AmandaTheNurse

Can you tell me more about the problem your interpersonal skills? How do the parents not like you? Is it that you get angry fast? Or you sound sarcastic or cold to them? I have a colleague. She has over 30 years of experience. She is someone you seek advice to and count on when you encounter nursing problems at work. However, most of the staff hate her. Why? Because of her trouble in emotional intelligence. The junior nurses and staff from other department couldn't take her because all she did was opened her mouth and scolded and retorted when they made mistakes or things didn't go her way. She created a lot of conflict. She doesn't like sweet talks and she tells you off when she does not like it. She got into trouble a lot because of this. She was fired at one point. Few years later, She tried to come back to the same employer to work but they refused to have her back. After many begging, they decided to give her a chance. Although it is hard to change, she still get into trouble because of her anger and yelling at people at times, but she is definitely much much mellow now. This has created a scar in her heart because she was hurt by the fact that people couldn't see the work she has done to her patients and her doing her job seriously and wholeheartedly but got annoyed because she picked out their incompetencies. Now I'm not the best either when it comes to communication. I look angry when I'm angry; I look upset and I'm upset; I look happy when I'm happy. Sometimes I say the wrong thing in wrong situation. If someone keeps stepping on my toes, I will make sarcastic remarks or retort if necessary. I hate dealing with parents so I have sworn to myself to never work in peds (because I had a very bad experience when I was junior. The mother just screamed at me not to touch her daughter and wanted a Dr to do it instead). I'm working in an adult ward and so far so good because I have learned to ask my nurse manager to deal with them instead when my first attempt of talking in a civilised way has failed. You need to first be aware of what your problem is. If you are not sure, try ask your colleagues personally. Be sincere and do not get defensive, then they will tell you honestly. Read some books to improve your communication skills. Learn some tricks to deal with the difficult situations (like me ask my manager to deal it, ask someone else to do the procedure instead if I know the patient or family members are fussy, wear a mask when going into a fussy patient's room.... etc). Find the field that suits your personality the most (like me working my way to become a nurse educator because student nurses LOVE me! I receive the best feedback from them). Listen to feedbacks. It may take some time to figure out, but you WILL figure out eventually. I hope you find your light soon :) take care!

I was once there. With the never-ending stress from patients and annoying family members, disorganization, short staffing and bad management, and dramas among coworkers, I grew to hate my nursing job in just short 5 months. So, fast forward, it's been almost 3 years since I joined this profession and worked for the same hospital. I have to say striving for a work-life balanced life doesn't seem an impossible goal after all ? So what I do? 1) I stay positive. I choose to mingle with only confident and cheerful staff who always stay upbeat. 2) I master my prioritization and organization skill. Because I want to have a proper break and to go home on time. 3) I ask for help. I'm no saint. I never think that I can get all the jobs done alone. Honestly, attempting to be a hero and doing it all yourself is just pride talking. 4) I don't do callbacks. I don't work double shifts. When I'm off, I'm off. 5) I'm lucky to have some nice and funny coworkers and a good nurse manager as a team. The floor is busy everyday, but we still make jokes and laugh and have pot-luck together. That makes work less stressful. 6) I take good good care of myself. Example: I would give myself a five-minute short tea break, even if the floor is very busy and I have no time to have a proper break. Go to the pantry, sit down, have some toasts and a cup of orange juice. When I'm in-charge of the floor, I make sure all the staff have their proper break, finish their food before coming out of the staff room. Starving myself and working my butt off just doesn't do the justice. I too have the right to take care of my health. How am I going to care for others while I am emotionally and physically sick? 7) I don't take things personally. The moment I sign off, I leave my work at work. Whoever gives me an unreasonable hard time, I do the old trick--this ear in, that ear out. If I took every criticism or mistake personally, I would have not just committed career suicide but real suicide. ? I give myself the credit I deserve. When a patient thanks me, I always accept it and say, "you're welcome." Because I indeed have done a good job and I deserve the recognition and gratification! 9) I divide my annual leaves and take them 3 times a year. I have 3 major long vacations and 2 mini long weekend-like holidays. It works very well for me. This way I allow myself to have constant refreshment instead of saving all the goods in the end and then realizing before that time arrives, I burn out. 10) I have a life outside of nursing. Nursing is my profession, but it's not the whole of who I am. I don't use what I do for a living to validate my values and self-worth. 11) I keep in touch with friends and family. Surround myself with smiling, positive people who have absolutely nothing to do with work. 12) If I had a real bad day at work today, I would do something such as yoga, watch a movie, talk to close friends... whatever to make myself feel better. There you go. They work very well for me ?

A full time traveller!! And also a full time writer/author too

RN coming to 3 years next month. Work in med-surg unit in the same hospital and just received a promotion early this year. Going back to school and the part time course is starting in 2 weeks. Planning on working for the same hospital for another 2.5 years. Then I'm going to quit and get a job position that I've been seeing myself to be in-- an educator!! Oh did I mention that I've also managed to find time to travel to Bali, Thailand, Paris, Ireland, Uk, Australia, Japan, Korea, China,Vietnam during this soon-to-be 3 years of my nursing career?? And it's not the end yet!! I just feel so blessed!! No complaints!! :)

Sorry I didn't know that!! Thanks for telling me in a nice way and not judging and criticizing me for being ignorant.

After years of experience in nursing, actually... to my surprise.. the nurses r one of the most pain in the butt patients (top 1 is teachers)...

In healthcare, ur beauty can be thrown out of the window. It is ur attire/grooming and communication skill that counts and they r darn important. Ok ur beauty might work if u work in a aesthetic clinic. Like one of my friends, she is a nurse at a aesthetic clinic. She told me she got hired was because of her look. She is young and beautiful. She has done botox and liposuction. She is like a real-live advertisement to the clinic. So it is more persuasive when she talks to a potential client. For me personally, when I go to work, I make sure I bun up hair neatly and put on a little make-up because my lecturer, who is an old-time nurse, used to tell me that when I was a student nurse, "The patients r already sick enough, they don't wanna see ur pale, sick-looking face. Put on a little lipstick, brighten up ur look, and it will brighten up ur patients' day." Believe it or not, this little trick does has its magic On a side note, I do believe that u can be a nurse and be beautiful. Deciding to be beautiful is a personal thing. Career is another thing. It should not stop u from doing what u love for a living.

First of all, 99% of the doctors have got so much pride in themselves. Asking the Dr whether he is familiar with his own patient is a huge blow to his ego. Questions like this will only make the Dr more defensive and angry. You should've never phrased ur sentence in this way. Anyways, now u know. When it comes to patients' urgent safety and health issue, I always call the Dr, even if it is 3 o clock in the morning. I don't care if he is grumpy or sleepy. But I make it very short and sweet and straight to the point, like, "Hello Dr__, this is calling from__ from__ regarding your patient__ from room__. He is having blah blah blah and blah blah blah." And that's it. I wait for the Dr to make up his mind and tell me what he wanna do for the patient. If the Dr is still in his sleepy head, I would then say, "Is there any orders I can carry out for u?". And that keeps me from the yellings and naggings from all these nasty Drs all this while

I've been through a lot when I was in my early 20s. when I decided to reinvent my life, I told my family that i wanted to join nursing. My parents and my brother had doubts about my capability. To them, I'm always an inpatient, hotheaded child. but I decided to believe in myself because I know what I want for my life, what I want to do, and I think I know myself better than outsiders (although they are my family). And then there comes my cousin talking down on me. When she saw that I now got a good job, make good money that at least allows me to travel overseas for holidays twice a year, and really live my life to the fullest (learn surfing in Bali, do bungy jump in Macao, ski in Australia, practise yoga, hangout with friends and etc), she started to make sarcastic and negative comments about me. This is what I replied to her: i work so hard for my life, i think i deserve to have some fun for myself too! Just because I don't do, be and live the way u want me to, it doesn't mean I'm less of a person. Just because I know how to sing, it doesn't mean I can't dance. Just because I'm fat, it doesn't mean I'm not allowed to do what I love. Just because u hate ur life, it doesn't mean I have to make my life suck too!! Good day!

i received the first complaint about me soon on my[color=#ff3366] third month of work. the patient claimed that i gave him a “dirty look” while what i was expressing was actually a surprise + confuse look, like this--> he said a massive of alcohol needed to be swabbed on his finger before pricking him for the blood glucose check, otherwise he would feel the pain a lot. with such an inaccurate statement, who won't be surprised after listening? before i even got the chance to explain, he already opened his mouth wide and yelled and screamed that he wanted to talk to the manager i conclude that i'm just not good at hiding my emotions like a robot. another case is i had a typical doctors-are-better-than-nurses thinking patient's complain that we check his bp on his right arm by bringing the dinamap machine to his right side while the doctor checks his bp on the same arm by leaving the machine at his left side.

I hate customer serivce oriented nursing. No I don't work for free. Stop beeping you stupid infusion machine!

recently i was posted to Emergency Room for my clinical practice. i realized that this is the area where im gonna specialize myself in eventually. and im gonna tell this everyone-- "u better treat us nurses nicely. because one day when ur admitted to emergency room, ur gonna cry there, and ur gonna beg us to save ur life." i learnt this after a middle-aged lawyer, being beaten up and slashed by knives, came in to the ER. he cried and asked me, "will i die? will i die?"

it reminds me of one time, we were practicing rectal suppository insertion on a mannequin. a classmate of mine was inserting it w/ her middle finger. my instructor screamed, " y r u using that finger?!" my classmate, standing there looking blurred, said, "y not?" my instructor gave her a glare & said, " dont use that finger again."

there was once a patient asked me to fix the TV screen.... i said to her, "u know im not a cable fixer right?" then i told her that i'd call the technitian to come & fix it and i just walked out the room

well in a sense, because people pay for it. they pay the hospital to get health services. so they are considered as "clients" i guess. but im not a fan of it as well. i feel like this term has blocked me from building a rapport relationship w/ my "patients"... oh well:confused: