Nursing Dreams

all4schwa · Mar 6, 2006

IMy husband came inot our room to wake me up . I said to him, "you better flush that babies line w salin, then heplock in and clamp it! you Cant just leave it open like that"! Anyway I was really upset at my husband for laughing (*hello. noo baby in the room!) becuase I really thought that baby was in our room!

that's a good one!! :roll

MMARN, BSN, RN · Mar 6, 2006

Great thread! When and if I have one, I'll post it here. Right now, my dreams are only of passing the friggin' exams.

Gompers, BSN, RN · Mar 6, 2006

I have dreams where I'm at work and it's been a crazy night, and towards morning I find out that I had another patient assigned to me that I didn't know about. Patient has been neglected all shift long (in an ICU setting no less) and is practically dead by the time I find out about it.

I've been working for 7-8 years in the same NICU and I still have this dream at least a couple of times a year.

themonalisa · Mar 6, 2006

I had a dream a few weeks ago where my ex-boyfriend was in my ICU on a ventilator, whether from a car accident or what I don't know, but his parents, who never did like me, were yelling at me and blaming me and I was like "don't worry, he'll pull through" and he hears me and self-extubates and just starts talking. What a turd, making me fill out "unplanned extubation" paperwork!

themonalisa · Mar 6, 2006

Gompers, I've had that dream too (going thru a whole shift and then finding out I was assigned to a patient I didn't know about!) I actually had that happen when I was working as nurse aide on a rehab floor and the charge nurse didn't assign one patient to any of the aides, but a patient missing his bath/supper tray is way different than an ICU patient with no nurse! I had that dream when I was working in an ICU where sometimes I felt like my patients didn't really have a nurse we were stretched so thin. I gave back my sign-on bonus and high-tailed it out of there!

all4schwa · Mar 7, 2006

i had a night full of the most bizarre dreams, the first of which woke me up and i immediately thought of this thread...

...in the LTC were i work, we have few elopement risks. one evening three residents come up missing. after searching through and through i go out side, around the back of the church next door, over to the grocery store, i look everywhere, frantic! how did three of them (out of 50) disapear? turns out it was all a 'drill' thought up by our administrator!! i was v.mad!! :angryfire i told him i did not appreciate being played!!!

next dream i'm in school (my other full time job,i grad 06/06), but in my dream, i'm first year RN again and i'm taking a test that is short answer/essay, not multiple choice, and the girls around me are all talking, i can't answer questions like this!! nobody is telling them to shut up, and then they jump all over me for telling them to do so...!!

a had a few other twisted dreams, not related to work, won't and wouldn't tell you about them... :uhoh3: ...and i was having the worst choking fits in my sleep, i thought i was dying...i had to get up and say, forget sleep, i'm not going back!!

froggg123 · Mar 7, 2006

When I was in Nursing School during finals I had a dream my son called me, I remembered thinking oh his IV bag needs to be changed so I went in his room and told him to just change the bag and it will stop beeping, needless to say he had no idea what I was saying or why I had woken him up LOL

SmilingBluEyes · Mar 7, 2006

Cannot say I dream about work. No.

BamaBound2bRN · Mar 7, 2006

I have had dreams of nurses, but then my wife usually bops me on the haed and I wake up.:smiley_ab

jgwe4e · Mar 7, 2006

I'm glad I'm not the only one dreaming about work. They're usually not good dreams either--I'm so relieved when I wake up. I work in a peds hospital, so most of my dreams are about infant or toddler patients. Last night I dreamed I hung a med, then went to take care of another pt. While I was gone, the med turned to raspberry puree, seeds included, and another nurse changed the pump so it would flow through the IV better. At the same time another infant fell out of his bed, which wasn't a normal crib at all, and vomited all over everything. A third patient had received morphine resulting in fixed, dilated pupils and extreme tachycardia.

It would be bad enough if the setting of the dream was my normal hospital, but it never is. There's always some huge distortion in the setting. In last night's dream my hospital unit was someone's living room, and people I haven't seen in 25 years were wandering in and out.

Pretty often I dream that it's the end of the shift and I realize I've totally forgotten to take care of a patient. Then there are the dreams where I have to suction a baby's trach but the suction isn't working, I call for help but the call buttons don't work, etc.

I'm still in my first year of nursing (2nd career). Does this get better with time? Any suggestions for reducing the frequency of stressful dreams?

Gompers, BSN, RN · Mar 7, 2006

I'm still in my first year of nursing (2nd career). Does this get better with time? Any suggestions for reducing the frequency of stressful dreams?

Well, I graduated eight years ago this spring, and it still happens to me...

It's much less frequent though. It's almost always after a very bad shift. What works best is to try and get everything out of your mind before you go to sleep. Write everything down and tear up the paper, just to vent it all out. Take a bubble bath. Drink some herbal tea or warm milk. Read a good book. Just do something, anything, so that when you lay down to sleep, your mind is at peace.

jgwe4e · Mar 7, 2006

Usually I'm not even aware of feeling stressed about work. I love what I do, and have wonderful, supportive co-workers. I relax with music on the drive home, enjoy my days off. But these dreams are becoming annoying! They even happen when I don't work.

I'll try doing some writing and focused relaxation before going to sleep--it can't hurt, and just might help. Thanks for the suggestions.