nurse/doctor relationships?

NurseDennie, BSN, RN · Feb 17, 2003

Well, for a couple of minutes, I was a pre-med student. So I've got a few friends from WAyyyyy back who are now docs. Of my MD friends the one I with whom I get along the best is a pathologist. They're weird people, most of them I think.

My closest MD friend (not that we get along all that well, but we seem not to be able to not be friends - especially now that we all have the internet) is a trauma ortho surgeon in Italy. We talk on the phone and on the internet and sometimes I help translate for him when he's in a chat with a Brit or American or the odd French woman.

Once someone asked him if he liked to play role-playing games, and he had to ask me about it. He has great English, but not great idiomatic English. Anyway, I explained it, and he told her he played doctor and nurse, but only with him in the doctor role.

I told him that he ought to tell this women that he and I play doctor and nurse the way it's done in real life: He ignores me, and I say nasty things about him behind his back!

You know about orthopaedic surgeons, don't you? They have to be as strong as an ox. And probably twice as smart.

There are also a couple of people I got to know when they were residents on my floor that I still see socially.

So I guess if you have something in common with someone, or a shared history or some sort of strange affection that just doesn't seem to extinguish, you can put up with what they do for a living.

But I agree about *most* docs. And I have to admit that the ones with whom I'm friends are not necessarily any better. But I've never had an affair or been in love with any of them. For what that's worth.

Love

Dennie

RN2B2005 · Feb 17, 2003

Still just a pre-nursing/CNA student here, but I've worked the clerical side of medicine since 1995, and seen my share of...well, things.

Of the 13 male docs I currently work with, 7 are on their second or third wives and four of the rest are unmarried. The remaining two are happily married; both of these are married to physicians, as well. The only one I'd vaguely consider attractive--witty, funny, devastatingly brilliant--is not 'traditionally' handsome. Life is not like "ER". I like him for him--not because he's a doctor; we actually met for the first time BEFORE I worked with him.

Another doc I worked with, who has since left the practise, was noted for (or infamous for) seducing nurses and other staff while a fellow at the university...he continued to have various and sundry affairs and was so flirtatious with me that an uninformed coworker thought he was my husband (we carpooled, so left work and arrived together at the same time). He was married, but didn't wear a wedding ring and never mentioned his wife unless directly asked. She eventually divorced him, and she and I remain good friends.

So, moral of the story: Beware. There are docs out there waiting to take advantage of the white-coat charm. And it doesn't get easier if he marries you...you'll never see him, because he's with me, at work, or at a conference, or on call...and that's AFTER residency. He'll forget your birthday, your anniversary, your kid's birthday. His secretary (me) will pick out your Valentine's card, remember your cell phone number, and track down your husband when he forgets that the in-laws are coming for dinner tonight.

Good luck.

EmeraldNYL, BSN, RN · Feb 17, 2003

I'm engaged to a med student but I got him before he ever got accepted to med school, so he's all right. :wink2: Some of my friends from college went on to med school too and we still keep in touch. They're great people, hopefully they won't change!

alwaysthere · Feb 17, 2003

Only know two dr/dr prs and the practice in different specialties and in different hospitals from one another...Most of the physicians here are married...and the others seemingly have no interest or girlfriends in different proffesions...The few personal realationships that do spring up are simply casual friendships..the type of realationship that makes it easier to work with the person, not harder...

Tweety, BSN, RN · Feb 17, 2003

Sometimes MDs are so busy, especially residents that the only people they get to know are nurses, so naturally some of them ask them out.

I've seen a few coworkers date doctors. Most of the time it hasn't worked out.

One of our docs notoriously flirts and asks out nurses all the time, and find no shortage of takers. But also, gets many rejections along the way.

I keep the relationships strictly professional and am no unfriendly, but don't get to know the docs I work with.

chicagonurse · Feb 17, 2003

About 95% of the docs where I work are married and in orietation the nurse educator told us if any one of us was looking for a doctor to marry we better go elsewhere.

I don't know why anyone would want to marry one they seem like more trouble than they are worth.

Lausana · Feb 17, 2003

When you think about what you want in a spouse-marrying a doctor just doesn't fit those things. Especially with a nurse's life thrown in there, how would you successfully have a marriage or family? Unless you wanted to end up at home raising kids essentially alone.

I grew up with a family whose dad was a surgeon. He was about as ideal of a dr/dad combo as they come, actually did stay involved in the kid's/wife's lives but even then his pager was constantly going off and he was never really there-could leave any moment. That gets old and I wasn't even related :rolleyes: I feel for his wife now that their kids are moved out and away--what a lonely life she must have now. You can get "involved" in things to fill up your day, but it just isn't the same.

Definately not for me

NurseLiNA · Feb 17, 2003

mmmmuahhhh!!

lina