Returning back to bedside NICU nursing

[Jonesp75, BSN]

Hi everyone I am hoping to get some insight on possibly returning back to the bedside and I’m torn on what to do. I am a newer nurse (only 1 year Bedside) who was able to land an office job with blue cross blue shield as nurse medical reviewer. A little background about me is that straight from nursing school I was able to start out in a Level IV Neonatal ICU which had been my dream speciality since nursing school. I loved the aspect of taking care of these high acuity fragile babies and at the time could not see myself doing anything else. The same month I was due to graduate March 2020 I also found out I was pregnant with my first child. Although not an ideal time I was just thankful I didn’t have to experience it while I was still getting through school. I oriented on day shift and worked day shift up until I left for maternity leave and absolutely loved my job. However after I had my baby my whole perspective on the hospital as a whole changed drastically. Looking back on it I do believe I suffered a bit from post partum after having my baby. I only took 8 weeks off and switched myself to night shift ( as a new grad I was going to night shift anyways but decided to do it earlier). Since my baby at that time Was still sleeping during the day mostly I figured it would be easiest for me to just transition to nights where dad would be at home and I would take over when I got off. This worked for a bit until it didn’t. As you can imagine I totally exhausted myself, and felt most of the time I was sleep deprived. Daycare at this time just was not an option for me as we were heavily still in the mist of covid & it just was not my preference. It took me about 6 months after returning from maternity leave to land the office job. At the time when I applied for the office job it seemed so appealing because I had worked for a utilization management company for several years before nursing school and always thought that was the type of nurse I wanted to be. (I also feel that my experience in the insurance world pre nursing  4+ years is what made it easier for me to land this type of job) I liked the thought of having a ‘normal schedule’ M-F with holidays and weekends off and not having to be on my feet for 12+ Hours or a high stress environment. This job originally was suppose to be work at home which was the biggest factor for me in accepting the job. Later finding out that they placed working at home on hold indefinitely and that I would be working in the office & not at home. This was a total bummer for me but at the time it felt like the grass was still greener on the other side so I still accepted. I place my child in daycare and took the position. For anyone who has placed their baby in child care knows the first year is absolutely miserable! Since starting daycare my baby has had multiple respiratory viruses, secondary ear infections as a result to the viruses. And a febrile seizure. Because of this, this has caused me to get ‘occurrences’ at my job for having to miss work & I absolutely hate it because I’ve always been great about my attendance. However I’ve been in this medical review position for a couple months now and it’s just not fulfilling the way I thought it would be. My commute is 45-1 hour long one way (depending on traffic) five days a week. I am quite frankly bored of the job and don’t care for the environment. Things are weird in the office because it is half empty as most of the staff are working from home. Even my manager that I report to lives in a different state and works from home. I will admit I am a bit salty about the working from home aspect because when I applied for the position that’s what it was for & then changed at the last minute. My entire department will still be working from home & when I spoke with my manager about the possibility of working  from home at a later date I was told this was not going to happen as they were no longer having working at home opportunities but yet they just hired 5 more nurses who ARE working from home. This is a salaried position however if you miss and you don’t have PTO it’s counted as hourly and you don’t get paid for that time missed. I also feel that I lose out on so much time with my baby and only get to really spend a lot of time on weekends when I’m not working. ( as by the time my child is picked up from childcare) he is exhausted and ready to go to bed. Returning to the hospital I feel would allow me-to be able to spend more time with him since I’d only be working 3 days out of the week. I’ll be able to keep my technical skills and I also like the fact that you can have multiple days off where you don’t have to use PTO if you wanted to take a vacation. When I think about my long term goals I know that I want to further my education. Whether that is the  CRNA Path or NP path. I know for a fact if I choose CRNA path I will need to go back to hospital. (I am highly interested in a CRNA program where NICU experience fulfills the ICU requirement). NP path Although highly suggested getting more clinical experience before applying, NP schools have made it quite easy to get in without having to have that clinical experience. Although eventually when clinicals start for NP School working M-F would be hard to do. The only thing I really don’t like about returning to hospital is the mandatory weekends and holidays. I absolutely hate the thought of having to work on Christmas or thanksgiving rather than spending that time with my family. & missing out on my babies first holidays..Those are memories I could never get back! I do love night shift & to be honest would much rather be on nights than days but it does make it hard to leave my family at night to go to work I do like the fact that if I return back to the NICU my child is in daycare now so working nights I’d be able to come home and get adequate rest, I am able to pick up OT as often as I’d like ( I’m in the process of trying to become debt free, and also save for a home). In my salaried position I’d have to pick up a second job if I wanted additional income to save for my goals. I just don’t want to go back to the hospital especially with the mass exudus that’s happening with nurses leaving beside now & feel like I’ve made the wrong decision in going back. Also I want to add, I was offered a NICU position on nights already & so I need to make a decision. 

[Sour Lemon]

This giant, unorganized wall of text is difficult to read. The point seems to be that you were offered a job you want? If so, take it.

[JBMmom, MSN, NP]

It sounds like you've already answered your own question. (you might consider going back and breaking your post up into paragraphs for easier reading)

There's not really anything keeping you at your current position other than weekends and holidays, right? You may not be able to get out of weekends, but it's possible there are staff members willing to switch for holidays. I always switch to work Christmas for those staff with small kids and I take New Years Eve off (because we have a family board game marathon), and most people with smaller kids don't care about New Years. 

If you know what you want and your current job meets none of those needs, going back to the NICU position makes the most sense. Good luck.