Already burned out...

Nursing Students CNA/MA

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I just recently finished my CNA class, but facilities around here will hire students, so I've been working at a nursing home since February. However, I'm already showing signs of burnout.

I think my facility strives to be a "good" nursing home, but the common perils of LTCs are still there: the toxic work environment, some "bad" CNAs, the mindless repetition of nothing but ADLs, the low pay, the back problems, etc. I dread going to work every day. I really should have known-- the DON told me when I was hired that she's never seen a place where CNAs left so fast. Most new CNAs leave after about six months, and I'll probably find myself leaving before then!

I've really found myself disagreeing with what nursing homes do in general. I feel like offspring dump their parents there to die, and we only prolong the process. So many residents wish they were gone, and yet we only sustain their misery. If it were up to me, all the residents would be receiving home health care, not stuck in an institution.

The only reason I took the job was because it was within walking distance, and at the time we could not afford a car. I have a wife, a stepson, and a baby on the way that I need to support, but I need to get out of the nursing home.

I had a job interview at the hospital (VERY hard to get hired there), and there are some mental health agencies around here I could apply for, assuming transportation works out (we only have one car). But until I find out how things go with the hospital, how can I avoid burnout? I don't want my residents to suffer from poor car due to my stress. :crying2:

Specializes in -.

I totally agree with you about feeling like we are prolonging their misery. We are there cleaning and moving them, they are miserable. Very few families are there to help, visit, or love them. They are left on their own to be taken care of by a few people who are running around trying to lift, turn, change, the next person on the list. Very few of them have adequate personal products or clothes. It has made me incredibly sad and much more attuned to the needs of our elderly.

As far as being burnt out - I get that too. I am only three days into my first nursing home experience and I want to quit. I won't though until I've tried to change things. Maybe you can voice your concerns to management? None of the girls I work with feel like they can, but I plan on sitting down with the HR person and having a chat this week.

I wish you the best

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Specializes in LTC.

I am burnt out but it's taken me 2 years to get to this point.

I used to love my job. Nowadays it's not that I hate it, but that I am sooooo stressed out I don't have a chance to enjoy it.

I can't sleep at all the night before I have to work, which just makes it worse. When I'm there I bust my ass trying to keep everybody clean and dry. I don't take pee breaks, I don't take water breaks, my back hurts, my head hurts, I'm sweating, and I want to cry. But my residents are alright. And in return for all this effort I feel like I get **** on by everyone. Snotty PT people looking down their noses at you and yelling at you for stupid things, the nurse riding your butt wanting you to do literally 5 THINGS AT ONCE and then yelling at you 2 minutes later when you *only* did one of those things so far. She makes it impossible to be productive because she pulls you in several directions and contradicts herself. If you try to clarify what she wants or explain what you're going to do she raises her voice. Administration finding new things to nitpick every day. And of course as the lowly bottom-feeder pieces of crap we are, everything rolls downhill to the CNAs. I am sick of having to work with someone I don't like every day. Mostly picking up slack. Today I worked with someone who manages to get her work done without you bailing her out. However she has a one-track mind and refuses to help you with anything until all her people are done. Twice today I held up a 200# quadriplegic man with one arm and struggled to clean the thick poop that exploded out of him with the other. She stood there without helping and nagged at me because I wasn't dropping everything to get her residents OOB. Well this would go a lot faster if you would jump in instead of harping on me. Not to mention what's more important here, having your clean residents lay in bed an extra 5 minutes or cleaning the poop off this man? She had 2 showers and I had none so she bossed me into doing one (which I think is fair but I'd rather volunteer or be asked nicely) then pretended to the nurse that she did them both. The kitchen was late in sending lunch down, so we were all late with our last rounds. Then the nurse says, in front of the nurse and the oncoming CNAs, that we're all stupid and incompetent (not her words exactly but that's what was passive-aggressively implied).

I have had it! I can't take it anymore. I feel like looking for a new job. The other facilities around here might be the same or worse, but at least I'd get paid more. We get the same low pay that other departments like housekeeping and maintenance get and none of them work a fraction as hard as we do. Nor do they get blamed and harped on for everything.

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Specializes in -.

"....I think maybe its your attitude towards your job.Can you maybe try to get to know your residents a little better,take the time to listen to them and maybe this will help.I know CNAs have lots of duties and little time but I think if everyone has a sunny outlook about having an opportunity to touch these people lives in a positive way ......."

This is all sunny and roses but I've worked three days in a nursing home (first time on the job) and I shadowed a CNA who had 30 fully dependent patients assigned to her!! If I am assigned this floor by myself after three weeks training there is no way I can give proper care let alone try to 'get to know them'. I had to change the bed of a 400lb woman who couldn't help move herself at all and she had dementia. There was no one to help me. I can see how CNA's can burn out easily in this kind of setting.

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Specializes in LTC.

^wow, what shift do you work?

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Specializes in -.

It was third shift overnight - which you would think would be easy. But all of the residents were dementia and totally dependent and all had to be changed every two hours (or when we could get to them). It was never ending and really hard. It just doesn't seem normal or safe to assign one CNA 30 patients.:confused:

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"....I think maybe its your attitude towards your job.Can you maybe try to get to know your residents a little better,take the time to listen to them and maybe this will help.I know CNAs have lots of duties and little time but I think if everyone has a sunny outlook about having an opportunity to touch these people lives in a positive way ......."

This is all sunny and roses but I've worked three days in a nursing home (first time on the job) and I shadowed a CNA who had 30 fully dependent patients assigned to her!! If I am assigned this floor by myself after three weeks training there is no way I can give proper care let alone try to 'get to know them'. I had to change the bed of a 400lb woman who couldn't help move herself at all and she had dementia. There was no one to help me. I can see how CNA's can burn out easily in this kind of setting.

Well,my attitude is all sunny and roses and no one can change that unless I let them.I am not saying its not easy to get burned out.This happens in ANY JOB hon.I have worked as an Activity Director for 20 years and I suffered from burn out too.I was just trying to say that CNA is a tough job and not easy by any means but if you have a good outlook your day will go by better and its very easy to talk to your residents and get to know them while trying to get your job done.I have helped CNAs,laundry,I even helped for two weeks in the kitchen at 5:00 am because four dietary staff up and quit and I was needed in there,I have helped tolet,shower and dress residents as well and that wasn't in my job description either.My point is you do what you need to and try to work as a team.I have no fear that I will make a great CNA no matter what they try to throw at me and I will do it with a "sunny and rosey" attitude.I hope that maybe you will try it too.:twocents: Just my two cents.Enjoy life,its too short!

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Specializes in LTC, Med/Surg.

So, I've been thinking about the main reasons why working in LTC is so hard for me right now. On top of the low pay, hard labour, bad co-workers, and (dare I say it) ungrateful residents, there are a few things.

First and foremost, I feel like I am unnecessarily prolonging the lives of people that want to die. The other day I fed a resident who 99% of the time keeps his eyes clothes and mutters about being on a boat. But that day, he was aware. He just stared into space, obviously embarrassed about having to be fed, and didn't answer me when I talked to him. The next day he was back to his old end-stage dementia self.

He is almost one hundred. How long would he have survived if we weren't there spoon-feeding him? I just wanted to stand up and ask what the heck I was doing. I felt like I was committing some kind of crime.

I sent in a job application to the hospital. I had an interview, but no word back from them yet. There are also mental health agencies that are supposedly hiring CNAs. At this point I just feel that for the sake of my mental health, I need to remove myself from the nursing home environment.

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Specializes in LTC.
Well,my attitude is all sunny and roses and no one can change that unless I let them.I am not saying its not easy to get burned out.This happens in ANY JOB hon.I have worked as an Activity Director for 20 years and I suffered from burn out too.I was just trying to say that CNA is a tough job and not easy by any means but if you have a good outlook your day will go by better and its very easy to talk to your residents and get to know them while trying to get your job done.I have helped CNAs,laundry,I even helped for two weeks in the kitchen at 5:00 am because four dietary staff up and quit and I was needed in there,I have helped tolet,shower and dress residents as well and that wasn't in my job description either.My point is you do what you need to and try to work as a team.I have no fear that I will make a great CNA no matter what they try to throw at me and I will do it with a "sunny and rosey" attitude.I hope that maybe you will try it too.:twocents: Just my two cents.Enjoy life,its too short!

It's annoying when someone who isn't a CNA yet tries to tell us what to do or how to feel. Helping out is great, but it's just that- helping out. It's not the same thing as doing the job all day every day. At least see for yourself before you preach to us.

ETA: You say your attitude is all sunny and roses well maybe because you're job is EASY. So you gave a shower one time. I doubt you spent 8 hours overnight changing (and yes those people wet every time) and turning 30 people, many of them over 200#s, by yourself. Like BioGirl. Or lifting, turning, toileting, feeding, laying down, getting up, walking, showering, dressing, and repositioning 15 on days like I do. You have no idea.

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Specializes in LTC.
So, I've been thinking about the main reasons why working in LTC is so hard for me right now. On top of the low pay, hard labour, bad co-workers, and (dare I say it) ungrateful residents, there are a few things.

First and foremost, I feel like I am unnecessarily prolonging the lives of people that want to die. The other day I fed a resident who 99% of the time keeps his eyes clothes and mutters about being on a boat. But that day, he was aware. He just stared into space, obviously embarrassed about having to be fed, and didn't answer me when I talked to him. The next day he was back to his old end-stage dementia self.

He is almost one hundred. How long would he have survived if we weren't there spoon-feeding him? I just wanted to stand up and ask what the heck I was doing. I felt like I was committing some kind of crime.

I sent in a job application to the hospital. I had an interview, but no word back from them yet. There are also mental health agencies that are supposedly hiring CNAs. At this point I just feel that for the sake of my mental health, I need to remove myself from the nursing home environment.

It's sad when those people are a full code and have tube feeds and such. But if that guy is on comfort measures, then he will stop eating when he wants to stop eating. Once someone has decided it's their time you can try all you want but you're not getting anything into them if they don't want to take it, short of a feeding tube. You'll see. With some people it's gradual, and with some they're doing fine and then all of a sudden they refuse to eat. So I don't really see feeding someone who's forgotten how to feed himself or whose arms no longer work as prolonging their death.

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It's annoying when someone who isn't a CNA yet tries to tell us what to do or how to feel. Helping out is great, but it's just that- helping out. It's not the same thing as doing the job all day every day. At least see for yourself before you preach to us.

WOW! I am sorry for putting my two cents in.I was not preaching at anyone,let alone trying to tell you what to do.A job is a job thats it,if you dont like your job get a new one.

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Specializes in LTC.

Well I don't know what you would call that if not preaching. Someone who has no clue what it's like because they are NOT a CNA telling us that it's our fault if we're stressed because it's all in our heads. The staffing ratios are not in our heads. What about when you have 10 minutes until lunch and still have a shower to do (because the last resident you were with is NOT demented and she made you stay in there for 40 minutes while she insulted everything about you and even slapped you a few times)? Is whistling a happy tune going to get the shower done faster? Or keep you from being b*tched at because you were late? Pretending to be cheerful won't do it for the back pain either.

People like you are always convinced that you're going to become great CNAs before you even get out there because you "care." Well we all care, despite what you may think. But caring isn't what gets the heavy workload done... heavy work does! And it's the heavy work (and the beating down by superiors), that burns us out. It's not our fault. Usually the Great and Wonderful Future CNA turns out to be a total drag because she literally carries half the workload and the others have to pick up her slack.

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Well I don't know what you would call that if not preaching. Someone who has no clue what it's like because they are NOT a CNA telling us that it's our fault if we're stressed because it's all in our heads. The staffing ratios are not in our heads. What about when you have 10 minutes until lunch and still have a shower to do (because the last resident you were with is NOT demented and she made you stay in there for 40 minutes while she insulted everything about you and even slapped you a few times)? Is whistling a happy tune going to get the shower done faster? Or keep you from being b*tched at because you were late? Pretending to be cheerful won't do it for the back pain either.

People like you are always convinced that you're going to become great CNAs before you even get out there because you "care." Well we all care, despite what you may think. But caring isn't what gets the heavy workload done... heavy work does! And it's the heavy work (and the beating down by superiors), that burns us out. It's not our fault. Usually the Great and Wonderful Future CNA turns out to be a total drag because she literally carries half the workload and the others have to pick up her slack.

Well hon, as far as a heavy workload,I have worked as a caregiver in the 80's before I was an Activity Director and I have had over two hundred residents as an AD that were mine alone to do my job for so please be aware that I do know what I am talking about.I can go and be an Activity Director but I am choosing to be more hands on and make a difference.And yes,singing a tune and being happy does get the job done easier.I must say WOW again at your attitude towards someone that you have no clue about.I never said that it was all in your head or that it was your fault that you are stressed,NEVER.I also never stated that you or anyone else didn't care about their residents.I simply stated that if you (the original poster) was already burnt out maybe trying a different approach at the job would make a difference.I am so sorry if you didnt understand that I was trying to just give my opinion and try to suggest a different approach.I will not give my opinion again since I dont know anything and you seem to know it all.

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