dreams

[LargoLPN]

On your nights off do you ever dream you are working. On several occasions I dream I am filling med cups, pouring liquids over and over, then I wake up and feel like I worked all night for no pay. Some times Ill dream I am giving a pt a wrong med and as they put it up to their mouth it goes in slow motion as I wave my arms and yell nooooooo. OK, am I alone here, or does anyone else work in their sleep? or have nightmares about work?

[tgb3rn]

Sleep? What the heck is that? I don't believe there is such a thing. I know I close my eyes then open them and go back to work. I look kinda like this guy most of the time as well:troll:. If I dream of anything ---it's sleep.

Sorry, just had to hijack your thread and vent a little.:lol_hitti

Tom

[UM Review RN, ASN, RN]

Sure I do, all the time.

I once was awakened by my son (I work nights) who wanted to go somewhere on a Saturday afternoon. He says that I sat up, pointed and said, "You can, but you need to take that blood pressure first and I need it now, please." Then I lay back down, totally zoned out.

He was so freaked, he stayed home and kept and eye on me.

Poor kid.

[NurseCard, ADN]

Oh yes, all the time. When I worked med/surge, I used to kinda wake up thinking "Oh no, here I am asleep, what about my patients???". Now that I work psych, I often wake up thinking that the patients are living in my house with me, kinda like I'm running a group home.

[emmycRN]

I hear call lights and IV pumps in my sleep all the time.

[navynurse06]

When I worked in the ICU/PCU, I would hear the tele alarms going off long after I left work.

[aKyRN81]

Awakening in a panic to find out in relief that no, I hadn't completely forgotten to care for one of my patients or start that IV or whatever horrible scenario, was what convinced me that it was time to change jobs! I left the high stress (for me) hospital and found a position that I can enjoy in nursing without that level of anxiety. I no longer 'work' and worry all night!

[clemmm78, RN]

I came here to post about a dream I had last night and saw this thread. :-)

I dreamt that I was helping one of the current patients into bed and she threw herself on the mattress, only to go flipping over the to other side and fall on the floor. I ran to get help and when we got back, the patient was back on the bed and looked at me like I had three heads. Then, I went to clean the commode she'd just used and ick, it was gross. Sigh.

[EmerNurse, BSN, RN]

I do this all the time - funny thing is, it's always NEW patients (not ones I've had recently, or ever). I have dreamed an entire normal mayhem shift, and then gotten up and gone to work. Felt like I'd already done it and I should have the night off!

I've also laid in bed trying to fall asleep, and keep hearing the V-tach tele alarm (ours are sensitive to EVERY THING), and I now know what a schizophrenic must feel like when they hear things. I was awake and HEARING it and it wasn't there and it was so wierd.

Hope I can sleep tonite - just finished three and tomorrow I start another three - and have I done xmas shopping yet? HA! WHEN?

nite!

[gonzo1, ASN, RN]

I do this and what I do is tell myself that I am not at work right now, and not getting paid so I can go back to sleep and let work go away. This usually works very good for me. I used to have a job that was very intense and with a lot of discipline for about 20 years. I still dream more about that job and not in a good way ever. Also dream sometimes that I am at school in class and didn't do my homework and am in trouble (high school). The fact that I was a stellar college student hasn't helped those dreams go away at all, surprisingly enough. I quess sometimes our minds just can't let go.

[rclimbr]

I am just a student but do any of you that are having these dreams still have your textbooks? Look up stress and burnout and you will see your picture there. I am coming into Nursing from a previous career and I do know about stress, find and activity to get your mind off work before bedtime and you will sleep better.

[RNfromMN, BSN, RN]

One very sad thing I learned when working with severely mentally retarded pts is that many many many families completely abandon their children, usually after age 10. I was shocked @ all the charts I would read that would describe how families just stopped visiting these kids & it was always just after their child turned 10. For some parents it was just too hard for them, but from what I derived from most of the charts, a lot of parents just stopped making the trip. (My personal opinion is that for these parents, their little retarded kids just stop being "cute" after age 10.) I've actually sat up straight in bed gasping for air from a bad dream 2x in my life. Here's 1 of them:

I'd been floated on a NOC shift to a unit I'd never been to before & was doing rounds sometime in the middle of the night. I was about to go into 1 little boys' room to change him & repos him, when a male nurse who worked on the floor grabbed me & said, "Now, this one's our saddest case...this little boy's actually very intelligent & he came here to live with us a few years ago. His family just completely abandoned him, which is just so sad because unlike most of our residents here, he actually knows his family & responds to them...but they just left him here." So I went into the room & found this little boy on a mattress on the floor with a sheet over his heads & a flashlight, like he was reading under the covers, or something. When I pulled back the sheet, it was my little brother. So it was my family that had actually abandoned him here! And I remember thinking to myself in the dream, "I have to get permanently transferred to this unit so that I can take care of him myself!"

I know now where this dream came from. First of all, the place I worked at took excellent care of its residents, but it's a terrifying place for any child to ever have to see, let alone grow up in - it's an old-fashioned mental institution. The insides look exactly like the place in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I took care of a little boy there for awhile that was just a sweetheart...nonverbal, about 10 years old with blond hair & big blue eyes & he looked just like my little brother. And the 1st night I met him, he didn't especially respond to me, but I kinda had a "thing" for him b/c he looked so much like my brother, so I took extra special care of him. Like I said, he didn't respond to me all night, but when I went to tuck him into bed, I told him, "Now, I'm gonna be here all night...so if you need anything, just crawl out here - I'll find you, I promise." And several hours later, around midnight, or so, one of the girls came running to me, "Jessica, you just have to come look at this!" And I looked down the hallway and found this little guy 1-arm soldier dragging himself down the hallway. And I'd forgotten what I'd said to him when I'd put him to bed...didn't know what he was doing in the hallway until my co-worker said, "Well...you told him to come find you!" Turned out he was wet & needed to be changed:heartbeat .