brandy1017

While that is usually true, I agree with the others not to tell people that I'm a nurse or suggest meds they should take, especially strangers on the internet. To think he needs antipsychotic meds because he thinks calvinists are satanic is unwise, most likely wrong and not nursing scope. People have lots of "crazy" ideas about religion and politics, but to label them as mentally ill for that and then say I'm a nurse and you need meds is very stupid and leaving yourself open for a slap from the BON if he does find her and file a complaint. I agree to make her facebook private now. Or have one with a pseudo pen name, but I heard they are making you prove you are who you say you are now. Don't know if that is true though. Either way I would advise not to volunteer that you are a nurse and not to recommend med treatments to strangers on the internet.

I believe Indiana is one of the states that reports to BON when they fire nurses which I think is ridiculous when most work "at will" and can be fired at any time for any or no reason without union protection and hospitals do that especially if you are older and cost them more money!.

I agree and the tax cuts in 2017 may have caused a temporary economic boost but at the effect of worsening the debt by trillions at a time when the economy was good and they should have been conserving in case of an economic downturn like what is happening now and what happened during the covid "emergency" lockdowns! Those lockdowns harmed a lot of small businesses and restaurants and largely benefited the big corporations while worsening our deficit! We've been in a recession since Biden, but he changed the definition to try to hide it and now I would say we are in a stagflation and on the cusp of a great depression. This is the worst time to lay off federal workers, government programs and social benefits. Made even more egregious by the reality that it is to give tax cuts to the rich especially the millionaires and billionaires! They are the ones who already have plenty of money and will come out of this depression fine! That Musk was put in as an unelected oligarch to destroy our government and its social benefit, economic and political programs to enrich himself is disgusting! He is reaping billions in government contracts that he hasn't earned. Personally, I'm glad to see Tesla suffering from the boycott!

Right, it is very alarming that Musk is trying to cut SS staff, when they are already at a historic 50 year low of employees and having trouble with retention! They need more staff and investment in new computer systems, not less! Also I read the other day Congress wanted to raise SS age to 69 for everyone 59 or older! That is insane! A lot of people don't live that long. On top of that the last SS Commissioner said he figures about 30K people die waiting for disability! They make the process very hard, deny most on the first try and you can literally wait years to get approved. This will lead to even more people dying!

Wow! Three call ins a year are allowed! How generous, NOT! My best advice to the OP worrying about losing her job is find a non-bedside job where you aren't as stressed and exposed to as many bugs and you will probably be much happier and less prone to illness!

Sorry he is a PhD. He has his own YouTube site. For some reason the link didn't work, but if you search it on YouTube or Google you should be able to find the video where he explains the process in depth and has many other informative videos as well. Former SSA Insider EXPLAINS: How YOUR Social Security benefits are CALCULATED - YouTube - Search

My understanding is SS is based off a formula of the average best 35 years of your working career. So, if you worked more than 35 years, the lower paid ones drop off. Here is an explanation of the formula from a SS expert, Dr ED Weir. Former SSA Insider EXPLAINS: How YOUR Social Security benefits are CALCULATED - YouTube

Where I worked, they had female urinals that worked wonderful especially for someone with a hip fracture. If your place doesn't stock them, I would advocate for them to be added. They also helped for men that were swollen from CHF, for instance. I agree I think the purewiks are a stupid gimmick and suspect patients still get UTI's for all the reason you mentioned. Having the sponge against your skin is going to harbor bacteria and with women's short urethra's it doesn't take much for it to travel to the bladder and start a UTI. A true silver foley would be much preferred for an incontinent patient to keep them clean, dry and infection free!

Think you would have heard already. My God they sent the notice out to the air traffic controllers encouraging them to resign in the midst of that nationwide crisis with air crashes happening all around! But crickets for nurses. Once again you are probably too valuable to get an early retirement incentive! Consider the irony in that. During the Ascension takeover of my hospital, they were laying off people in droves, but not nurses. Sometimes they would play musical chairs with management they could reapply and see who was left standing. When they closed hospitals, they would reassign nurses to other area hospitals, and we were told if you didn't accept their choice for you than it was no severance and just goodbye to the unemployment line! Hope you get the chance for early retirement, but I would be surprised. Good luck!

See my last post under the thread by Davey Do "What do you miss about nursing". Someone just like you was asking for help. Too long to rewrite it here. See your Dr and an ortho specialist about your back. I had serious back problems for years and only recently learned what they were when I finally went to the Dr and eventually got an MRI from ortho. There may be things to help starting with PT and depending on the situation the Dr may suggest other interventions such as an epidural, facet injection or ablation. It all starts with getting checked out and not just living with the pain! Also stop damaging your back by finding a job where you aren't lifting and moving people. or maybe after reading my prior reply to the OP 58Dontfeelgreat you will realize you can afford to retire early if you live frugally! I suggested a couple books on personal finance. Deal with your Debt by Liz Weston has an interesting take on it to use it as a strategy to reach your goals. She even used a HELOC for income temporarily while waiting for a new job to come to fruition! It is OK to have debt at times, not to be in a rush to pay off debt but consider flexibility to look at the big picture. I'm using this strategy to keep my taxable income low for Obamacare subsidies to make healthcare affordable and to help me make it to SS and Medicare. Maybe you will find you can retire earlier than you think! Best wishes to a more peaceful, healthy, pain free and stress-free New Year!

If you can't afford to retire, I would try clinics, Dr offices where they do things that they need nurses like urology, neurology for IV meds, cardiology or you could try an outpatient dialysis center. They will train you and the techs do a lot of the work. You could try to get an insurance job as a case manager. Or maybe you could get a PT job with health insurance if you can't afford to retire completely that could be the best of both worlds! I had been saving money for a long time, had a Roth IRA, HSA, 403b and had a small pension and used the Rule of 55 to retire early. It allows you to take money out of your 401k/403b without penalty as long as your employer allows this option. Most allow you to roll any IRA into it and some old 401k/403b's as well. But you would have to check with your 401k before you quit your job that they would allow for multiple distributions and you have to keep it at your employer. If they do, many do, you can take periodic withdrawals as needed to pay your bills but be forewarned they withhold 20% for taxes even if you are not in that tax bracket until you are 59 1/2. You get the excess back the next year when you file taxes. Downsides tend to be poor investment choices and high fees. I would use a bucket approach of several years' expenses in a cash account like treasury funds or annuity if that is not an option. I also had saved thru a Roth IRA where you can take the contributions out you put in before 59 1/2 without penalty and it helps keep my taxable income low to get affordable health insurance thru Obamacare. You need to keep your income at 400% of poverty or less for the best subsidies otherwise it is unaffordable. I have an HSA to help pay for medical/dental that is tax free and keeps my income low. You can do COBRA although it is unrealistic for health insurance so expensive but can use it just for dental and vision as I did for 18 months. I did a HELOC before I quit so I would have money in case of an emergency until I get Social Security. Have only touched it once to put on a new roof. It also would allow you to take money out to keep your taxable income low if need be if you didn't have a Roth IRA, but you would have to be very careful and frugal and not get over your head. Best rates usually thru a credit union in my opinion, the first ten years you can pay interest only, the last ten years you pay back the loan but it is adjustable, and it can climb to as high as 18%. Mine is currently 7% but we don't know what the future holds. It depends on inflation, the economy and the feds where the HELOC and other interest rates will go so if you get one you have to be very conservative as your house is on the line, unlike credit cards! I also have a lot of credit cards and use them for points. Get some credit cards if you don't have before you retire. More is better. You can always use them for balance transfers if you have debt as well. That is preferable to the HELOC as your house isn't on the line. Discover has 5% reward cycles and also frequent balance transfers. Chase and Bank of America also have continued the balance transfer options plus rewards. Some credit cards are not offering transfers or only one time like American Express. The credit cards also there for emergencies especially if you don't have a lot of savings. It's a hard mindset to accept debt as a strategy but that might be necessary to retire early. I pay my bills each month except I retired with some CC debt that I use the balance transfers. My pension pays my mortgage which will be paid off when I'm 63. I was lucky that I had time to plan and save and prepare vs a coworker who retired early unexpectedly after going manic. It turned out to be a disaster for her. Ascension cheated her out of almost 200 hours of PTO after working thru covid on the technicality that she called in even though they knew she was manic and had put her in charge vs taking care of patients! She panicked and sold her condo at a loss to one of those We buy ugly houses for cash places. Somehow went thru all of her. retirement in a year even though she was living in a cabin in the woods with her husband in the middle of nowhere. She filed for disability but of course was denied as I told her they would do. Disability is almost impossible to get these days unless you have a terminal situation. It took over a year for the first denial, she would have had to keep appealing waiting years for them to finally approve it but she had no money and her husband never worked she was the breadwinner. She had a small pension but it wasn't enough to live on. Eventually she pulled herself together and she is currently working at a nursing home. I'm also a strong believer in learning about personal finance. I know it's late in the game but some books that helped me were Deal with your Debt, Personal Finance for Dummies and Smart Women Finish Rich. I'm not an expert by any means, nor a financial advisor just sharing what I did to retire early. I decided not to get another job because I can't stand without pain 2nd to neuroforaminal spinal stenosis and spondy. Just had an ablation but doesn't appear to have worked. Anyway, I hope this info is of some help and hope for you and anyone else out there stuck in a bad job!

Haven't seen you in a while, how have you been? Hope everything is well with you! I'm guessing the choice to wear scrubs is a nudge for you to be more helpful on the floor. Is that part of your job duties? Obviously if you wear scrubs it will be easier for you to jump in and be hands on with patient care vs business casual. I guess it would depend on the culture of that place and your job duties. Obviously business casual helps you stand out as management vs staff. It also depends on your own self confidence as we've had some supervisors that wear scrubs and don't mind helping out in a pinch vs others that prefer to wear more formal attire and are more standoffish. They make it clear they are not available to help out in a hands-on way! This is a hospital, but I think the same rules would apply.

I didn't mean for you to quit on the spot, although I found my best job when I did that myself. It was not nursing, but it led me into it as I was doing secretarial work, word processing for an insurance company. When I couldn't please them re speed no matter what I did, long story, I quit and gave my 2 weeks' notice and got a job as an ER admitting clerk. The manager that hired me was really wonderful and kind, a true Christian who prayed for her people back when I was not close to God, but I guess she helped nudge me back. It was my favorite job because it was enjoyable, low key and not stressful. I learned how much nurses did and gained a lot of respect for them though I didn't think I could be a nurse back then. After working 5 years there I went back to school to my dream university and that is where I had the aha moment that I should go back to school for nursing. But while school came easy, clinicals not as much due to my anxiety although I had very nice instructors and friends. Then got the nursing job I stayed with over my career, but it wasn't easy at all. Dealt with a bully out of the gate, an insane LPN who was jealous of new grads RN's just because she wasn't! I persevered thru that and other issues till I finally took early retirement end of 2020. They used to send me job offers in the mail from hospitals, nursing homes and home care etc. I considered them but most didn't come with a pension so that is one of the main reasons I stayed as well as free parking and I was close to work. But the important thing for you is that with this nursing shortage you should have no problem getting another job. Just take your time and find one that you will enjoy. You can always do agency nursing to fill in the gap in the meantime.

Right! The few times I was fired by a patient it was a relief! One time I was perplexed as I didn't know anything was wrong and I thought we had a good interaction. My supervisor understood these things sometimes happened so just put me on another wing the next day.

I think bedside nursing has gotten more difficult ever since administration refused to allow foleys. This was because Medicare refused to pay for adverse events like UTI's. Never mind the added stress and workload on nurses who are more short-staffed than ever, combined with the increased obesity of majority of patients along with multiple chronic illnesses. I'm sorry a purewick is a poor alternative for a foley as they tend to leak if the patient doesn't lay perfectly still or if it is a cheap brand which staff has no control over! I really think the foley free movement is overkill as there are silver antimicrobial foley's available that could be used as well as maintaining good peri care. As to the patient firing you well, I wouldn't take it personally, instead I would look at it as they did you a favor! As others have suggested plan for bathroom needs before Lasix in the future so you aren't rushing to deal with trying to convince a disgruntled patient to use a purewick or trying to find a commode and adequate staff or lift equipment to move them. Your symptoms sound like anxiety which is rife in nursing, especially ER and other high acuity fields. I would consider if a job change to something less stressful would improve your quality of life! You don't have to be a bedside nurse forever! It is not a badge of honor, nor does it make you a better nurse. I would consider finding a job that doesn't leave you feeling so stressed and anxious that you have to call out sick after a bad patient interaction because the truth is there will be plenty of difficult patients and situations in the future. I say this as someone who spent her career as a bedside nurse for almost 30 years in a high stress environment dealing with anxiety and many times dreaded coming in to work. I would take as many low censuses as possible to deal with the stress and take vacations even if staycations to try to have work life balance. The only thing I have to show for it is a small church pension, but now most places don't even offer a pension. I wish I had listened to my heart and quit and found a less stressful and more pleasant job years ago. I took early retirement rather than continue under the unsafe working conditions end of 2020. If things had been decent, I would have stayed. My back was wrecked so I can't stand without pain, so I didn't try to get a clinic job. I've had PT several times since I retired, and a few facet injections and now I just had an ablation which might help with the back pain, but even if it does it is only temporary. Don't let this happen to you! Don't stay where you are unhappy and where you will just end up injured and used up in the end. Your health both physical and mental is precious and a healthy back is vital to work and enjoy life! Don't make my mistake!