Odd interactions

Nurses Relations

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Some interactions are just plain odd. What's one that will stay with you forever?

Mines is I had a 34 y/o female pt. She would always put her light on to tell us that she had just used her diaper. She had been there about a week using diapers. She has also been DEMANDING us to put in a foley. So early on in my first day with her as I'm changing her I ask her how she uses the bathroom at home. "I just walk" She was in for a lap chole. So I ask her if she can use the restroom right now and she just jumps right out of bed and goes to use the restroom. Turns out she just really really really didnt want to get out of bed. After that she was still very insistent on getting a foley.

She was HANGRY

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I dread the aging baby boomers. Many of this generation have a sense of entitlement and can be quite assertive and aggressive.

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Had a hospice patient once whose daughter was sleeping in the room with her. Patient passed while daughter was sleeping. I removed her oxygen, and then woke up daughter to tell her. "I'll give you a couple minutes alone" Returned to find daughter back in bed, sound asleep AND the oxygen back on. Remove oxygen again, wake daughter again and ask for funeral home info. She rolls her eyes, gets up, opens her address book and lays it on deceased mother's chest while she flips through it. I get info, go to call funeral home.

Return to room to find (you can see where this is going)daughter back in bed asleep and the damned oxygen back on.

Now, this was literally the last room we had in the hospital. I once again wake daughter and tell her funeral home is en route and she will need to vacate. She is pissed "I was planning to stay through breakfast". (It's currently around midnight) Inform her no can do.

Funeral director arrives, and daughter brings two outfits on hangers out into hallway and asks us which she should wear to the viewing and which she should wear to the graveside.

Funeral directs beats a hasty retreat. Daughter then holds out her car keys and tells me I can put her luggage in her car now! I decline.

The CNA who was working with me that night lives in the same town as I do. Every now and then, we run into each other- and immediately burst into hysterics remembering this 'odd interaction'.

Good story to share approaching Hallowe'en. Just plain creepy.

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Specializes in med-surg, IMC, school nursing, NICU.

annie.rn Thank you! What a nice thing to say! My mom used to tell me if I got discovered and put on SNL, I could quit college.

I'm a nurse now, of course, so you can see how that turned out. But at least I can make you guys laugh on here.

People say laughter is the best medicine.

Those people are wrong.

Wine is.

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annie.rn Thank you! What a nice thing to say! My mom used to tell me if I got discovered and put on SNL, I could quit college.

I'm a nurse now, of course, so you can see how that turned out. But at least I can make you guys laugh on here.

People say laughter is the best medicine.

Those people are wrong.

Wine is.

Nurses really need to be able to laugh when they see all this craziness going on.
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Specializes in Med-Surg, OB, ICU, Public Health Nursing.

It was Halloween and I wore and orange top on a med-surg floor. I asked the patient if he knew that it was Halloween. He responded, " am a schizophrenic and don't you know I hate Halloween?"

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If I told all the weird encounters I've had we'd be here all night! Had a patient once that I caught eating a styrofoam cup and she fought me like a wildcat when I tried to pry it out of her hand. Had a patient once when I worked nights that slept peacefully all night while I sneaked in and hung 3 different antibiotics. Never even stirred. Went in the last time at 4 am and all of a sudden she goes "Do you know anything about the Portuguese language?" I almost wet my pants?

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Had a little brat of a patient who I was recovering after having jaw surgery. She refused to respond to me, even when I sternal rubbed her. I thought given she was less than 120 lbs, all that she got in OR was still in her system. I didn't even want to give her the small amount of Fentanyl I gave her even though I knew she was having pain. Later, this ruse kept on going well after I stopped giving her narcotics. Turns out she was just being a little b****. She didn't want to respond because she didn't want to. Later, after I handed her off to my coworker, her behavior got worse, and she left AMA.

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Specializes in Early Intervention, Nsg. Education.

When my sisters and I were young, my Mom worked nights at a little nursing home/rest home type facility. Our babysitter usually went on vacation for a few weeks in the summer, and we spent the night sleeping in the back of our huge green station wagon. The patients knew the three of us kids, and the cook used to make us breakfast around 6:00. (This was in the late 70s/early 80s, and no one complained or thought it was odd.) Until one morning...

Do you remember Figment, the purple dragon from the old Imagination ride at Epcot center? My grandparents had just come back from a trip to Florida to see the brand new park, and brought back a hat for my 6 year old sister. Purple hat with huge googly eyes and yellow horns. She was wrapped up in a patchwork quilt, with the hat perched on top of her head. My Mom noticed a lol with a very puzzled expression on her face, and asked "What's wrong, Mabel?" Mabel took a few more seconds to stare at my sister, drew in a deep breath, and said...

"I don't know what kind of animal that is, but it's eating a kid!" [emoji33][emoji33][emoji33]

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Lap choles are commonly 23 hour admits. So...you get them overnight.

Wow! I had a lap chole myself last month. I was in and out of the hospital in about six hours.

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