is anyone else stressed out?

EDGRADNURSE · Aug 22, 2006

I'm so sorry that you are feeling this way. I see that you have a lot of experience as a nurse. I'm a new nurse (graduated 12/05) and I already feel this way.

Med-Surg is incredibly hard nursing. Just yesterday, I had a pt w/ a serious GI bleed, a detoxing person on the light every 5 minutes and hyperventilating (kept docs coming up all day), a confused and crying person (on the light every 3 minutes), an person w/ESRD with serious issues (all day long), a pre-op/post-op and a new admission whose son complained to management about how long it took to hang fluids after a direct admit (had to get the orders).

You run run run all day long and get yelled at and verbally beaten by patient's families. Worse, you get in trouble with other nurses if something isn't done the way they think it should be done or if you didn't get every single thing done before night shift comes in (even after staying late--of course, because of the issues w/the patient's and their families). On top of this, all of the paperwork which is important (assessments, notes, etc.)

Was nursing different when you started? Perhaps it is different now as it does seem that the expectations are unreal.

I hope that things get better for you. Don't beat yourself up for feeling this way. It is the system (ratios, etc) that causes a lot of stress.

banditrn · Aug 22, 2006

recently i have found it harder and harder to go to work. i find myself not wanting to be a nurse anylonger, but i still need to work to support my family and don't have any job skills other than nursing. i work day shift and you can't find that many places. plus i live very close to my job and with the price of gas that is important. the floor i work on is a med surg floor and has been considered the best floor in our hospital. if you are sick that is where you want to be. it just seems every day we are expected to work harder and faster and never told we are doing anything right- only more things we should be doing as far as paper work etc. i guess this is just a pahse in my life and i hope this too passes, but i know that i am really stressed out about this now.

Have you thought about transferring to another unit? Maybe ICU? You have a lot of experience and that would serve you well in a specialty unit.

martymoose, BSN, RN · Aug 23, 2006

i feel the same way- new grad in dec 04. am hating being the filling in a S%$@^@ sandwich (pts, families, and docs) so much that i am considering going back to school for rad tech. It is so stressful to me to deal with some of these things that are beyond my control, but they all have to blame someone- so who gets it- the NURSE.And no one sticks up for us. Hospitals know there is a neverending group of new grads every semester, so you mean NOTHING to them. I would love to be the one with the thick skin, but since my livlihood depends on this, i have to sit there and take it. good luck to ya, too bad we had to find out the hard way that this job SUCKS.

bcskittlez · Aug 23, 2006

jrbl77, WOW I am sooooooooo proud of you! 29years! How faithful and dedicated. I would be ready to move too! I am only 29 years old and you have been a nurse since I was born.. geez.. it is indeed time for change.. I bet with 29 years of experience their is a school nearby that may want an instructor. Do you all have any insurance companies like United Health Care that has nurses that take calls? It may be worth the gas to move on...

NurseRiRi · Aug 23, 2006

I graduated in May '05, it is so nice to hear others feel the same way I do! I run around for 12 plus hours only to come home and worry that I forgot to do something or missed a piece of paperwork, Wish they had taught me this in nursing school! :nurse:

gooch951 · Aug 23, 2006

glad to know it's not just me feeling like i am hanging by a thread on a day to day basis ...i took up legal nurse consulting and will start my business soon...I just hope my blood pressure drops back to normal after that career move!

I really wish that if administration expects us to work that hard we should receive bi weekly health spa treatments added to our health benifits...wouldn't that be a PRO nurse objective!

slu_rn · Aug 23, 2006

I'm in the same boat as you are. I graduated in May of this year and I'm already dragged down and dreading every shift. I seriously looked at going back and getting another bachelors. I just can't decide what to do with myself....

Funny girl · Aug 23, 2006

I have been an RN for 34 years. When I was a new grad I had time to give my patient's backrubs and actually get to know them when I worked Med/Surg. The downside was there were only 2 or 3 of us on evenings for a 12 bed ICU/CCU unit.

Today I work in a med/surg/telemetry unit and am about to throw in the towel. Unworkable work loads, mountains of paperwork in our so called paperless unit. I resent having to be responsible for the LVN's work and for the med techs performance.... If they don't do their job correctly somehow that reflects upon me.

I hurt my back the other day having to lift a 400 lb patient with not enough help. The Nursing Supervisor could care less about me.... she seems to resent me for this. I have never had a work related injury in all these years. The patient was in severe respiratory distress and I couldn't always find sufficient help when needed. Makes me feel like a disposable piece of equipment.

I am not a happy camper. :sniff:

steelydanfan · Aug 23, 2006

I would agree that nursing has it's challenges today. I would also say that for a dedicated bedside nurse who wants to keep working, an insurance or outpatient surgery job may not have all the bedside skills that keep your adrenaline going.

I would think seriously about Hospice nursing. The clinical challenges are there, you can get the human interaction that you went into nursing for; and it's all at a SLOWER pace.

Asklepios · Aug 23, 2006

I new here, and haven't even begun the nursing program yet, but I have been doing a lot of reading here to see what I'm getting into. My opinion may not count for much, but I'll tell you this - the saying "the grass isn't always greener..." is very true. The reason I am going back to school in my late 30s to be a nurse is because I've spent the last 10 years working in a job I hate. Its taken a mental and physical toll on me, and I even had my first ever panic attack this summer (but I fought the urge to run to an ER and overburden the staff there even more).

Sounds like the short staffing and low morale stems from business related decisions. Well, I deal with that too. I am a claims adjuster on a team of 8 that covers a wide geographic range. When we don't have a lot of new claims to handle, mgmt instantly assumes we are overstaffed, but when a hurricane hits and we get swamped they tell us it's just a "spike" in workload and they aren't going to adjust for it. Last summer, they decided to save money by closing offices, putting a lot of people out of work if they didn't want to relocate. I now call my car my office, and work on a wireless laptop. I have no support staff to take care of administrative tasks. Can't get supplies, have a small office to go to in order to fax or print things but nothing ever works. It is hell. Today, I had to drive 2 hours away to attend a customer service seminar, in which they went over important things like using a happy voice on the phone...

Oh, and I know about the pts' families - they are the same ones who tell me my estimates are too low for their claims when they haven't even gotten any estimates of their own. They are the ones who scream at me that their claim is taking too long. The person whose mother is a pt on your floor is the person whose house burned down on a Friday night, and I have to spend all weekend getting them housing and inspecting the remains of their home while they cry and expect me to wave my pen and make it all better in one day. I have to be an investigator, attorney, engineer, contractor, appraiser, real estate agent, and physchiatrist all rolled into one.

The point is, today's profit driven, competitive world has put us all at the mercy of the bottom line. The only thing that can keep any of us sane is to tolerate that because we do what we love. Now, that is not true for me. I didn't go to college to be a claim rep. I fell into it because I couldn't find anything else with a business degree. As nurses, you all must have some love in your heart for the profession because you worked so hard to become one. Try to remember why you went into nursing. Think about the way those reasons show up in what you do from day to day. Hopefully they can lessen the stress of the negative side of your job. If not, maybe it is worth looking into other lines of work. But remember that every job is going to have it's drawbacks.

Hope this makes some sense...

GatorRN · Aug 23, 2006

I hear what you're saying. Perhaps it is time to transfer to another unit. Working on the same floor for 29 yrs would have gotten very old to me many many yrs ago. I applaude your commitment.

Do you have any desire to go into a specialty area? With your experience you would be a perfect candidate to go into the ICU unit at your facility. In critical care the nurse pt ratio is usually 1:2 or 3. Of course, the acuity level is much higher too, but this gives you time for a more personable nursing experience. I absolutely loved working ICU. If that doesn't interest you perhaps L & D, bringing new lil lifes into the world every day.

If I were you I'd strongly consider going onto another floor. A new surrounding, and new faces, with different pt needs may be exactly what you need to put that spark back into your day, and remind you why you became a nurse to begin with. I hope things improve for you. Good Luck to you if you do decide to make a change.