i HATE my job. Does anyone else feel the same?

toonsis · Feb 14, 2013

I would take a job I hate over no job at all. I hope things get better though :)

WoosahRN, MSN, RN · Feb 14, 2013

So sorry OP. Hard to do have a job that makes it difficult to get out of bed. I would definitely be looking for something else. At the very least, you have a group of people you can vent to. Just another reason I love my PICU patients. The kids are easy to take care of, it's the families that can make it difficult. My "favorites" are the passive aggressive ones and the ones that stare at the monitor ("his HR went up one, down two, up 3. Now it's down another 2."), or the pumps, or the machines. I sometimes want to ask them what they are going to do when they jump up because they heard something ding or beep.

NJnewRN · Feb 14, 2013

Welcome to the club! At least one nurse makes a post like this or says something about leaving the profession. I only have 3 yrs of experience and my last resort is home care. Honestly, I can't stand the hospitals anymore. I'm applying for my masters in the fall. If the homecare stint doesn't the work out (please pray that it will) I've decided to leave nursing at some point. I've decided that I am going to follow what I truly love, which is something creative like interior design. Life is short. The years, they just go so quickly. Why spend your life doing something that you hate?

iluvivt, BSN, RN · Feb 14, 2013

Jenni811 your post made me laugh :roflmao: because they are so TRUE...you say like it really is! If you cannot get the heck out of there seriously try playing around with your schedule. Maybe work 2 shifts..take a day off and then work the third. I was doing three in a row and switched to 2 on...1 off....1 on schedule and it has made a huge difference. On my third day I noticed I was very short on patience and irritated with the more difficult patients. My first thought when there was a troublemaker was, "I am really not in the mood for this **** today." It was not the actual work that was annoying me it was the families and the PIA patients. I can deal with much better now since I changed my schedule although next week I have to do 3 in a row b/c there was noone else to do it!

Sweet charm, ASN, RN · Feb 14, 2013

Patient's are so demanding. What on earth makes you think i want to "wipe your butt" when you can do it at home just fine? Ok...you have two broken arms, i will help you. But if you are here for i don't know...Chest pain observation and you can feed yourself the 50 trays of food you just ordered and open the soda bottle your family snuck you in, why would you not be able to wipe your own butt?? What makes people feel the need to be so darn needy like this?? Don't put on your call light for me to pour you a glass of water from the water pitcher sitting next to your hand. You are perfectly capable of doing it yourself (Im talking about people who CAN do it.) You are not a 65 year old baby, you are an adult who has wiped your own butt and poured your own water for i don't know, 63 years now??

HAHAHA! Made my day

anotherone, BSN, RN · Feb 14, 2013

I get fed up with it and hate it sometimes. working nights (less pt and family interaction )helps. if olening a soda, lotion on their gross feet or wiping their butt , shuts them up i will probably do it. easier that way. for the really rude ones i might get sarcastic but usually kill them with obviously fake kindness

FurBabyMom, MSN, RN · Feb 14, 2013

I felt the same way the original poster did about my old jobs at times. I also loved my jobs sometimes.

I had some impossible patients, but I had some amazing patients. Some of the patients I cared for - either themselves or their family situation would be enough to monopolize hours of my time. I really had to work to keep my cool with as high acuity as my assignments could be, when dealing with some difficult families. Sometimes saying nothing is better than rebutting everything. I worked in a call center in customer service before becoming a nurse. Whether we like it or not, things right now are such that people expect to be treated as the single most important thing in the world, regardless of how they treat you or how they act.

For times you must say something, my advice is that you take a deep breath, consider it all (how to handle it, how to be as polite as possible but still setting boundaries or limits) and then speak. My other piece of advice is, if you know an assignment is getting the best of you (frustrating you, family is impossible), maybe requesting a different assignment? Both times I worked as a floor RN, we had a handful of patients that were just horrible. And we would "share the love", and rotate whose turn it was to take that assignment. Both of those patients had inpatient stays of well over 2 months, so by the time it truly became overwhelming the entire staff knew almost everything there was to know about the patient.

That being said, I've seen other posters have suggested a different specialty. It worked for me. I'm very happy now 95% of the time where I would only be very happy about 5% of then time at my old job. The other thing I can say, it's very apparent to me the coworkers one has on their team can make or break a shift.

Sunny68 · Feb 14, 2013

All I can say is ditto. I have been a nurse for 13 years and I have worked in a step down unit and med surge. Will admit that I liked the step down unit way better, alas the hospital I am at now no such unit is found and the ICU is so cliche that getting in there will be awhile. It does not help I am new nurse on the floor and drive about an hour to get there unlike the other nurses there so I am out of the loop all the way around. I will add that it usually is not the patient but the family who can make all of our day go down hill in a heart beat. Most of the time I believe it would be best if they stayed at home and not advise us on how to do our jobs. Now if they want to help assist their loved one with feeding them, when they cant, sitting beside the ones who have dementia to keep them calm then that is great, but don t pull me out of another's patient's room while I am tending to them to tell me that so and so needs some ICE... please.

Another pet peeve.... I treat all the patients the same no matter their back ground, so don't tell me so and so is the mayer or a family member of one of the city's so and so... all patients have needs and should be served in the same manor.

Yes, there are alot more days now that a fake smile is there instead of the real one...

tired as well.

cherry_blossom · Feb 14, 2013

I absolutley despise my job. I work as a nurse in a intermediate/telemetry type floor. We are in the process of moving to a new hospital, so we were a telemetry unit and we are splitting into telemetry/intermediate care. We will be split evenetually but right now kind of combined...its weird.
Anyway, i HATE HATE HATE HATE my job. I i get so worked up on the way to work, up to the point i start getting massive headaches and offset my vertigo issues. I've always struggled with unexplained vertigo that comes with stress/anxiety. i can't stand patients and families who are so demanding and disrespectful.
I do my absolute best to put on my "fake smile" to please them. i'm a person of very short temper so it takes every ounce of energy in me not to slap some of them in the face. I got in trouble one time because a patient's daughter was giving me a really hard time and everything she said that came from her mouth started with "Well i'm a nurse and...." it ould have been totally irrelevant to what she had to say. For example: "Well i'm a nurse and i had an egg salad sandwich for lunch."
"Well, i'm a nurse and i have a kitten named Dutchess" (that was actually a real one).
She was SO disrespectul, rolled her eyes everytime i talked, very short answers. Finally i had it...i looked at her and said "I don't care if you are a nurse. I'm her nurse now and i will make the decisions on what i think is best for my patient."
Yup...i got in trouble for that one. But i explained everything to my manager and she, deep inside, i knew agreed she was being ridiculous. And i told her i just couldn't take it anymore. It went on for THREE DAYS, in 12 hour shifts and i was on day 4 with her. I snapped...yup.
Anyway, my point with that story is it wasn't this one time...it is ALL the freaking time. Patient's are so demanding. What on earth makes you think i want to "wipe your butt" when you can do it at home just fine? Ok...you have two broken arms, i will help you. But if you are here for i don't know...Chest pain observation and you can feed yourself the 50 trays of food you just ordered and open the soda bottle your family snuck you in, why would you not be able to wipe your own butt?? What makes people feel the need to be so darn needy like this?? Don't put on your call light for me to pour you a glass of water from the water pitcher sitting next to your hand. You are perfectly capable of doing it yourself (Im talking about people who CAN do it.) You are not a 65 year old baby, you are an adult who has wiped your own butt and poured your own water for i don't know, 63 years now??
Im sorry i have to vent. Makes me feel better. Does anyone else feel this way about nursing? I feel so stuck in it and i want to get out. What else can i do with my degree that i would enjoy??
Once my fiance and i are married we want to start a family right away. he has agreed for me to quit my job at that point to be stay at home. I'm afraid i will enjoy not being a nurse so much i may never go back. What other career choices do people ENJOY as a nurse? I have my BSN.

Well first, I think most if us feel this way at hospitals. We are too overworked with too many patients. I'm sorry your stressed, I've got anxiety too...it started when I became a CNA! Lol. First tip: before i worked in a hospital as a PCT, i worked in the DD field....developmentally disabled. I worked with people who had schizophrenia, bipolar....and so on. This has given me so much patience and understanding. It's called " ignore junk behavior"! When a patient, family or coworker asks the impossible, has an attitude or anything along those lines, ignore them. When that family member (the NUrSE) starts her stuff, ignore her. Just say okay, whatever, and move on! I promise this works. People that start confrontations ENJOY them and survive off them. Just ignore them. If they keep it up, direct them to your NM ( like, I'm sorry if you have questions, please direct them to the NM) or with the patient " being in a hospital is to help you improve and get well. when you get home you will have to be able to take care of yourself, so no i wont do it for you, i want you to show me how you can do it for yourself and il assist when needed". Just keep a cool smooth attitude with them too, like your a great nurse and them talking to you is slowing you down. I would also suggest you try finding a job in mental health? I've got a few friends who work as nurses in psych hospitals, and love it! they tell me im crazy for working in a regular hospital. Lol. 2nd and last tip....I also work for another company as a Health and Safety , CPR and FA instructor. When I'm finished with my BSN, I will be continuing my career in this field. I love teaching others skills and so forth. I like bedside work....but only sometimes like you it's too stressful for me. So maybe look into getting a job as an instructor like at schools or your hospital? Or go back to school for your MSN and do clinical education? That's my plan, even tho it's down the road. Lol. But good luck and let stuff like this go....women seem to hold on to stuff longer than men do....Unfortunately. It's hard to let go, but you can do it! :)

HoustonRN-VA · Feb 14, 2013

I'm a 48 y/o male that went to nursing school at the age of 38. I loved my first job, but I wasn't learning what I needed to progress. I ended up on a step-down unit when I went to the VA, it's federal so they don't have to look at what states are doing across the nation with nurse/patient ratios. We would have 4 heavy patients and draw our own labs and IV starts. I was there for 4 years and many times wanted to quit, but I need to work. 18 months ago I applied for and got a PACU position. I have been there for 18 months and love it. That was one of the reasons I became a nurse, because if you're in a position you don't like, find one that you do. I too ran into people who would not do things for themselves that they could, I would remind them , my job is to get you as independent as possible, if you cannot do it, like you said, I'll gladly help you when you "need" it. I love my current position recovering veterans from surgery. I hope you find a position you love.

NotMyProblem MSN, ASN, BSN, MSN, LPN, RN · Feb 14, 2013

YEP!!!!!!!!! As it turns out, I will be leaving nursing OFFICIALLY to take care of a parent who can no longer live alone. I refuse to put her in a nursing home. I've taken care of some of the most ungrateful, demanding, and pathetic people on Earth for the past 27 years. And a lot of the patients were awful, too! If I can do this for total strangers for that length of time, I surely don't mind doing that and then some, for the woman who gave me life. Once I leave nursing, I'm not going to say I'll never look back because no one knows what the future holds. But I can say that I will re-enter the field filled with regret and extreme disappointment. I'm so sick of working in a field where the humans taking care of humans are expected to be able to part the Red Sea or at the very least, walk on it, and when that doesn't happen, heads roll to pacify the threat of lawsuits.

uRNmyway, ASN, RN · Feb 14, 2013

You know, something occurred to me that I hadn't thought of. With those patients that still act like two year olds and want you to wipe their butt and hold their cup to drink and all that, even after you give them the whole "My job as a nurse is to help you be independent and blablabla'... I've alluded to the fact that if they are healthy but not ready to go home because based on our evaluations they do not have an adequate level of independence, well they will need to go to a rehab facility until we feel safe letting them be alone. That has also sometimes worked. Not always, there have been a few who just didn't care. But most of the time that implied, kinda threat works.