Nurses that you remember

[snoopy29]

Over my years in nursing there have been some patients and some nurses that I will always remember. Please join me in a little trip down memory lane.

Sister C - my first ever ward sister. She was a year off retiring having joined nursing aged 16. A stickler for punctuality she would rather hand over to an empty room than wait for late nurses!!!! She would sit at the nurses station and correct our Kardex (old fashioned charting system) in red pen. Any spelling mistakes we had to write the correct version three times!!! At 11am every day she would do a ward round, in those days we had the old "Nightingale" wards huge long big windowed wards with 15 patients down either side. She would inspect the beds and bounce a coin off the sheets to make sure they were made tight enough, and would check that corners had proper hospital corners. She called all the Doctors Mr ... and nurses Nurse surname. I worked with her until she retired and never learnt her first name.

Sister M - called the marmite sister by junior nurses as you either loved her or hated her!! (think this will lose something in translation as I think we only have Marmite in the UK!!) Her big thing was uniforms. She insisted that nurses came to and from work and when doing transfers that they wear the long navy blue capes lined with red felt that we had issued. I used to like mine even though they were very dated so although I would never have admitted it I liked that rule!! On Sundays she would take the tape measures that officially were there to measure limbs for Thomas splint and measure our dresses to ensure they were the required 3cms below the knee. She had never married and would smuggle her little dog into work and hide him under the nurses station and junior nurses would walk him during breaks. It makes me smile because infection control would have a field day.

Sister H - drop dead pretty, fantastic figure looked like she should have been a nurse from a telly show. The more stressed she got the higher pitched her voice became until just a little squeak came out. We would always know what sort of day we were in for by how high the squeak was. Had a nasty habit of blaming everyone else for anything that went wrong earning herself the nickname of the teflon sister - as nothing ever stuck with her.

Charge Nurse P - 6ft 7inches, 22 stone with hands like shovels affectionately called the BFG (big friendly giant) after an awe struck child said "Daddy look there's the BFG". The only nurse that could see into a cubicle by looking over the curtains by looking over rather than in. Took any preconceptions I had he was the gentlest kindest nurse I ever had the pleasure to work with.

I'm sure there are many more but those are the ones that spring to mind. I look at my junior nurses now and really hope that some of them will remember me for the right reasons of course :)

[BanoraWhite]

At a nursing home where I used to work we had an "old school" nurse whom I really looked up to. She was always very calm and collected, even in an emergency she was extremely levelheaded, methodical and professional. She was a great nurse ... It seemed she could handle anything !! I really aspire to be able to carry my self in that way in the workplace when I graduate.

[Virgo_RN, BSN, RN]

Thank you for sharing, Snoopy. How incredibly different your experience of nursing has been from mine! I really enjoyed reading your post.

[nursel56]

What a great thread idea! I have a tremendous amount of respect and affection for the "old school" nurses. I'm talking about the type I thought was a battle-axe when I was a young nurse in the seventies. They were the no-nonsense type, all gruff and kind at the same time, God bless 'em. Here are a few of mine:

Mrs. Van H- one of my instructors, an ex-Navy nurse who, even wearing street clothes had that military bearing, was our stickler for skirt length and starched caps. I remember the arduously perfect printing she had, as she explained that day shift nurses charted in black ink printing, evening shift nurses charted in green ink, night shift in red ink. It was a work of art, her printing. She was the only one who gave me a remark that approached a compliment, nearly growling, "I think you have the potential to be a good bedside nurse". She actually wrote me up when my hair fell out of the bobbie pins one day.

Audrey G.- this was the lady who was old school and aging, but slight in stature and hair dyed a flaming red color. We didn't see a lot of her, because she had been diagnosed recently with Huntington's Disease and her nervous system was deteriorating. She did however, by apparent sheer force of will, meet with all us new nurses once each. I remember so well seeing her talk to me about her love of nursing, wearing that stiff snow white cap against the red hair,wearing bright red lipstick-- and not being able to get the words out properly but persevering-- as she needed to say those words and the involuntary movement of her neck and face. (Oh, Lord now I've gone and made myself cry.)

Betty- she was the fun nurse that could charm any recalcitrant child (worked in peds) and also a very freckled redhead. She literally would offer to do a dance for a child if he slurped up that god-awful stuff in the cup. She kept up her part of the bargain, too. Sort of an Irish jig tap dance thing, I think. She ended up with a laughing 4 year old who just forgot about that icky stuff altogether.

Last, my Aunt Nellie. I'm not sure if she had an RN license for sure, but she was the "baby nurse" for countless babies in our extended family. She was a live-in for several weeks, but she always wore a crisp white uniform and those white orthopedic looking shoes. She reassured many a terrified new first time mom, and in our family she had the authority of God when it came to babies. I only remember her as "old". She was always old to me. She didn't need to do this. She wanted to and did, I am sure, until the old bod just wouldn't do it anymore.

Thanks for starting this thread, that was a fun trip down memory lane for me!:)

[DogWmn]

The terrifying shift super who was ex-army, she always scared the .... out of me as a new nurse until one night I was working with a new post-op that was going south and my floor super was fobing it off to me being a noob and she silently came up behind the conversation (she must have had special forces training because she was always silent on her approaches...LOL) and turned around, went to eval the patient, came back to the nurses station, called the doc right in front of the floor super, grabbed me and helped me get some supplies and we re-dressed a new post-op site and she went with me back to chart and I nervously charted what I saw in great detail and who called who etc. Anywho, to make a long story short, the super gave me a compliment and encouraged me to always stick to my guns and was impressed I stood up to the floor super to get good care for my patient. I shined off of that complement for years. It meant more to me than many others I've gotten during my career.

I graduated from school in '72 and I worked with a large amount of ex-service nurses - totally unflappable and nun/nurses - tough as nails. They commanded respect with their wealth of knowledge and experience, they may have made me nervous but I loved working with them for the most part, they were always willing to help and to teach. They were generous with their knowlege, if you asked.

[scoochy]

When I was a nurse's aide in the early '70s and worked only week-ends d/t the high demands of private school, the charge nurse was a "tough cookie." If she caught you sitting, you would find that you had 10 more tasks on your assignment..cleaning fingernails, folding laundry (that was the 11-7 shift job), giving extra, extra nourishments, etc..We used to give a lot of enemas back then...SSE's..high, hot and a hell of a lot!! She then came up with her own concoction for treating constipation..warm prune juice mixed with MOM. It worked like a charm! Today, I find myself doing some of the same things!! I used to complain about her all the time to my best friend (who also worked with me). She has since passed on; I thank her every day for the tips I learned from her!!

[Kooky Korky, BSN, RN]

Genie S. - tiny in stature; took up with some guy and left the school without notice or so we were told;

Joyce ? - former nun; beautiful eyes, gentle, kind, complimented me on something I did in the way of taking initiative to change a policy I didn't think was fair;

Penny H - impressed by my composure when doing my first bandage change; allowed no students to nurse her when she gave birth; can we blame her?

Peg L - crotchety, unfriendly Ortho instructor; knew her stuff, just not friendly or popular; drove 2 hours each way, each day; first lesbian I ever heard of;

Mrs. C - only black instructor ('70's); OB; nice, knowledgeable, pretty; just now retired from DON position;

an Asian RN I worked with as an aide - had trouble telling us to do this or that; I think it was cultural, as it was probably considered to be too direct in her culture; used to irk me at the time, now I think I understand;

Asian supervisor who would tell me I had filled out a certain paper wrong, but never told me exactly how to do it right in the first place; an Asian coworker said it would be considered rude of her to tell me. Ruder than me having to re-do it 4 times? Just goes to show - things aren't always what we think they are.

Ms. P - many of you have probably used her textbooks;

Betty C and Judy S - conniving, dishonest, evil as the day is long - a pox on them - my first HN and AHN;

evil, foul-tempered wenches on ER evening & night shifts - would rarely speak to lowly new grad me, would never help or teach (at least, not nicely), very rude and unfriendly, grew fat on eating many young nurses; a pox on them, too; brought their personal unhappiness to work and poured it out on all of us who had to work with them;

Pat ? - HN who no more belonged as an HN than I did; afraid to step on toes; of course, this was when it was completely unacceptable to hold minorities accountable for any wrongdoing. I know this might offend some of you, but it's the truth. As a minority myself, I was always embarrassed when I'd see majority bosses cater to minority employees who were in the wrong. Is it any wonder we have problems in this area?

Mrs. S - used to ride my friend so badly; of course, friend sort of had it coming; She would not bow down or kiss backsides the way most of us did and she was very outspoken. Not sure what my friend, a convicted drug addict, was doing in nursing school to begin with but she was really feisty.

Mom, aka Dorothy - I sure loved her, a fellow student, a little older, and LPN, never slept, worked full time, not sure how she ever made it through school and was still always friendly and nice.

I guess I could go on but that's enough. Like most of you, a mixture of good and terrible.

[newtress, LPN]

I will not ever forget one special nursing instructor. I live in the deep south and you had an instructor/advisor that you would have throughout the entire program. They were refered to as your "mama teacher." She truly was my mother teacher. She was a very heavy set black woman. Her style of teaching and her knowledge blew the doors off my other instructors. I have always had a very difficult time with mathematics. I had been out of high school over 27 years when I started NS. Well, I failed my prerequisite intro to pharm first go around by one point. I just couldn't get a handle on those darn fractions! She told me to retake the course again, that she would be teaching it at night. The previous teacher really rubbed my nose in the fact that no one fails this course and you did. So I did take it again with my mama teacher, and she had me come into her office half hour before each class and tutored me. She showed me how to do those fractions and eventually pediatric dosage calculations like a beautiful two step, like a texas waltz. I was acing my exams and I am greatful to her forever for that. I had never gotten an A in ANY type of math ever. She was my clinical instructor also and was gentle with all of us. At the graduation ceremony, we were to give a special thanks to an instructor(s). I spoke and said "where ever I'm at, I will always carry you in my back pocket". She muttered softly from the audiance "gurl, you gonna have to have to have you some big ol' pockets, and deep too!."

[husker_rn, RN]

Carolyn RN who oriented me on day shift in a small hospital years ago. We had a very obnoxious doc and when he started to rant she would let him; and then look over the top of her glasses and ask " Are you through now ? ". She would tell how " Some fool " did whatever. When I confessed that I was " Some fool" she said that she knew and I knew and no one else needed to know.

Lily RN same place, same time. Nothing ever flustered her, her knowledge base was astounding. She was the queen of ingenuity and make do. Very staunch patient advocate before it was at the forefront and taught me to be the same.

These ladies were the best !! I owe them more than I could ever repay but when I told them so they would say to just pass it on to the next new nurse. And I try to do so.