Kicking my butt...

meownsmile, BSN, RN · Nov 18, 2003

Ummm,, if you are doing 12 hour nights, and going to school days i presume, when are you doing homework and sleeping? That may be the root of the problem. You burn the candle at both ends long enough and it eventually meets in the middle right?

Lack of sleep and exhaustion can cause major mental deficits just like you are describing. Get some sleep!

Katnip, RN · Nov 18, 2003

Agreed, it could be the nights. BUT lots of new grads come up against something new everyday. I didn't know how to turn on suction, knew when someone coded you had to bag them, even knew that you had to hook the thing to O2, but didn't know what setting.

Those things come over time. And when you have your own patients, sometimes it's hard to get organized. At the beginning of every shift, after i've looked at my pts. I make a list of what I need to do for each pt, and what time. Helps enormously.

PJMommy · Nov 22, 2003

Thanks for the responses. I'm better now...I guess I was just overwhelmed from lack of sleep, new environment, and a straight up learning curve. I'm settled into a routine now and enjoying this much more! Although there are times I still feel pretty lost, I'm feeling a little more like a nurse now. :)

Thanks again for the responses.

PJ

K8RN · Nov 22, 2003

I had/have the same problem. Don't worry too much about it. I graduated the beginning of August. I did my 4month pre-grad in neurosurg. I was always coming up against new disease processes, new meds, new issues. Now I've been working on a 44 bed telemetry unit since Septemeber. Everyday it gets a little bit better. I still come up against organizational problems occaisionally, still come up against new meds, new issues... that kind of stuff, but the staff are great and there's lots of support for us new grads. No one expects you to be able to handle difficult issues or perform like an expert nurse right out of school ( at least that's what my collegues say ). Keep your chin up... it will get better!

purplemania, BSN, RN · Nov 26, 2003

Its called stress. If need be, write notes to yourself. Focus on what you are doing at that minute. Do not carry problems from home or work over into school or vice versa. Eliminate as much mental activity as possible from your life and "veg out" when you can. I would bet you are not sleeping enough. Apologize to your family & friends and say I will see you next month. A benadryl to help you sleep is not out of order but DO NOT start drugs/alcohol routine as it will mess you up royally. Your new mantra: I can do it, I can do it---------good luck!

AndiMac · Dec 4, 2003

Here's my 2 cents ...

Those things are to be expected, schooling isn't easy. It pushes you, tests your limits, pushes you to the limit of curling up under the nurses station desk and sucking your thumb. All school does is give you the basics, and then pushes you off to learn the rest. The real world and nursing school is so different, it's amazing.

I was 9 months pregnant when I graduated. I waddled up and down halls, trying to catch up with escaping patients refusing meds, and avoiding swings from dementia patients, g-tubes gurgling in my face. I was exhausted, the whole time I was in school, I was pregnant and exhausted, and then I had to go to work after school. After work I camed home and did my homework, went to bed around 12 or 1, every night. Then got up at 7 and started my day all over.

Hold your head up, and just remember, school isn't the same. You don't know everything, you're never going to know everything, take every procedure one procedure at a time. School can't teach you how to do orders, or what paperwork needs done now, and what can wait. School can't teach you how to organize yourself the way that works for you, or which doctors are going to yell at you for calling them instead of faxing them, or how to drop ship meds, or how to send out a urine specimen to the hospital lab a block away. (All wonderful things that have happened to me.) Don't be so hard on yourself. That just makes you lose confidence in yourself, and then you'll begin to question everything you do.

And remember there's people like me that went through school and never gave an injection on an actual person. Get everything you can out of every experience, good or bad. We learn from our mistakes ...