Okay, the title might be a little misleading (and I'm sure it will probably be renamed by the administrators :icon_roll) but, if it is true that some nurses eat their young, then I might have a pretty good example here. Any advice would be helpful. I just got my license this morning (Yay!) but have been working for several weeks at a small LTC facility just following people around and getting oriented. There's this one nurse that we will just call Satan so that we might protect her identity , and she has been rude and demeaning to me since I started. In our textbooks, she is called a 'toxic mentor'. I'm sure these people are everywhere. There have been other nurses that have opened their lives and hearts to me and really showed me what the people mean to them in the scope of their jobs but this one acts as if what she does is top secret and I can't have any part of it. I asked her a general policy question the other day when a particular patient was reporting severe pain for several days due to a UTI from a urinary catheter that he kept pulling on in tears. She answered with a very quick and abrupt "He's just fine" and looked down at me with a very condescending stare. I immediately asked if I had done something wrong (trying to take a peace-making approach) and she said "No, but neither have I" implying that I was questioning her judgment. I almost told her to take that guilt to a priest where it belongs cause I never said she did do anything wrong. I'm not sure what the issue is specifically, but everything I say, she will counter with a statement that feels like she is trying to one-up me, or put me in my place. I know that I don't know as much as she does (even though I am her senior by several years I'm sure) but I don't know how to confront this attitude. I know that there will be a time in the very near future that I will have to seriously struggle to remain respectful to her. I have a great relationship with the rest of the staff in the facility and I am afraid that if we don't end up getting along that she could make my time there very difficult since she is pretty tightly networked. What a silly way to treat new nurses! As a nurse, about half or more of our job is teaching (or that's what it seems to me at this stage) and what could be more exciting than being a mentor/teacher to the brand new? Any advice out there?
Hi...I'm new to this website and I've been reading all of your comments and replies to different situations in nursing. It's all been so helpful to me...I have 1 yr. experience as an RN and I recently started a new job on a cardiac telemetry unit. I had 6 weeks of orientation. My first night off orientation I had 3 admissions and picked up 2 patients from someone who left at 11pm. Some nurses I give report to have no mercy for the new ones. I haven't really figured out why. They have 1 year experience just like me, only taking care of different types of patients. It's been difficult learning their routine, way of giving report, and just overall knowing what to do in certain situations, i.e. paperwork for admissions, which doctors to call for which reasons, phone numbers commonly used, etc..I think for the new grads falling behind is just because it takes time to learn your own routine of doing things plus becoming oriented to the floor you're on. Over time, though, it gets easier. I learn something new every night that I work. I try to ignore the sarcastic looks and sighs when someone feels like they're not getting what they want in report. I'm just trying to learn as best I can. I just keep pushing forward.
, and she has been rude and demeaning to me since I started. In our textbooks, she is called a 'toxic mentor'. I'm sure these people are everywhere. There have been other nurses that have opened their lives and hearts to me and really showed me what the people mean to them in the scope of their jobs but this one acts as if what she does is top secret and I can't have any part of it. I asked her a general policy question the other day when a particular patient was reporting severe pain for several days due to a UTI from a urinary catheter that he kept pulling on in tears. She answered with a very quick and abrupt "He's just fine" and looked down at me with a very condescending stare. I immediately asked if I had done something wrong (trying to take a peace-making approach) and she said "No, but neither have I" implying that I was questioning her judgment. I almost told her to take that guilt to a priest where it belongs cause I never said she did do anything wrong. I'm not sure what the issue is specifically, but everything I say, she will counter with a statement that feels like she is trying to one-up me, or put me in my place. I know that I don't know as much as she does (even though I am her senior by several years I'm sure) but I don't know how to confront this attitude. I know that there will be a time in the very near future that I will have to seriously struggle to remain respectful to her. I have a great relationship with the rest of the staff in the facility and I am afraid that if we don't end up getting along that she could make my time there very difficult since she is pretty tightly networked. What a silly way to treat new nurses! As a nurse, about half or more of our job is teaching (or that's what it seems to me at this stage) and what could be more exciting than being a mentor/teacher to the brand new? Any advice out there?
lovemusic31
2 Posts
Hi...I'm new to this website and I've been reading all of your comments and replies to different situations in nursing. It's all been so helpful to me...I have 1 yr. experience as an RN and I recently started a new job on a cardiac telemetry unit. I had 6 weeks of orientation. My first night off orientation I had 3 admissions and picked up 2 patients from someone who left at 11pm. Some nurses I give report to have no mercy for the new ones. I haven't really figured out why. They have 1 year experience just like me, only taking care of different types of patients. It's been difficult learning their routine, way of giving report, and just overall knowing what to do in certain situations, i.e. paperwork for admissions, which doctors to call for which reasons, phone numbers commonly used, etc..I think for the new grads falling behind is just because it takes time to learn your own routine of doing things plus becoming oriented to the floor you're on. Over time, though, it gets easier. I learn something new every night that I work. I try to ignore the sarcastic looks and sighs when someone feels like they're not getting what they want in report. I'm just trying to learn as best I can. I just keep pushing forward.