So yesterday was my last day at our clinical site. We've been there for an entire semester. I usually feel pretty good about my work - not 100%, because I am not in the medical field currently. We only get a clinical once weekly, which in my eyes is just not enough.
I am doing pretty well in lecture (B+) and lab I feel fine as well. When I get to the clinical site, of course my nerves can get the best of me. I push through them though and do my best and keep my patient safe.
I've had several instances where I felt that I was under the teacher's gun and that she was assigning me patients that were very complicated...where as other students in my class were getting easy patients. Whenever I was assigned a complicated patient my teacher would basically spend the entire clinical period breathing down my neck essentially and harassing me.
I was always taught that as long as you got things done in time, and done correctly it didn't matter how you did them - as long as your patient's safety was not jeaporized in any way. Sometimes I prefer to do things a little differently, I just do them the way I feel comfortable. Well, yesterday was awful. I felt like she was continuously drilling me, and singling me out for no reason. Even my other classmates noticed it and were approaching me on it. She did not make it private, in fact she pulled me off to the side - basically in front of my entire class and went up one side of me and down the other for everyone to hear. She told me that she could tell I was not experienced in the medical field and I had better get myself a PCT job over the summer so I can re-learn all of the basic skills that I don't know how to do. I must know how to do them if I passed last semester, right???
She also told me that I will probably never make it as a nurse ... and a lot of other hurtful things. I tried so hard to not cry, but it was just inevitible. I'm under so much stress with school and trying to get good grades and putting in so much effort that for someone to tell me that I'm never going to make it and never be a good nurse has got me down in the dumps. This has been my life long dream... and now I'm questioning it.
I'm starting to think maybe she's right. Sometimes I get too flustered and it's a weakness that is going to essentially make me a bad nurse. All I can do is stew over this now, because really I had no chance to prove anything to her when she was saying this to me. It was my last clinical rotation with her, and now she has to evaluate me and I'm afraid she's not going to pass me because of this. If she doesn't pass me, I don't know what I'll do.
Can anyone relate to something similar to this??? What the heck do I do??? Everyone tells me to just let this all go and stop worrying because I'm obviously doing something right and that she just doesn't like me ... but I'm really doubting myself and my self esteem is just down in the dumps.
I have been a nurse for almost 2 years. I remember my instructor doing the same thing to me. Here's how I looked at it:
Is it a pain in the butt and a lot of stress? YES! But.....I felt that if she didn't think I was a great nurse, she wouldn't take the time to push ME as hard as she did! I took advantage of this and made it a point to be able to answer her questions, Ace the procedures, and give nothing but great care, that way if she did say something I knew it was only to make me better!
After taking my NCLEX I found that test to be a price of cake compared to what I dealt with from my instructor! Easiest test I had taken since starting school! This made me realize that all the crap I took from her was preparing me for this. And I thank her now for being so hard! I feel I am better prepared than someone who had an "easy" instructor.
Take your time, breathe, let it out, and know that you are not the only one. You will do great and be a great nurse! TRUST ME!
Good luck! you can do it! Now it seems painful and such but over time it forces you to learn and yes toughen up the emotional shell. Think of it as working out ..you dont get any muscles if all you did was lift weights at the minimum 10 lbs you need to up the weight, and rep. Out there people maybe bullying, writing you up, cussing you out left and right. There will be no prof to check with or protecting you.
I had my share of instructors "picking on me" and i really was deathly afraid of her each week and post clinical once i almost burst into tears on the unit. Well you know what everything my instructor said was true: I was weak in the basics, came unprepared, not assertive. Afterwards that class before each clinical for all semester I made sure i reviewed basics, looked up procedures i'd most likely need to know and practiced my command voice. After graduation I spoke with my 1st semester instructor and said prof thanks for your advices in freshmen remember you said, I needed to be more confident. well i've fixed that :) She smiled and said wow to think you were the same student as day 1 see? I knew you could do it. She's been watching so they do care even if they're harsh.
Anyways personalities aside, she's not your mom, friend or whatnot. Look at it objectively and see the benefits from her critiques, if its true you aren't following procedure then yes you're in the wrong so do it textbook style, if she's standing next to you .. uhm means she's knows this patient's a bit unstable and things could go south fast and or its complicated and if she's watching she can help with stuff you didn't understand or didn't even think you needed to do. Ultimately its her license covering all of you guys at clinical so if she feels you haven't mastered the skills to provide safe care she will stand there, watch and intervene.
haha my clinical instructor actually said she doesnt like me....but she's getting fired anyways. Honestly people are a-holes sometimes. Maybe she is stressed out. Just make sure you follow the rules and you'll be fine!
WOW ... I'm not sure if I feel better or worse?? I DEFINITELY should have explained my "doing things my way" comment!!!!! I wasn't specifically speaking of any procedure or skill. When I said that I was doing things my way, I just meant that during my assessment I decided to assess things in a different order. I started with the basics - vitals, checking IV, checking operative site, etc. But after I was done making sure my patient was ... "well" ... that's when I decided that I would start giving her her morning care. My teacher was "mad" at me because I decided to wash the patient's legs last and still had her Venodynes on .. she proclaimed that I should have already had my patient out of her Venodynes before I even started her bed bath. To me, leaving the Venodynes on while she was in bed seemed more logical ... since well.... she was still in BED!
Sorry, my original post was a little unclear. But under NO means did I do ANY procedure "my own way" ... what I meant by that was that sometimes I just do things in the order which I feel most rationale. Like I said, as long as I'm not harming my patient by doing this, am I wrong? I've yet to see anything in a text book state that you have to remove Venodynes first, then give the patient the bed bath... obviously though, when I washed her legs and feet I removed them! :)
During the course of the week I've had random students whom I'm in clinical with asking me if I was okay, that they saw me crying in the hallway, and that they heard the entire thing that my teacher was saying to me. So to me, that is truly humiliating. I have to keep telling them that everything is fine, because I find it unprofessional on my behalf to speak about it to them. And just like one of the previous posters stated - if she really had a true "issue" with me then she should have been coming to be during the semester, not waiting for the last day of clinical to bash me upside the head with all of this.
My husband seemed to think that maybe she sees that I have a weakness when under pressure, and she's really just trying to prove it to me and show me that I need to work on that area. Could be?
Regardless ... I'll find out Thursday if she's passing me or not! If she does not pass me, then yes I'll be discussing the matter with her, and then possibly bringing it to someone else's attention. But as of right now, I'm letting it go... I've come to the realization that I have not done anything wrong, I've followed protocol and procedure ... Am I perfect? Heck no! I don't know many who are. Am I giving this my all?? ABSOLUTELY! And no, I am not becoming a PCT during the summer. If I had the time and resources, maybe... but I'm a new mom, and I work full time as well as go to school full time. I'm exhausted... looking forward to my summer. I'm confident that I know all of my skills, and am just as competent as any other person in my clinical course.
OH, and might I add -- about 2/3 of the class is failing ... I have a B+ in the class. That would have to look pretty good on my behalf if I do have to go to a Dean or someone else higher up, right??????
Thanks ladies for all of the constructive criticism, and the encouragement... I needed it!
You are 100% that you have a right to be upset about criticizing/humiliating you in public. This is totally unprofessional, and you should go to her about this...certainly speak to her in private about it before you go to the dean.
Also, I understand do things in the way you find most "rationale" [sic], but you're in school. Do it her way. Even if it does not make sense to you, so things in the order that she requests.
Whatever happens, keep your head up and stick with you best work.
I had some problems in my first clinical rotation in the hospital. My teaching caught me not transferring a patient properly (I was on ortho) on the first day, and she totally blew up on me in front of the patient and said I'm lucky I didn't kill her...whoa. Ever since that day, it was like she was out to get me. I couldn't do anything right. She also told me through the whole semester that I should rethink things because she didn't think I was cut out to be a nurse. I passed, but barely. After that, I did poorly on my other clinicals because I had such low self esteem from her. At the end of second year, I ended up failing one of my rotations, and I was forced to redo ALL my second year rotations, even the ones I had passed. At this point, I was REALLY doubting if this was what I should do, if it was worth redoing a whole year for. I couldn't have done it without my boyfriend pushing me and reassuring me that I would make a great nurse. So I redid that year, and with the instructors help and my motivation to do better, I started learning things I couldn't get before and doing my skills may better, I could put things together better rather than seeing every symptom and disease as an isolated incident. My marks improved drastically, and my self esteem is way better. I now have 2 months of classes left and 3 months of final practicums (which I will be doing overseas), and I will be done. Hang in there, it gets better. Even if you fail, it may be a good thing for you. If you think you can do it, you can!
Ive only been out of nursing school for 6 months, so my wounds are still fresh.... Halve way through my very last semester, the DON decided to fail me in the clinical portion even though I was passing Med Surg. I was crushed. That meant I had to go another semester and was not able to graduate with my class. I felt I was treated unfairly and was singled out simply because I am a "non-traditional" student. I was absolutely convinced I was being personally picked on, and was filled with pain and extreme anger. Well, now that I have graduated, I can absolutely see that I did need that extra semester in school, and I was in fact not prepared to graduate with my class. The stresses of nursing school will sometimes cloud your thinking and not allow you to see things clearly.
Another thing, I was told by an instructor that my school believed in treating the nursing students better than the "old school" ways of constantly beating down the student through fear and humiliation. So, thats just how most nursing schools train the students, by treating then like crap. I guess its just their way of acting like the drill Sergeant and preparing us to be thick skinned after we go to work as a licensed nurse.
Yes, I passed! Thanks for asking! Best part was this -- I was obviously being made an example for my fellow students. Personally in my opinion was a real crappy way of doing so. During my final evaluation she told me that I was a pleasure to have in class, and good luck next semester, oh and also that I did a great job. She gave me a nice big smile too. I literally sat there with my jaw on the floor. I said thanks and practically ran out the door! Talk about nuts? Yup.
sometimes a strict, hard-*** instructor is the one you learned the most from, but you don't know it until you've been out in th real world for awhile. her good-bye to you indicates to me that she was on you because she saw you being lazy (doing it your own way-- believe it or not, most nursing students who "do it their own way" almost always have lousy rationales for that and there's a reason instructors crack down on it) and responded better when she came down on you.
and yes, some of us are put on this earth to be examples to others. congratulations, this time it was you.
she said you did well, which means she saw you do well. take it. she isn't nuts. it's quite possible that you're just too close to the situation to assess it accurately. give it a few years.
I was in this situation last semester. My friend and I seemed to be the only ones who didn't LOVE her. For some reason she really didn't like me. I was berated and belittled in the nurses station, with other nurses and students present. I have a serious problem remembering things about my patient (way worse when I get anxious). And this day when my anxiety was getting the best of me because I myself couldn't remember anything about this one med, I broke down and cried in front of the instructor, the other students and nurses that were present. I had to go to the bathroom, stop crying then give myself a little pep talk, then go back out there and show her I knew what I was doing. Boy was it embarrassing. But I did it! From that day on, I had to look at it like this. Those that can't do teach. The moment she made me cry, she took my power. She became my enemy. (Now mind you I know she was my instructor so I never said anything about this to anyone, I just personally really don't like her and I don't think she should be teaching. But who cares! These techniques got me through it...) Anyways as my enemy, I was never going to allow her to see me upset. Especially not crying. I believe their job isn't to teach us how to be nurses, that's our job. Their job is to keep the unsafe/incompetent ones away from the public. Now I know I am going to be a d*** good nurse. I just had to prove it to myself and to her. I must have proved something to her because I came out with an A in clinicals. I know people say an A is easy to get in clinicals. I totally disagree, especially when you have absolutely horrible instructors! But da**it I did it!!!!!!!!!!!! You can too keep your chin up!
bbgirlmil
15 Posts
I have been a nurse for almost 2 years. I remember my instructor doing the same thing to me. Here's how I looked at it:
Is it a pain in the butt and a lot of stress? YES! But.....I felt that if she didn't think I was a great nurse, she wouldn't take the time to push ME as hard as she did! I took advantage of this and made it a point to be able to answer her questions, Ace the procedures, and give nothing but great care, that way if she did say something I knew it was only to make me better!
After taking my NCLEX I found that test to be a price of cake compared to what I dealt with from my instructor! Easiest test I had taken since starting school! This made me realize that all the crap I took from her was preparing me for this. And I thank her now for being so hard! I feel I am better prepared than someone who had an "easy" instructor.
Take your time, breathe, let it out, and know that you are not the only one. You will do great and be a great nurse! TRUST ME!