LoneRN

I burned out when I was 28 and a student but I'm OK now I was just going through depression. If your colleagues are horrid then it does not lead to good mental health at work no matter where u work. My unit has 19 beds but we all pull together and work hard for the patient. There's no reason to suffer as a qualified nurse for too long because you can change jobs more than students can who have to suffer in silence.

I always wear a skirt, and if a patient required CPR I would not care if someone could see my panties I can do patient care easily although my role requires minimal amounts except for special cases. LOL

I'm going to have to leave it and pray I get away with it. I can't be drug tested if I take prescription temazepam (to reduce the insomnia from starting my SSRI for above-mentioned social anxiety). I'll show up positive on a drugs test and lose my job. I feel awful. Thank god there was only one It is compounded by the fact that two patients next to each other were taking diazepam and I do not know who's diazepam it is. This is like a nightmare.

I am considering taking the subway back to work and taking that tablet back to my line manager. I am prescribed temazepam by my GP so taking a drugs test is not good.

OMG Help I am a new nurse. I had a massively hectic night shift and we were rushing from drug cabinet to drug cabinet with only one set of keys. I gave a patient 10mg (2x5mg) diazepams as prescribed. Sometimes, if a medication strip is finished I just stuff it into my pocket. Now, I have emptied my pockets to do my laundry and found what I thought was an empty strip actually has one tiny tablet on it! Or at least I assume that is why it is in my pocket? We do not keep diazepam in our controlled drugs cupboard so there is no register of it. It is kept in a bedside locker with a patient label on it like all the other meds. Though the pharmacy do keep track of when they are running out. What should I do? I have a few days off and now they are going to be ruined by stress. What if someone saw me do this? If I own up, I will look so suspicious, they know I have social anxiety so I will look like I am taking it for anxiety!!! Please, advise me. Destroy the tablet or phone work and get written up or suspended?

Reading these comments make me realise I'm not alone. I am really unsure whether I should continue with nursing. I am really struggling. I work on a HDU. Just being in it stresses me out with all the monitors and tracheostomies. This, combined with my inability to prioritise (or at times even follow what is going on with my patients through the day - this is really bad). When I give report there is no structure. I ramble about silly things and miss pertinent facts to the situation. This may be because of this weird mental block I have. Or the fact that I didn't even pick up on it in the first place. Today, I took a patient (late) to MRI. Complete with bangles, gold rings, and a metal hair clip. The staff on the MRI unit started laying into me for obvious reasons. Then, I could not get the bangles off because of the IV access in her hand! Eventually, I managed and had to work on getting the rings off. MRI were being plain nasty. Then, they asked me for the MRI checklist... and I realised it was still on the ward, clipped onto the bedside chart I had been so preoccupied collecting cardiac monitor, airways, ambu bag, suction, oxygen etc to take this very unwell patient off the ward that I did not even bring it. I was preoccupied with the fact that I would be alone with a HDU patient and I would not cope. I don't know why I was bothering taking all that stuff when I barely know how to use it. This is all coming on the back of a massive panic attack I had during a video-taped critical care simulation. I nearly could not face going back to work because of the humiliation at how badly I messed up. I burst into tears as soon as I got home. I am a grown man. My father called and he could hear the misery in my voice. I don't sleep, I just worry myself sick. If I sleep, I wake in a fright at 2.30am. I can't get back to sleep and lay there waiting for morning to come. The lighter it gets outside my window, the closer my shift. Then, the alarm goes off and it's time to go. I am on sleeping tablets but even that isn't enough to keep me sleeping well. When I have a day off the next day, I end up sleeping as soon as I get in. Like I can finally relax and sleeeeep without having to go in the next day. Then, the night before a shift, I am tense and sometimes do not sleep at all. Not a wink. I constantly try to remind myself of the pay check at the end of the month, to give myself a reason to keep going with this career. It feels like I have thrown my life away, like I am in a living hell/nightmare. I can't imagine other jobs expecting so much from a person. I just feel I am clutching at straws and I just don't "get it". I also look like a nervous wreck, especially during that simulation.

I can't comment on American culture as I live in England but I do think it is probably the same here. As far as being defined by what we do. I honestly do not think the general public have the faintest idea what a nurse does or what it is like. So they can define me by whatever model or image they have in their minds. In the UK it is not always a pleasant image as we are seen as lazy, unwashed and dirty. Solely to blame for the way the NHS is. But I refuse to put myself into the box of perfect, angelic nurse because I am far from it and would go insane. As humans we are not perfect to begin with. I am not going to feel guilty or inadequate because a did a tiny mistake in my job when everyone else does. As long as I am safety conscious and avoid harm at all costs.

Well I've lasted 2 weeks lol I only have to do this 26 times more and then I will have a year under my belt too

Interesting points about perception AggieNurse99. I think you should just give up after the evening meal. Get the meds done, get your break, tie things up, get your documentation done and get ready for the oncoming shift. All sorts will happen to tie you up now - discharges, transport will arrive, etc. If you happen to have time to do some extra bits, then you can do so and just add a note to your documentation. If they start and say that you didn't do something then just remind them that healthcare is a 24-hour service and that you prioritised the important tasks. And then GO HOME - enjoy your night, and let them get on with the job they are paid for!!

I am a new grad starting my first job. I focused on showing them I had the basics in my application. Nothing pretentious. No ACLS when I have no experience of even seeing actual arrests to match it. I just focused on demonstrating I can put together a good plan of care, evaluate it and administer meds safely. Just the basic ward RN role. An understanding of legal and ethical issues and a passion about the field. If they want you to have all the advanced stuff they should train you as you go. You don't have to be a perfect nurse to get a job, or be able to manage the most critical unstable patient. You do have the have to interpret changes from baseline vital signs and know when to get someone who can - eg. doctor.

Yes, getting a thank you, or realising that you have made somebody's day more tolerable is one of the best things about nursing. When I say, it's just a job, it doesn't mean that I think a nurse should come in late or just do the bare minimum. There is nothing wrong with going the extra mile to brighten somebody's day. I would try to do that even if I worked in the bank or, as an example, when I worked in the supermarket. What I find though, is that when somebody's day is brightened, it is really only a set of unlikely probabilities that have just happened to fall into place. It is not because I have been "working harder". Every day is hard work and sometimes I pull it off looking like a pro. Other days I look like a moron because I lack resources or we are short staffed. Whether I work hard or not does not guarantee that I will come away looking like a good nurse. A good aide, fair staffing levels, an empty bed in my bay, lower patient acuity overall... those things make me look like a good nurse from the patient's perspective. Often, I am praying I will somehow get all my tasks fitted into the day. Sometimes, we aren't given a fair chance because of managers, poor resources, poor work conditions, paperwork, fear of litigation, high patient acuities and too few staff to manage it. If they want me to go home and worry myself sick about whether I am a good nurse then they should pay me for "worry time". I am just a number on the staffing rota, so why am I bothered? If I am a bad nurse they can just fire me and I will do something else. That's how I feel! But again, that doesn't mean I should not aspire to do everything as well as I possibly can. Tend to my patient's every need as much as I can. But as soon as home-time comes then my life begins again. Whatever sector I worked in, health or otherwise, I would not appreciate having to work. I do it because I have to but it does not define me and it does not control me.

I have come to the conclusions that wards are either HELL or surprisingly tolerable. I was suicidal when I was put on a ward as a student full of vile nurses who bullied and belittled me for everything. I wanted to die. They tore me apart for just asking where the toothbrushes were on my second day (I couldn't remember which cupboard). At that time, I vowed to myself that I would NEVER be a nurse. I was just trying to drag myself to the end of my course so I could abandon the whole thing and do something else with my life. I was planning to return to being a cashier in a grocery store, just delighted to know I would never have to step foot on a ward or clean up excretions or speak to an arrogant Doctor again. However, my friends pushed me to just try as an RN and see how I feel. I am now on a HDU with a Stroke ward attached, and the nurses are great! I do not dislike nursing any more even though it is backbreaking work at times. Saying that, I do still wish I had chosen something else, as I did not know everything that it entailed at the start. However, I am going to stick with it as long as I can because I want the money and it's a job at the end of the day and I can't complain when there are so many unemployed. I do not subscribe to the school of thought that says you have to love your job to be a nurse... as long as you don't treat the patient badly... it's a job and you get paid to provide a service. We are a part of the economy like any other industry. I dislike all the brainwashing that you have to be perfect or that you're the worst person in the world for making a simple mistake... A job is a job is a job. I'm not going to sell my soul to my employer because my life outside of work is what means the most to me.

Sometimes I feel good and sometimes not. Today I felt like an idiot because I forgot to document that I put an NG in and had to phone the ward to tell them. I'm only on week 2 and most of my time has been on training days so that was only my third real day on the ward. Sometimes, I just think "well I'm at home and that is work, it is a job at the end of the day". I am not perfect but I will just do my best. It's a shame nurse education is so wishy washy that we are left floundering. I qualified without knowing how to manage a tracheostomy but on my ward they are common. I didn't know the first thing about them. Once again, unprepared for real life. I did an accelerated programme so I had to just cram knowledge in as fast as I could. As a student, I met plenty of nurses who pull that "incredulous" act when they're trying to manipulate you. I would just ignore them, there is nothing wrong with you but them. They know fine well sometimes you can't just miraculously produce an admission/nursing assessment with an Alzheimer's patient clambering everywhere. One of the biggest problems I have found is dealing with aides. They refuse to help me out and want me to flounder. I ask for assistance and they refuse. I ask them to collect a tiny item from upstairs so I can proceed and take the dressings down for the Doctor. They act like I am asking for the Earth and one snarled at me for that. I don't think I will bother asking them again because they will start talking about me... One has a real chip on her shoulder.

That's exactly what I did, I saw it was 4pm and was like "YES! Time to go!" In the changing room as I was leaving, the above agency nurse was hiding on her phone and booking more shifts with the agency. I was trying to give her some sort of handover but she was like "hold on!" and I handed a few other things over but she was a bit disinterested. I am definitely going to make sure I check everything more carefully before I go

I am such a fool, lol. I am newly qualified and still on induction, today I put in an NG Tube for the first time. I was with an agency nurse (as usual) and I asked her to show me the procedure. I was only doing a half day and just realised that I forgot to document doing it and I do not think she documented either. I am "supernumerary" but I don't think it's an excuse, I just totally did not remember. I phoned the ward just now and told the co-ordinator to ask her to remind the agency nurse (who is still there doing a long shift). Will they be mad do you think? I want to make a good impression but I keep doing dumb things.