New Grad & Bullying

[NICURN87]

Hello,

So I need some guidance and advice. I have been working as a new RN at a local hospital for the last year and a half and have been dealing with EXTREME bullying leading me to seek therapy, consider taking antidepressants and often times thinking about suicide. After about 6 months of working at my current job I began dealing with isolation, being left to do admissions by myself, asking people for help and having them tell me they were "too busy" and then people going to our Nurse Manager making up rumors about me including that I was trying to get fired. I am in the new grad program here and had to sign a two year contract when I started. At first I told people that liked it but I missed my friends and family back home and that I was struggling, they would ask if I thought I was going to stay and I said probably not because I missed them. That apparently got sent to our manager as "She's trying to get fired so she can get out of contract". First of all, if I quit or get fired I have to pay back my $5000 contract anyway AND if I get fired from my first job I'm setting myself up for failure. After this incident our NM was fired (unrelated) and our 2 acting ANMs took over until our new NM came. During this time our overnight ANM corned me in a patient room and accused me of refusing to provide patient care (which I have never done), and clocking out early to go home (also, I have never done and this can be proven via the time card swipes), when I tried explaining to her how those things aren't true and quoting things people said in rooms she said I wasn't in helping she would just raise her voice, roll her eyes and call me a liar. After about 5 minutes of this I said "I do not need to sit here and listen to you yell at me and call me a liar" I got up and closed the door. This was done during change of shift and in a room near the nurses station so upon exiting all of the day and night shift nurses looked at me and asked me what was wrong and I just started crying. That morning after the incident I had a meeting with the woman in charge of the nurse residency and she told me to go to the Director of Colleague Relations (DCR) regarding these things and told me this stuff was not okay and needed to be dealt with. I let it go for months and finally after a few more rude comments, nights of eye rolling and a night of being forced to have the highest patient load and go to deliveries while other nurses sat around at the front desk all night, I decided it was time to see the DCR. I met with her and was told I have a "victim mentality" and that this isn't really bullying and that she doesn't blame people for having a bad attitude towards me because of my call outs (I have FMLA because I have multiple autoimmune diseases so I get sick a lot, especially working nights). She told me I need to have a discussion with our new NM about everything. So we had a meeting with her, our new NM stated that 6 nurses had been consistently going into her office with complaints about me (nothing patient care related) and that because of that she believed them. I also had been told a few months ago when I requested to go to days that I was the first on the list and then they promoted a brand new nurse over me. When I asked about this in the meeting she told me during a lunch with the nurse she promoted that nurse had asked to go to day shift and it was before I asked and the ANM must not have known about it. Also she stated they wouldn't move me to days because of my sick calls (even though I don't have any corrective action). Basically the meeting ended with them telling me that this isn't bullying and isolation, I have a victim mentality I need to get over, I need to change and work on doing whatever the other nurses need/ask me to do for them and I need to not call out sick ever again otherwise things would never change. At this point I don't know what to do. I feel so alone and like nobody at this hospital sticks up for nurses at all. This hospital apparently has a reputation for having this happen a lot and their retention is really really bad. I just worry they will either try to find some crap reason to fire me before my contract, will make things even worse for me before my contract is up or make it impossible for me to get another job because they will put in terrible references. I am so depressed and feel so hopeless. I have known my whole life I wanted to be a nurse but this is making me regret my decision now and making me debate giving up on my career as a nurse. Any help or guidance would be appreciated.

[nutella, MSN, RN]

I wonder if it would be worth for you to get some legal counsel regarding getting out of the contract.

You are in a situation where it is probably really hard to turn things around.

It sounds that you have been there for 1.5 y already - so if your contract is done after 2 years it would be soon. If it is longer though I think legal counsel might be a good idea.

To be honest - because you have FMLA they are probably going to be very careful and not fire you because that will open them up to a lawsuit. But of course your life can be so miserable that you will resign. They can not tell you not to call out if you have intermittent FMLA - the intermittent FMLA is supposed to protect you.

Perhaps it would be a good idea to see who would give you a recommendation and start getting your resume together and so on in case you have to look for something else.

It sounds like nightshifts are not such a good fit for you in terms of health - perhaps you can look for a job that is more regular?

[KatieMI, BSN, MSN, RN]

Nutella is totally correct. If anything else, those $5000 are less than your health costs.

A year and a half is enough to make reason like "I'm just not a night person" perfectly legal. Start putting feelers out once you either know exactly what your contract implies, or have these $5000. And please think about something more regular in terms of hours.

[BuckyBadgerRN, ASN, RN]

Your lack of paragraphs made for extremely difficult reading!!

i will say that your fmla is probably not common knowledge and your coworkers are not at all happy about your multiple call outs. Justified or not, they surely see it as you not pulling your weight.

i wish you the best of luck in finishing out your contract and that your next position is a better fit for you.

[jadelpn, LPN, EMT-B]

Get some legal advice regarding getting out of your contract. Not to mention that I would think that your FMLA is federally protected (and not legal advice per AN TOS)

There are very few private hospitals anymore, but if there is one that you are working for, there's a level of administration above you and your management team that you need to discuss this with.

If it is a larger facility with a parent company, there's multiple references on the parent company website that allow one to send communication to corporate compliance, employee relations on the corporate level, and other resources to report these behaviors. A lot of which is subjective, however, if you have an approved FMLA, this is huge. Not to mention that your superior outright called you any names, from a "liar" to "victim mentality". So wrong on a number of levels.

You could also speak with your PCP regarding your health status, if disability would be something to consider, if your medical conditions are under protected class, that kind of thing.

Finally, if you have a contract, I am assuming that malpractice is under the contract conditions. If so, I would also put them in the loop of what is happening.

Never ever get yourself in a place where suicidal ideations, overwhelming sadness, and adjustment issues take over your life because of a job. You need to think of you first. Have discussion with your family as to where to go from here. Seek professional counseling for you.

You need to involve your parents. So call them like yesterday and have them assist you in decision making. It is important.

Disclaimer: I am not offering any legal or medical advice. But this is serious, and you need to call your parents.