I graduated in May and started my first job as an RN in July on a busy surgical floor at a local hospital minutes from my home. It was a perfect set up. The nurses I worked with were awesome, the supervisors were supportive and helpful, and as mentioned before, it was minutes from my house. The problem was I was about to be off orientation and I was terrified! I am definitely not cut out to be a floor nurse. The thought of taking care of 5-8 patients all by myself scared me to death!! I felt overwhelmed and worried that I was going to miss something when I no longer had my preceptor to catch me when I fall. The type of fear I was feeling wasn't normal new grad fear. It was clearly my personality and I can't change that. Anyone who has been a floor nurse should know what I mean. You either can do it or you can't. And it's not safe to "wing it." I recognized this was not where I belong as a nurse. I was always running around like a chicken with it's head cut off. So, needless to say, I decided to leave my job. Now I am unemployed and truly worried I have wasted the past 4 years of my life going to school for a career that I am not going to be able to do. My husband and parents think I'm a failure. I'm beginning to believe it also.
I love patient care and would work a lot better in an environment where I could spend more one-on-one time with my patient, but where are jobs like that when you don't have experience? And now I'm worried it will look bad that I quit a job after 3 months, but I truly felt like something bad was going to happen if I didn't get out now. I have applied at 2 dialysis centers, ECT, and considering correctional nursing. But again, all of those positions state experience required. I applied anyway, but not feeling too confident.
If anyone has any sound advice for me, I would greatly appreciate it.
Just like so many places that serve populations no one wants to deal with, understaffed to the max. No one cares if you work yourself to death and no one cares if the patients get any kind of care. Despite what most people think if someone in any facility complains you have to address it and do something about it. If you do not and there is a negative outcome then it is a failure to rescue. No RN can fail to address complaints in any setting. Yes it is a pain especially when you know that the chronic complainers take advantage but you cannot let the complaints go. And to the person who called prisoners "scum of the earth", regardless of feeling towards felons, every one in this country is entitled to health care. I found it counter productive to make value judgements about anyone. Certainly prisons would not be a place for that person but keep a professional perspective. I cared for some felons that were discharged from prison because they were terminally ill and the prison did not find them a threat anymore. The staff I worked with provided good, compassionate care to those people even though we knew they had robbed, killed or done some other horrible thing. It is the essence of nursing to do what ever you can for the person in front of you and not judge them. I know when we cared for the felons their families were always grateful that we cared for them in a professional and competent manner. I had more than one family member hug me and tell me that they appreciated my kindness and professionalism to the felon and to the family. If they can recognize it then it's OK with me. No one says we have to be saints but no one says we have to judge others for their bad choices, that part, the judging is not in my job description, I leave that to a higher power.
Finally2008
228 Posts
Your current job sounds interesting! For whom do you work? The county or for Medicaid? Would love to look into that at some point!