How many of you actually enjoy your job?!

jacksonvillelpn · Feb 9, 2015

If you entered nursing school because you felt either called or destined to it, then, no matter what you have to deal with, you will love being a nurse. This is how, and why, you will be happy. If you focus on the "job", you will always be miserable. Because the "job" sucks. But being a nurse is wonderful and amazing. Serve your patients. Focus on their needs. That is what you were meant to do. Do your best to ignore the garbage that swirls around every corporate culture everywhere, whether you are a lawyer, car dealer...whatever, or nurse. You weren't meant to be a corporate lap dog. You were called to care for your patients. Heal the sick, comfort the hurting, love the hard-to-love. Let others deal with the business end. You have your own "business ends" to deal with. Good luck. Study hard, keep your chin up and your head down, and fly below the radar.

SHGR, MSN, RN, CNS · Feb 9, 2015

I have to say I honestly love my job. It's fulfilling, has helped me grow immensely, and I really feel a sense of deep satisfaction in what I do. I could do without the petty politics, and sure there are things in the work environment that I would change if I had the power to do so. All in all, though, it's been a great fit.

No Stars In My Eyes · Feb 9, 2015

If you entered nursing school because you felt either called or destined to it, then, no matter what you have to deal with, you will love being a nurse. This is how, and why, you will be happy. If you focus on the "job", you will always be miserable. Because the "job" sucks. But being a nurse is wonderful and amazing. Serve your patients. Focus on their needs. That is what you were meant to do. Do your best to ignore the garbage that swirls around every corporate culture everywhere, whether you are a lawyer, car dealer...whatever, or nurse. You weren't meant to be a corporate lap dog. You were called to care for your patients. Heal the sick, comfort the hurting, love the hard-to-love. Let others deal with the business end. You have your own "business ends" to deal with. Good luck. Study hard, keep your chin up and your head down, and fly below the radar.

Excellent!

Speedy09 · Feb 9, 2015

I just came off of a 14 hour shift, so I still have a lot on my mind about my job. There is no part of my job that is easy. I've been a nurse for 5 months, and I work at an LTAC hospital with a 7 pt/nurse load. I also work per diem at a SNF with a 15 pt/nurse ratio. I would like to start by saying that both jobs pay VERY well for new grads. Working 60 hours/week I make about $2,200 after taxes, as a day shift nurse. As far as bang for your buck, there is no job, that I'm aware of that offers that type of pay scale with less than a year of experience and only 2 years of education (I have an ADN). These jobs also work completely around my school, and my hospital job pays for my classes.

Nursing is hard for so many reasons. It's hard to motivate your CNAs, who are often overworked with multiple jobs and young or old relatives to care for at home. It's hard to time manage, when pt loads are increasingly high, while support systems are being phased out. It's hard because pts are getting older, sicker, and they are surviving longer with multiple complex diseases. It's also hard because people are complex, and grief and discomfort can bring out the worst in people's character.

I believe that what makes my job challenging is that I get to know my patients and their relatives over weeks or months, and the place where I work is usually the last resort. They are too sick to go home, too complex to get better, and many of them require ventilation, wound care, or dialysis.

When I first meet relatives, they are usually yelling at me or crying. They want answers, medications for their loved one, and there's a seemingly endless list of tasks they need from me that can't wait to be done, but I pour my love and attention into all that I do for these people. Often, I'm the first person they see when they arrive and the last person they see when they leave.

You cannot go into your day as a nurse and think about what you can get out of nursing. You have to go into it thinking about what you can give of yourself. If you can't do that, nursing will make you miserable because people will need you all day long, and they need all of you at the same time. They need you to support them when nothing can be done to make them better, to fight for them when everyone else fails them, to recognize the humanity behind the charts, to be firm with them when they make terrible choices.

I love my job. I work myself to the bone, but my life has so much meaning because of the relationships I form, the people I've helped, and the character I'm developing. Life is so precious and fragile, and I feel truly blessed that people allow me to care for them. With that being said I won't be a floor nurse forever. It's not good for the body, so have a plan like going into education or management after your mid 40s.

JWG223 · Feb 9, 2015

I just came off of a 14 hour shift, so I still have a lot on my mind about my job. There is no part of my job that is easy. I've been a nurse for 5 months, and I work at an LTAC hospital with a 7 pt/nurse load. I also work per diem at a SNF with a 15 pt/nurse ratio. I would like to start by saying that both jobs pay VERY well for new grads. Working 60 hours/week I make about $2,200 after taxes, as a day shift nurse. As far as bang for your buck, there is no job, that I'm aware of that offers that type of pay scale with less than a year of experience and only 2 years of education (I have an ADN). These jobs also work completely around my school, and my hospital job pays for my classes.
Nursing is hard for so many reasons. It's hard to motivate your CNAs, who are often overworked with multiple jobs and young or old relatives to care for at home. It's hard to time manage, when pt loads are increasingly high, while support systems are being phased out. It's hard because pts are getting older, sicker, and they are surviving longer with multiple complex diseases. It's also hard because people are complex, and grief and discomfort can bring out the worst in people's character.
I believe that what makes my job challenging is that I get to know my patients and their relatives over weeks or months, and the place where I work is usually the last resort. They are too sick to go home, too complex to get better, and many of them require ventilation, wound care, or dialysis.
When I first meet relatives, they are usually yelling at me or crying. They want answers, medications for their loved one, and there's a seemingly endless list of tasks they need from me that can't wait to be done, but I pour my love and attention into all that I do for these people. Often, I'm the first person they see when they arrive and the last person they see when they leave.
You cannot go into your day as a nurse and think about what you can get out of nursing. You have to go into it thinking about what you can give of yourself. If you can't do that, nursing will make you miserable because people will need you all day long, and they need all of you at the same time. They need you to support them when nothing can be done to make them better, to fight for them when everyone else fails them, to recognize the humanity behind the charts, to be firm with them when they make terrible choices.
I love my job. I work myself to the bone, but my life has so much meaning because of the relationships I form, the people I've helped, and the character I'm developing. Life is so precious and fragile, and I feel truly blessed that people allow me to care for them. With that being said I won't be a floor nurse forever. It's not good for the body, so have a plan like going into education or management after your mid 40s.

That's the way things should be, but most people are ungrateful and then complain about things like the blinds or a bright street light outside or whatever to get money off for their stay. They don't care about you or being nurtured or any of that. They want to blow the fluid off their lungs so they can go and get drunk or eat a bunch or fried food again and skip another 3 dialysis treatments so they can come get their q4h morphine and not have to worry about walking to the bathroom to take about dump like they would at home.

So while some patients do want help and are grateful for what we give, many just don't care about health or wellness or common decency and only want drugs and to do whatever they want regardless of medical advice. How do you reconcile this, or do you just consider it "building character" to maintain professionalism and uphold standards of care with these folks? That's about the best I've got for it, myself. I have bills...this builds character...let's get it done and go home.

skillsfreakrn · Feb 9, 2015

I am an older new nurse and just hit my 10 month mark with my first job on an extremely busy medical surgical unit that during the day sees discharges, direct admits, post op, pre-op, and admissions from ER, 6 patient load...day shift is nuts, I wonder how many miles I walk a day. The job is very demanding and fast paced...we have cell phones and use cows/wows and wear "trackers". Some days the phone never stops ringing! The phone will ring during a dressing change and when I can't answer they get on the overhead speaker and ask why! Even though they can see what room I am in! Im always like if I am not answering it's because I can't like I am doing an iv or foley... Bed alarms and hourly rounding, and the director checking response times even when you are suited up in ppe and another patient is calling.. Stressing over hcaps, core measures. Many iv antibiotics and constant pain meds...some days you feel like you are just chasing your Tail... I knew medsurg was nuts from clinicals but it's completely different when you become an RN. I have had some real bad days and some real good ones..I have seen nurses leave and quit..or switch to nights. But I have learned so much and overall I LOVE my job! After my very short orientation of just 8 weeks..I was on my own and I must say I was overwhelmed! But my two charge nurses are amazing!!!!!!! I call them the "queens" out of sincere respect. They are awesome and I couldn't have made it this far without them. The other veteran nurses have been helpful as well whenever I have a question. I don't think there is a "perfect" job, and I do think all the extra demands that get put on nurses rather than other departments or people are ridiculous..but you can't let that get you down...having excellent coworkers does make a HUGE difference... I would be sad without them. You have to remain positive on most days and accept the crazy lol. ðŸ˜ today I am smiling tomorrow I may be crying...If you get too frustrated it can get you down and make you have a bad attitude. Don't let yourself go there...I think nurses no matter where they work need encouragement and support with positive feedback, and appreciation from management. Nursing is the hardest job you'll ever love next to motherhood. And the best thing is nursing offers so many options especially when new grads get that one year experience, so then you can find the specialty area that works for you....for now I'm sticking to medsurg and learning all I can from some of the best nurses ðŸ˜Š

SubSippi · Feb 9, 2015

It's "job/work". If people enjoyed it, it would be called "hobby".

I don't think it's a lack of enjoyment that makes something a job necessarily...I think of nursing as my job because I get paid to do it.

However I don't get paid to clean my house, and I certainly don't enjoy it. I definitely don't consider it to be a hobby, either.

I guess we are all just really lucky to live in a place and time where the possibility of enjoying your job even exists.

TNValley · Feb 9, 2015

I enjoy my job. I even enjoy, as do most of us, years later recalling those days of pure horror where the thought of taking hostages almost became a reality.

p.s. bad dialysis days are bad, really really bad, but surviving them is great, really really great

Anna S, RN · Feb 9, 2015

If you entered nursing school because you felt either called or destined to it, then, no matter what you have to deal with, you will love being a nurse. This is how, and why, you will be happy. If you focus on the "job", you will always be miserable. Because the "job" sucks. But being a nurse is wonderful and amazing. Serve your patients. Focus on their needs. That is what you were meant to do. Do your best to ignore the garbage that swirls around every corporate culture everywhere, whether you are a lawyer, car dealer...whatever, or nurse. You weren't meant to be a corporate lap dog. You were called to care for your patients. Heal the sick, comfort the hurting, love the hard-to-love. Let others deal with the business end. You have your own "business ends" to deal with. Good luck. Study hard, keep your chin up and your head down, and fly below the radar.

Great advice!

YogaloverRN · Feb 9, 2015

Hi, I have not posted for a long time because I am a home health nurse and if you know anything about it, the paperwork is "H___", lol. I have been sick and had to take some time off, so....I'll put my 2 cents in. I started nursing at 25 as an LPN. I fell in love with nursing because I love people and I am ADHD and had had many jobs where I just got so bored and felt disillusioned with working. Now, I am almost 55 and I too am looking for another option for nursing. I think part of the problem is that nursing has changed due to many influences, politics, health care changes, money, etc. I tried to work in medical surgical which is what I started doing in 1985 on a surgical floor for 14 years. I lasted about 90 days, lol before I almost had a nervous breakdown. Patients are sicker, there is less staff and more to do, and my biggest complaint is that with all this technology, there is no voice activated charting out there so that I am not sitting for hours charting?!!! Argh, that's why I loved nursing, because it was helping patients, taking care of them and spending a few minutes documenting, now, with all the legal implications, you do a pile of work and then do a pile of charting to prove you did it, or.....you chart and the patients do not get enough care. And management did not seem to care. Now I was PRN which meant that Christmas night, I got really dumped on, I cried all night, came in at 3 pm, supposed to work until 11, left at 2 am, and had 5 for total care, couldn't get any help, and that's a real problem, that's the price of PRN. So.....I ran back to home health where I can depend on one person, me. Don't read negative posts, go to counselor, talk to your boss, and keep looking for your niche, its out there. I have a hate love relationship with nursing and at my age, im looking for another change, that's the magic of nursing, there is an endless supply of opportunities for you, good luck. Oh and YOGA helps a lot too!!

J2RN1999 · Feb 9, 2015

I really enjoy my job in interventional radiology! It is nice to work in a specialty area focusing on one patient at a time. I worked ER before and it was fast paced and every day was interesting and different!

Larry3373 · Feb 9, 2015

I am an older new nurse and just hit my 10 month mark with my first job on an extremely busy medical surgical unit that during the day sees discharges, direct admits, post op, pre-op, and admissions from ER, 6 patient load...day shift is nuts, I wonder how many miles I walk a day. The job is very demanding and fast paced...we have cell phones and use cows/wows and wear "trackers". Some days the phone never stops ringing! The phone will ring during a dressing change and when I can't answer they get on the overhead speaker and ask why! Even though they can see what room I am in! Im always like if I am not answering it's because I can't like I am doing an iv or foley... Bed alarms and hourly rounding, and the director checking response times even when you are suited up in ppe and another patient is calling.. Stressing over hcaps, core measures. Many iv antibiotics and constant pain meds...some days you feel like you are just chasing your Tail... I knew medsurg was nuts from clinicals but it's completely different when you become an RN. I have had some real bad days and some real good ones..I have seen nurses leave and quit..or switch to nights. But I have learned so much and overall I LOVE my job! After my very short orientation of just 8 weeks..I was on my own and I must say I was overwhelmed! But my two charge nurses are amazing!!!!!!! I call them the "queens" out of sincere respect. They are awesome and I couldn't have made it this far without them. The other veteran nurses have been helpful as well whenever I have a question. I don't think there is a "perfect" job, and I do think all the extra demands that get put on nurses rather than other departments or people are ridiculous..but you can't let that get you down...having excellent coworkers does make a HUGE difference... I would be sad without them. You have to remain positive on most days and accept the crazy lol. ðŸ˜ today I am smiling tomorrow I may be crying...If you get too frustrated it can get you down and make you have a bad attitude. Don't let yourself go there...I think nurses no matter where they work need encouragement and support with positive feedback, and appreciation from management. Nursing is the hardest job you'll ever love next to motherhood. And the best thing is nursing offers so many options especially when new grads get that one year experience, so then you can find the specialty area that works for you....for now I'm sticking to medsurg and learning all I can from some of the best nurses ðŸ˜Š

Your hospital sounds like a hospital that I worked for in Biloxi.