This vile expression implies that experienced nurses do not treat new nurses kindly. My first problem with the statement is that it’s a generalization implying that all nurses are like that. Interestingly, whenever I hear someone utter the expression, I always say, “I don’t do that. Do you?” The person making the statement always says, “Oh no, I don’t, but many others do.” I’ve never heard even one nurse own up to doing this, although some nurses are willing to indict the entire profession. Every time that statement is repeated, it causes harm and casts a dark shadow on every nurse. Say anything enough, and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Please note that by moderator consensus some of the "Nurses Eat Their Young" posts will be referred to this thread where there can be an ongoing discussion, rather than several threads saying the same thing.
To students and new grads that are having problems with nurses, please take a moment to read the above link. Is it really the entire profession, every single nurse, or do you need help with one or a few nurses? We will be glad to help you in dealing with those people, but let bury the phrase "Nurses Eat Their Young".
To experienced nurses who claim our profession eats it's young, please take a moment to read it as well and think about it. Also take time to teach, be friendly and nurturing to the new nurse and students on your unit.
yada, yada, yada,I am getting soooo sick and tired of "senior" nurses complaining about newer nurses. Guess what if you don't like it you know where the door is - use it - leave. I didn't ask to be here with so many other newer nurses. YES - maybe I should have researched better - call me naive, I didn't know any better at the time - now I do. I will tell you one thing - I will always know better than to treat newer nurses better than what I have been hearing on this board and how I have been treated on my floor. I will say one thing - I am a 40+ person and have been in the health care field since I was 19 years old - so you are not addressing a 20 somethething person (I don't know why I waited so long to get my RN) Since reading these boards and hearing complaints from other nurses on my floor - I have stopped asking any questions or asking for help (not that I really did before) and guess who suffers? my patients - while I go and take the time to research on the computer or look up info in books available on the floor. Questions that maybe senior nurses could rattle off the top of their heads. SHAME ON ALL OF YOU!!!! YOU ALL STARTED SOMEWHERE AND WERE FULL OF QUESTIONS!!!! I am disgusted with nursing and with all of you that call yourselves "CARING NURSES" how funny - when you can't even care enough to pass your knowledge on. Oh, sorry you are too busy with your own assignments to worry about anyone else. Or better yet - you are too busy worrying about your own tasks than about another person that may have trouble breathing or dealing with a a new nurse that is struggling to get her own footing. SHAME ON ALL OF YOU!!! Don't bother to respond to this because I don't know if I will even read this again. I apologize to those of you that help and are "TRUE" nurses that want to help and by the way helping is not only helping your patients but helping others-we are supposed to be patient adovcates. I still have not lost sight of this - even out of school for almost one year. For those of you that are negative - maybe you need to rethink nursing - you are not going to be here forever. You need to pass on you're knowledge - believe me you are sooo appreciated!!!!DEE
foxc...YOU sound like the one who doesn't like it! What a post! How angry were you? just hope you have had time to calm down, and maybe realise that nurses, humans are not ALL the same, no matter how "senior" they are..
How inflammatory to "Shame" us all in the same bunch!
You say you "didn't ask to be here"..yes you DID..YOU chose this career. YOU!
As for recommending that nurses of experience "know where the door is!", when the experience goes, it will be a sorry day. Not Everything can be learned from a book.
I'm sorry you had a negative experience, but thats not true of all new nurses and students. I'm MORE sorry that YOUR patients are suffering!
Thank you for those that agree with me and thank you to those that even don't agree with me - yet - recognzed that I was posting out of frustration and anger. I know I said that I was not going to respond to this post - but curiosity got the best of me. I feel the need to validate myself - I am 40+ years old - I have worked in hospital systems since I was 19 years old - I have seen my mother die before my own eyes in hospice (no I am not blaming anyone she suffered from a terminal disease) - and I am currently caring for my 86 year old grandmother. My patients do not suffer in any way - at least not on my shift - and I tell them all this - trying to inject a little humor into the situation. I treat all my patients as if they were my grandmother or mother. I see the frustration in their eyes when they cannot do for themselves - I wonder do more seasoned nurses see this? Don't write me back attacking me for this I am sure that most of you can, yet some of you can't. I will never, ever, ever forget the look in my mother's eyes before she died - I refuse to let my own patients look that way if they can help it. I push my patients to the point that they want to argue with me - but guess what - they get up and walk with PT and they let me clean them up.
I guess my problem is management - I will share this senario with you - I was in the middle of passing my 5:00 meds - I get a call from my nurse manager - so and so is discharged the doctor just wrote the orders do you want me to bring you the chart? Duh??!! no - I am in the middle of taking care of another patient - my priority right now is to pass my meds (though I didn't say that) - I am all for discharging patients ASAP but did I really need to get called for this when I was in the middle of hanging an IV?
I am not a lazy nurse - I don't run to other more experienced nurses - I look up my own info - I don't bother anyone. I guess I need to find a new job - believe me I am looking. I am tired of management breathing down my throat about customer service - we are not running a hotel here - I need to take care of my patients that can't breathe - that is my prority - DON'T CALL ME WITH A DISCHARGE - when you don't know what the status of my other 6 patients are.
Dee (the new nurse with 6-7 patients and management breathing down her throat to make our facility a four star hotel)
foxc...EVERYONE's problem is management, whether you are where you are, or where I am...(worldwise!) That frustration will never be a problem to be gotten over easily.
oh... and by the way I AM one of the young - and I can truly, honestly, deep within my heart tell you that it is true - you definelty eat your own young weather you believe it or not.
foxc..from one "Dee" to another!...Just do your job. If you love the job, do it, if you don't, whether through management, other staff or whatever is making you unhappy, then I could only say, find something career wise that does make you happy. maybe you work in the wrong department to suit you.
If you are seriously peed off with your working life, which is a big part of your life, don't we all know that BTW!, then rethink where you are at. You have to be in a place that does not make you so down and angry. jmho.
Dear Danissa:Thank you so much for your reply. After much soul searching I don't think that I am in the wrong field - just in the wrong hospital department. More particularly with the wrong manger - she is on my back when I get morning report and she is there again at night (actually listeining by the bedside) to berate me for what I got wrong. I think that it was wrong of management to hire 6 new grads at one time - what a strain to put on more experienced nurses!! Now to boot they want to change protocol - I am loosing my mind. I can only say - please, please let met get established as a new nurse - let me get my feet wet - but no - I am expected to be perfect. I am not perfect - have never proclaimed myself to be and am worried that I will make a med error that will cause a patient some serious damage because I am expected to be perfect. Case in point - my manager kept calling me and I almost hung the wrong IV med because she had me so frazzled to DC a patient - this is my license - I can't be pushed to the point that I make such stupid mistakes. Dee
. I think that it was wrong of management to hire 6 new grads at one time - what a strain to put on more experienced nurses!! Now to boot they want to change protocol - I am loosing my mind.
One day, when you are that "experienced nurse", you will know the feeling. OMG for them, new protocals AND new nurses, all together, what a mix.
Just relax a wee bit, find where you are, what you want from your job, and Im sure you will be back here in a while posting happily about stuff that you want others input from. We all do things in the heat of the moment, this IS a great forum, with many seasoned nurses, with many years experience, and we all can learn from each other. Just chill Chick, take your time, dont flame others who could help you out one day. In agreement, the management in your place is questionable, but you have to be the bigger person and get by that. Its what we most all have to do.
oh... and by the way I AM one of the young - and I can truly, honestly, deep within my heart tell you that it is true - you definelty eat your own young weather you believe it or not.
DEE
No I do not.
We'll agree to disagree that has a whole the entire profession is one that eats it's young.
I guess my problem is management - I will share this senario with you - I was in the middle of passing my 5:00 meds - I get a call from my nurse manager - so and so is discharged the doctor just wrote the orders do you want me to bring you the chart? Duh??!! no - I am in the middle of taking care of another patient - my priority right now is to pass my meds (though I didn't say that) - I am all for discharging patients ASAP but did I really need to get called for this when I was in the middle of hanging an IV?
What is wrong with your manager telling you that you have a discharge? It might have been hours before you got around to realizing you have a discharge. Perhaps she/he thought they were helping by offering to bring you the chart. Perhaps the order was written a long time prior the the patient was chomping at the bits to leave.
Sorry, but I'm not feeling you here because the manager was just imparting information and offering to help. Perhaps you could have saved some internal aggravation by simply saying, "No thanks, I'll get to get as soon as I can. I appreciate the information."
We have beepers and there are many times I'll beep a nurse that an MD has discharged a patient of theirs. They need to put this on their "to do" list. Doesn't mean I'm not aware they are busy or need to drop what they are doing, but they do need to be made aware.
It does sound like you and your manager need to have a heart to heart discussion about your feelings and some of the things you shared here in how it's making you feel, and how it's putting you in danager of making mistakes. The BON certainly isn't going to blame your manager if you make an error, this I know. Maybe the manager simply feels that as a new grad, he/she needs to help you keep on top of things, and let you know what's what, but you need to tell her/him it's stifling and unfair, etc. insteading of accepting that you're in a profession where the old is going to eat their young.
The first year is tough and demanding I know. Good luck to you.
i just finished my first quarter of a nursing program. every instructor that i've had has stated in class that nurses eat their young. i'd never heard of that before. it didn't seem congruent with the nature of the profession, but if they tell you that in school, it becomes part of the education we receive. it becomes part of the nursing culture that we expect.
i liked the article (linked in the initial post). it made me feel hopeful.
........ but if they tell you that in SCHOOL, it becomes part of the education we receive. It becomes part of the nursing culture that we expect.
Good point. To me it's shameful instructors would turn their students off like this. To demean a profession they actually supposed like enough to teach new entries is a pretty poor instructor in my opinion. It's almost as if they are teaching you to later become someone who is expected to eat their young. That's just the way it is, so let eat our young.
It makes you look for instances to say "yes, nurses do eat their young" when often it's just one instance out of their day. Often it's an instance that is blown out of proprotion (the old "juding someone's insides by how one interprets their outsides" thing). How often does a newbie come across dozens of people in their week, and someone rubs them the wrong way and they cry "nurses eat their young, just like I thought".
danissa, LPN, LVN
896 Posts
foxc...YOU sound like the one who doesn't like it! What a post! How angry were you? just hope you have had time to calm down, and maybe realise that nurses, humans are not ALL the same, no matter how "senior" they are..
How inflammatory to "Shame" us all in the same bunch!
You say you "didn't ask to be here"..yes you DID..YOU chose this career. YOU!
As for recommending that nurses of experience "know where the door is!", when the experience goes, it will be a sorry day. Not Everything can be learned from a book.
I'm sorry you had a negative experience, but thats not true of all new nurses and students. I'm MORE sorry that YOUR patients are suffering!