't about me.) No other profession would put up with this kind of abuse! Nursing has a long way to go.
PTSS is an interesting point, I never thought of that (burnout may be just another word for it?)
Travel and agency nurses do seem to get appreciated more than staffers - this might be an excellent option for you, as you said.
I wish you well,
DeLana
P.S. Are there any nurses out there who have not experienced at least some horrific conditions? Is it really affecting all, or most of us?! Truly scary.
I'm just glad that you could see where the OP was coming from too! And I'm glad you shared about your loss - that's important for US to know in responding to YOU.
Nurse SMS, MSN, RN
6,843 Posts
I am so sorry for the sudden loss of your brother. My kids are having such a hard time adjusting to their loss as well. Thank you for your compassionate response. I am grateful for it.
This thread is not about me and perhaps in my grief I tend to think most of the world is. I wrote the OP an apology yesterday by private message and offer the same to the rest of you. I am interested in what challenges lie ahead in nursing, thus my having opened the thread in the first place. Coming from a place of despair myself, I have little to offer right now in way of support and probably should have kept quiet. It is hard for me to look at situations that have the potential to be improved still and see them as hopeless. I wasn't what she needed at the time and learning to recognize my skewed view of the world with the loss of my child so fresh is a challenge for me. I sincerely hope she finds what she needs and I am sorry if my replies yesterday increased her level of distress.
Rock on nurses. I'll leave you to it and get back to studying where I belong.