New Grad Nurse Might Lose Job Struggling In Orientation

[Scrubba Dub]

I work on an oncology med/surg floor as a new grad nurse. I have been wanting to be a bedside nurse and I love working with my patients. But I am apparently not flourishing enough to be ready to come off orientation. I have trouble with time management but have been working diligently on it and have been improving bit by bit every day. But some days it’s so hard to finish on time when I am still learning a lot of new things and can’t always retain it all at once. I am also still struggling with understanding computer stuff and following all of the rules there are in everything I do. I am also a bit anxious and according to the nurses I work with on the floor, it shows.

I’ve cried already 3 times at work because of the way the nurses criticize me. They say they are trying to help but when they would talk to me, they would say things like, “you don’t know this yet?,” “you should know this by now.” And everything that they teach me, they make sure to tell my manager the things I didn’t know how to do and the mistakes I made (that I learned from and corrected).

They would also keep telling me to stop being so anxious and crying all the time and it just made me feel even worse and I would not be able to focus on my work and would make more mistakes.

My manager isn’t really nice when it comes to giving me feedback. She never had anything positive to say. It was always just about the preceptors complaining about me doing things wrong. She thinks I am genuinely failing at this job and told me that if I don’t improve enough in my last week of orientation, that my employment will be terminated.

I’ve been on orientation for about 11 weeks and I feel like I should be flourishing more than this and honestly, I am not happy here. I feel like I should be learning much faster than this. I know I am really new and it’s going to take a long time to get good, but I am not getting good enough after 3 months and that worries me that I am not cut out for this

I’m really really going to fight for my job but at the same time, is it worth all of this toxic behavior from my preceptors and manager? What do I do?!

[Hoosier_RN, MSN]

We see so many so many of these posts, very similar. Toxic preceptors, crying orientee. I see a 2 pronged problem.

Problem 1- for the prior 10-15 years, nursing schools teach to the NCLEX, and students coming out of school with ability to answer NCLEX questions, but not a lot of skills, or knowledge of the application of those skills. Facilities are having to invest a lot of time and money to bring the skills, knowledge, and application of both, together. 15-20 years ago, and longer, all of this was taught in nursing school. New nurses got a few weeks to learn charting, P&P, and where supplies are located. We did pretty well without a lot of tears.

Problem 2-not a popular view, but we have become a participation trophy society. If someone doesn't tell you how great you are continuously, they're a "meanie". No one is good at everything, and no one is a good fit everywhere. As @Ruby Vee mentioned, it's not the preceptors job to deliver critique wrapped up pretty with a bow on it. As long as it's factual, non-derogatory, and not prejudiced in any way, shape, or form, it's not up to the preceptor to make the orientee feel warm and fuzzy.

The fact that the OP noted that the preceptor acted "less toxic" tells me that this was more about the OPs feelings than what may have really been going on.

[caliotter3]

It would be nice if the OP would return and give us an update on their present perspective.