Best/Worst List of L&D nursing

[hardworkinmama]

If you had to pick 1 thing as the best & 1 thing as the worst, what would you pick? I'm trying to decide if I should accept an L&D offer. So bombard me with your favorite aspects & the worst aspects! Thanks so much!

[sandseaandstone]

If you had to pick 1 thing as the best & 1 thing as the worst what would you pick? I'm trying to decide if I should accept an L&D offer. So bombard me with your favorite aspects & the worst aspects! Thanks so much![/quote']

Best:: Seeing a little soul enter the world....being able to do the beginning of life things for them....meeting so many wonderful families and people who support each other~It's a really magical thing :)

Worst:: helpless Babies being born addicted to whatever the mom put into her body --- I feel horrified I have to hand over a little baby and script for phenobarbital that I assume the mom won't give her baby and will take herself (, and all of the scenarios mentioned above~

[cayenne06, MSN, CNM]

Worst: for me it is dealing with circumcisions. I'm not against it per se, I mean we circ'd my son but the whole thing skeezes me out. I cannot assist in them and I hate doing the dressing changes. I like teaching parents to care for them extra special afterwards though.

I love postpartum nursing so much that even when I had an anencehalic baby who was dying and on comfort measures only, and I cried big tears with the family, I still loved my job.

I actually am against routine infant circumcision, and it WOULD be the worst part of my job, except I won't assist in them. I mean, I would if there was no other option, but I'm lucky enough that there has always been another nurse available to do it. I really think that, in developed countries without endemic HIV, a person should be able to choose whether or not to have their foreskin removed- it shouldn't be a choice made for them, by their parents, when they are too young to consent. A large majority of parents who choose to circ do it just because "that's what you do." When I worked at a practice that gave full informed consent on circ, the vast majority opted out.

BEST part of my job- helping a family get through a difficult labor. Assisting at-risk moms (teenagers, drug users, etc) feel empowered by their birth.

WORST- seeing all the blatantly non-evidenced based practice that still occur daily at my small community hospital. Seeing the cascade of interventions occur and feeling powerless to stop it. Wanting to do more than my proscribed RN role will allow me.

Hoping to rectify some of these feelings by becoming a CNM- just about to start my second semester!

[Barbie3026]

I will start in labor and delivery as a graduate nurse in February and this post was a great read. The good outweighs the bad from reading these posts and I am looking forward to starting my journey in L&D. Thanks for the great posts everyone.