from the frying pan into the fire

[Honeygirl46]

Hi everyone,

I was working at a major insurance company, doing work from home, and they were doing mass layoffs. Being a single mom, I didn't want to risk being laid off, and I knew I didn't see myself working at this company long term, so I started looking for a new position. I interviewed for two jobs within a couple days of each other. One was a hospital case man job, and the other was with a prior manager, for a bedside RN. Both managers indicated at the time they were interested, and that they would submit me into the HR system. I was really excited about the bedside nursing job, because I missed patient care. That job was with a previous manager, so she was willing to take a risk on me, even though it had been 5 years since my last hospital bedside position. The other job, I loved the manager, and felt that it would be a good personality fit. I was just going to see which one came through. Wellll, the case man job came through in 2.5 weeks, I stalled a little, called the bedside position HR, was told if I had the job, the hiring manager would call me. At 3 weeks, I took the case man job....and a week later, the bedside position was offered at a couple dollars more an hour (both jobs ended up being about the same annually, with case man M-F/40 hrs/salaried). I took a weekend to really consider dropping the case man job and jumping to the bedside one, but finally felt, that due to having gone through accepting the case man position officially/completing the physical, that it would be unprofessional to not go through with it.

So, with boring backstory done, I am four months into the case management position, and they are laying off people, cut one FT position from my department (so I now have no assigned SW, which increased my workload 25%-50%). I am very frustrated, since I clearly indicated during the interview process I was looking for more stability, wanting a position to settle into, with the manager telling me about the longevity of staff working at that hospital. So, post layoffs, I have spent the past month working late/through lunch (yeah, I know, we are nurses, suck it up - but when you are salaried, and took a job for a couple bucks less an hour, every hour extra bites). Additionally, I am killing myself, and we are low census, with one unit closed, so I am dreading when census is back up, and the other unit open again, because at least now, if I am really drowning, someone can come help me with a SNF referral or open a couple new patients. Being impatient, I looked to see if they were hiring at the bedside job, and they are...so, the big question, is should I call the bedside job hiring manager and ask if they would still consider hiring me (when we talked at the time I turned down the position, explaining that I ended up taking the case man job because the delay in the job offer made me think I was not getting the job, he had told me to call him if anything changed in the future).

Thanks for any/all advice

:)

[dishes, BSN, RN]

The bedside job is open again after just four months, kind of suggests a revolving door...I wonder if the nurses in that position feel like their killing themselves with work.

[Been there,done that, ASN, RN]

"Being impatient, I looked to see if they were hiring at the bedside job".

Your post is hard to follow. I can't tell what you want, and I think you can't either. Take some time to carefully assess what position you want.

You are qualified for many.. deep breaths.. take some time for introspection.

[Honeygirl46]

The bedside job is in LTACH, which I have done in the past. There is typically a lot of turnover, as the field draws former ICU nurses, who are just horrified by what happens to the trach/pegged pt's, and they get a lot of nursing home nurses, who think the smaller patient load will be easier, and they can't handle how sick the patients are. I loved LTACH as a former ICU nurse, complex patients, like the wound care, but less intense than running a patient actively in shock all day. Granted, it was emotionally draining work, but I have worked in a variety of settings, and quite frankly, I have found all of nursing draining.

Thanks for responding :)

[Honeygirl46]

Very true, I think in general, I am completely burned out on nursing, and am hoping that there will be some relief with being on a 3-12's schedule.