Has anyone else found it difficult to sustain a healthy and happy relationship while working as a nurse? I worked on a CT surgery floor for 6 years as a nurse until the stress finally got to me.
My fiancé pointed out how I was always stressed and couldn’t even enjoy my days off because I was thinking about my next shifts to come. I knew it was ready for a change and have now been working a year on a cardiac intervention unit (yes outpatient but it’s still within the old hospital I used to work).
I thought this job was going well. My stress level went from a 9 or 10 every day to a 1 or 2 at work. I still do 3 12 hour shifts and a lot of my shifts are 5am-5:30pm or 6am-6:30pm. Since they are such early shifts, by the time I get out, go home shower and eat dinner I usually put a show on and fall asleep on the couch.
I never thought this bothered my fiancé until tonight.
Today was his birthday.
I went into work for 5:30am and I ended up not being able to get out until almost 8pm because I was the closing nurse with one other nurse and we had a couple issues with our patients and couldn’t discharge them on time. I kept texting my fiancé to update him apologizing I was stuck at work. But asked him where I could take him out to dinner.
I got home from work by 8:10pm, changed immediately and took him out to dinner at the restaurant he suggested. I was extremely exhausted during dinner because I had gotten up at 4:30am and worked a 14+ hr day but I didn’t think it was that obvious. When we got home I could tell my fiancé was upset.
We watched a show together and I fell asleep on the couch at 10:30ish. By the time we went to bed I knew he was upset. I had to pry it out of him but he felt as if he spent his birthday alone because I wasn’t present at dinner and for the rest of the night. He said he didn’t care I had to work late but I should power through it because that’s what you do when you love someone.
I tried to explain that I was up really early (probably 4 hrs before home because he works from home most days) and had a long day at work and I never intended to make him feel like that, I apologized profusely but I guess he just feels as though I always use work as an excuse.
He said it’s not just today it’s all the time when he feels like he doesn’t see me during the week because I’m so tired after my shifts and just fall asleep on the couch.
I told him I can talk to my manager and try to have them put me on the 7am shifts and take me off 5am and 6am shifts as much as possible since other nurses like this shift. I told him I had no idea it bothered him that much until tonight. He still seems upset but I just feel like he truly doesn’t understand the exhaustion when you get up so early and work such long shifts.
Has anyone else experienced anything like this before? If so, how did you cope and what advice do you have for me.
he just jumps to “I know im just the worst. Im a terrible person!”
Hooo boy, that might seem like a simple reaction of immaturity (which, it is immature) but it's quite more than that, actually. First, it is manipulative; it's to get you to feel silly/stupid for what you said and to walk it back. And even if you don't walk it back, it's just him all but point-blank telling you that what you've said is ridiculous (as evidenced by him equating your words with ^ that ridiculous hyperbole).
If someone said that once because their feelings were really hurt, that's one thing. If that sort of response tends to be their go-to.....NOT GOOD. Not good at all.
I agree with whoever wrote that you should work on boundaries, too. There was no reason to be going out to dinner that night in the first place when you both could have spent the rest of the birthday relaxing together and planned a dedicated night out to celebrate the birthday on a different night.
We're not here to rip apart your relationship but...there are some things that sound "off," and now's the time to either seriously work them out, grow and mature or else go your separate ways.
I agree with a lot of other responses and have found that people who do not work in health care simply don't "get it." I work Sunday Monday Tuesday nights to mesh with my son's basketball schedule as much as possible, and I can understand why my boyfriend (and frankly my son as well) may feel like I'm less than present during that stretch in the beginning of the week. As far as my romantic relationship- there are absolutely some trying times, but at this point my boyfriend will also look at me and go "take a nap" when I start to get snippy or whiney. We have meals together when we can, and in the beginning of the week the Crock Pot is everyone's best friend.
Like another poster said- we are not here to judge you or shred your relationship. That being said, I don't think my boyfriend would have the thought to be upset with me for being exhausted. His birthday this year falls on a Monday- smack dab in the middle of my three shifts- and our solution is to simply have his "birthday activity" (whatever that may be) the Friday of the same week. Compromise is CRUCIAL for any relationship but I think it is especially important when people plunge into relationships with someone with careers as emotionally tolling, mentally draining, and physically exhausting as ours (even more so if you're an introvert like me and work drains you of nearly all of your interaction energy). If I can offer any advice: compromise whenever you can- sometimes that means you don't even see your partner for a full day because we all need to sleep and eat; communicate (preferably without arguing or getting heated); remember self-care is crucial; and shoot a spicy text on a random Thursday to give his ego a boost.
JKL33
7,044 Posts
Hooo boy, that might seem like a simple reaction of immaturity (which, it is immature) but it's quite more than that, actually. First, it is manipulative; it's to get you to feel silly/stupid for what you said and to walk it back. And even if you don't walk it back, it's just him all but point-blank telling you that what you've said is ridiculous (as evidenced by him equating your words with ^ that ridiculous hyperbole).
If someone said that once because their feelings were really hurt, that's one thing. If that sort of response tends to be their go-to.....NOT GOOD. Not good at all.
I agree with whoever wrote that you should work on boundaries, too. There was no reason to be going out to dinner that night in the first place when you both could have spent the rest of the birthday relaxing together and planned a dedicated night out to celebrate the birthday on a different night.
We're not here to rip apart your relationship but...there are some things that sound "off," and now's the time to either seriously work them out, grow and mature or else go your separate ways.