KB4848

That's what I'm sayin, and honestly what would happen if someone came up to me and told me to cover my tattoo and I didn't have anything to cover it with? Would I have to abandon my patients and be sent home? The sleeve I used to wear in nursing school to cover it drew more attention to my arm than my actual tattoo ever did, haha, people would ask me what was wrong with my arm all the time. I just think it's all quite silly honestly.

I get it maybe my manager is just trying to warn me that if I ever want to be in a management type position I can't be covered in tattoos. Still though I'm an extremely professional person, and having tattoos shouldn't keep someone from getting a job in any field really. Heck, most of my patients have tattoos, and not a single one of them has gone "that lotus tattoo on your arm is extremely offensive to me and making it so I feel as though you cannot care for me please cover it up." I guess it just makes me a little upset that my outward appearance would override my actual actions and qualifications. It's easy to judge a book by its cover, but it's so much more rewarding to actually open that book up and read it.

This is a direct quote of the policy: "Tattoos must be covered as much as possible. Employees who have a visible tattoo that could reasonably be considered degrading, offensive, or demeaning to patients, family members, co-workers, or management must have it covered at all times while on health system property. Out of respect for our patients, employees must cover a tattoo if a patient complains about a tattoo while they are being cared for. Extreme body altering and branding must not be visible" Which is pretty vague to me, and personally want more tattoos, so I don't really think it's okay for my manager to tell me I can't get anymore or I'm not going to go any further in nursing.

Hey all! There was recently an email sent out by our manager talking about dress code and how patients or other staff can ask us to cover our tattoos if they are offended by them. There's no actually hospital policy stating we aren't allowed to have tattoos or that they absolutely must be covered up, I believe the policy states that they must be covered as much as possible. I see more staff with tattoos than not these days. I have one on my arm and some days it's just too hot to wear long sleeves so it's not always covered. I personally want more but after my manager deiscovered one on my arm she told me not to go getting anymore and that if I do I won't be able to go much further in nursing if I'm covered in tattoos. Which I find ridiculous. I've never had a patient or anyone else complain about my tattoos being visible. She seems to be the only one that has a huge problem with it but tries to play it off like she doesn't. What's your take on the matter?

Hello everyone, So I had my first day off orientation yesterday a little prematurely as my preceptor called in sick leaving everyone with six patients. It was supposed to be my last day of orientation but they decided to pull me off early and gave me five patients of my own. I work in the progressive cardiovascular unit which is the step down from the CVICU. Sitting here this morning I just can't help but recount the day and worry I made a bunch of mistakes. A lot of the issues I wasn't having was getting lab to come get a vanc trough I needed for a patient, or getting pharmacy to quickly get meds to me for a patient that was in a fib at rate in the 130s or not being able to rely on telemetry to tell me if his HR was sustaining below a certain point after getting those meds to him. Then it all just fell back on me which I understand. So I guess I'm wondering how do I stress the importance of these things to the support staff so I can ensure they get done without just being a super ***** or without having to constantly harass them? I made my own mistakes too, I understand that, I hung the vanc before I got the trough back and didn't realize they never came and got the lab work done. I don't know what I was thinking other than I didn't want it to be late and it completely skipped my mind that before I hung it I needed to get the trough back first, I know better than that and now I'll never make that mistake again. I hope that now they aren't like omg she's an idiot and doesn't need to be working here.

Wow, thank you all so much for your input and comments! I really appreciate it a lot. As an update I went to my manager and told her I decided it would be best for me/my family to switch to a weekend day shift. As luck would have it there was something open in the step down unit so I'm really happy to have all this resolved. When I told my little lady that mommy isn't going to work nights anymore her face lit up like a Christmas tree and I knew I made the right choice immediately. I know I won't have much time with her at night but it will be better than the no time I had at all working weekend nights sleeping during the day and waking up and going straight to work at night. Also, being a new grad I think the step down unit will be a really great place for me to learn without as much stress as the ICU, I realized I'm not a failure but more that this just wasn't the right time for me to be there and maybe one day I will be.

It's really just working nights, I have to be up during the day on my days off for my daughter so trying to be up normal hours four days of the week and then going and working nights on the weekend just isn't going well for me and since I've started I've just been constantly exhausted. I asked if the step down unit might have anything on days available I could switch to but they don't. I love my job though and I don't want to give it up, but I don't want to keep trying and then still have it be that night shift just really isn't for me.

So I went and spoke to my educator and she also had me meet with my manager and they seem to think the solution is that nights just aren't for me and they don't have any spots available on days. So they want me to take these next two days and think about what I want to do wether I want to stay or talk to HR and be moved to a completely different unit. I've only been working nights for 10 weeks, I don't feel as though that's enough time to determine if nights work for me or not. I've put everything into this job and I don't just want to quit. I'm so torn now and my educator told me that she doesn't want to see me burn out and that she's heard nothing but great things about me and sees how much potential I have yet I feel like they are pushing me to just go, "yep! I can't do nights send me somewhere else!"

After working my last shift last week I had a class I had to attend until 12 that afternoon and then go meet with educator so I was basically up for 24 hours by the time I got home, and through out the whole week I was just exhausted because wasn't able to adjust my sleeping schedule to be up during the days on my days off like usual. On top of that my daughter, who's 4, has been crying every morning all of a sudden when I drop her off at school and acting out at home for attention. Also, my dog has been sick and it's not looking good. I just feel like I've been burning the candle at both ends and I'm just completely exhausted. I basically went from graduating nursing school to studying for NCLEX to starting orientation for my job, and in the middle of all that we moved into a new house. My husband was so good and supportive through out nursing school and I thought when I finished and started working I'd be able to manage our home again like I used too, but with all the classes I have to attend outside of working my regular shifts I'm just constantly exhausted and feel guilty. My stress levels are at an all time high and my tank is just empty.

Nursing school is hard, but you can do it! Are you feeling like you can't focus to study because you're overwhelmed by the amount of information you need to go over? If so you just need to take a few deep breaths and start with one thing and go to the next. I know it can be very overwhelming, I'm a new grad and just went through a two year program. It takes up your life, but if it's what you really want you can do it and make it work. You just have to do what you can when you can. Don't try and study for hours and hours at a time. Take little breaks every hour. Also, do you feel like the study group is helping you or hurting you? I tried to do the study group thing and realized it just wasn't for me and that I was better off studying on my own so I could really focus on what I needed to focus on. Most importantly if you find you're making mistakes on test then don't second guess yourself, stick with the answer you originally chose. Some of our test they would even let us backtrack on questions so once it our answer was submitted that was it and we couldn't go back and change it. I realized I did better on those test so even when we did have a test we go back and change answers I just wouldn't because whenever I did I would end up getting them wrong. I'm actually going through a rough time with my orientation at work and feeling exhausted and stressed and now that I've been able to take a step back my best advice for you is to make sure you're taking care of yourself. You can't care for others with an empty tank.

Hello all, I'm a new nurse and this past weekend was just a disaster for me at work. I'm still in orientation and I'm working in the CVICU. I went in Friday night just already not wanting to be there. For the past week I've had a lot going on at home and I've just felt extremely exhausted and burned out. Either way I really wanted to just try to put my week at home behind me and get ready to go into work and do my best for my patients, but it just seemed like I couldn't focus at all and I kept making mistakes left and right and I finally just broke down and started crying and my preceptor let me take a break to go calm myself down. I made t through the night but I just felt like I was on the verge of tears all night. I went back in the next night and the same thing happened an hour into my shift so I talked to my charge nurse and decided to go home for the night. I'm just totally embarrassed because I usually have no issue leaving my personal life at home or with being told I need to correct something if I'm doing something wrong but I just broke down this time. I've been feeling completely and totally exhausted/stressed and wake up with migraines. It's been really hard for me to adjust to working weekend nights and manage my family/home life on the days I'm off work. I think when I started crying at work it wasn't because my preceptor was getting on to me it was because I felt like I was failing my patients by not being in the right head space to be there. I just feel lost at this point and I don't know where to go from here. This job means a lot to me and I worked so hard to get through nursing school because this is truly what I'm passionate about doing with my life. Between adjusting to working weekend nights and having classes to go to and feeling like a failure as a mom and then constantly feeling like I'm not good enough to be a nurse I've just sunk myself. Even more so I feel completely embarrassed I cried at work not once but twice. Please any advice would be helpful on what I can do to get out of this rut.