Spooky Stuff

Nurses General Nursing

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Anybody out there ever have any spooky things happen at work? You know, like ghost stories?

I've had some strange things happen to me after a patient has died..at home, not at work. I used to do Hospice nursing, and one particular patient that I had gotten very close to had told me that she would be my angel when she died. One morning while working on a paper, it felt like someone was stroking my hand. I would stop what I was doing and look at my hand and saw that the hair on the back of it was standing up. I went back to writing, and felt the same thing again. Just then, the phone rang. It was my patients hubby telling me that she had just taken her last breath.

During the next week, if I was in the kitchen working on the computer, the burners on my gas stove would turn on full force. I'd shut them off only to have them turn on again. The coolest thing happened the day of her funeral. My twin daughters went up to bed, but came down screaming for me. I ran up to their room to see that"someone" had laid out a complete outfit for each of them on their beds...shirts, pants, underwear, socks, shoes. It looked like a body on their bed...just couldn't see hands, feet or head. Needless to say, my girls were petrified. Since my patient never had daughters, only grown sons, I assumed this was her way of letting me know that she was okay in heaven. I told my girls this, and together that night we thanked "Edna" and asked her not to help with their clothes anymore. She never did anything like that again, but I know that she watches over me to this day.

I'm sure that you other nurses have had a patient let you know that they made it to the other side safely. I would love to hear some of those stories!

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Laurie +]:p

so many patients...

so little time.....

[This message has been edited by NurseMom (edited July 09, 2000).]

Originally posted by bunky:

Anybody out there ever have any spooky things happen at work? You know, like ghost stories?

Well I owrked at a Catholic hospital that had

just took the nuns off the floor as nurses and put them in pastoral care services. I had just started back in 1977 and yes on the night shift. the unit use to be peds and nursery and the last nun that died was allowed to stay and die on her floor in room

406 now the room is a play room but every once and a while I would look or hear a baby cry the call light would come on in 406 and the we would see her the nun go in the room and the light would turn off and the crying would stop. They say the nun said her life was taking care of the babies and only she had that special touch that would make any baby quit crying as soon as she picked them up.

Originally posted by bunky:

Anybody out there ever have any spooky things happen at work? You know, like ghost stories?

Many years ago a nun told me this story. She said she was waiting at an elevator to counsel a family who had been called in to see a patient who had passed. She said the patient had been pronounced dead by two physicians, both of which had evaluated her very carefully. A nurse went into collect up the patients things and do post mortum care. Suddenly a blood curdling scream came from the room and the nun rushed in expecting God know what. She found the patient sitting up in bed looking around and the nurse in a faint. The nurse said later that she had been bending over the night stand packing things when a voice behind her said,"what are you doing in my stuff?" The woman then called a relative with whom she had a falling out many years before and reconciled. She died again shortly thereafter.

Wow that is a freaky one!

I just picked my coworkers brains for this one: Catholic hospital. They had an elderly lady patient who they swore was posessed. They had to restrain her as she was wild, and despite 4 point restraints and a Posey vest (she almost broke a nurses arm) they'd come in and find the bed halfway across the room. But that wasn't even the scariest part to this. One Sunday morning, one of the nurse went in and found the lady sleeping, she turned on her TV quietly and there was a church show on, the lady woke up, somehow managed to bolt upright in bed, and she began screaming and wailing at the top of her lungs. The nurse looked at the head of her bed to see the crucifix had turned upside down! They called in the supervisor who had been teasing them about their fears over this woman and he lasted about 30 seconds in that room. She began telling him to have sex with her in some very crude language and smiled and told him in Spanish that she was El Diablo, and how would he like a piece of that. Someone even had the priest come in to see her, and according to this nurse that accompanied him to the doorway to the room, he went in and walked right back out as white as a sheet! He didn't say a word but he never went back. I had such goosebumps when they told me this!

Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.

In the last hospital in which I worked, there was a haunted elevator. It seems that a dialysis patient on the 4th floor had decided he'd had enough. He disconnected himself from the dialysis machine (leaving at least one of the needles in) and made it as far as the freight elevator before exsanguinating. (Or so the story goes). Apparently, a housekeeper getting on the elevator found him there, having bled out. I have trouble understanding why the dialysis machine alarms -- which are loud enough to wake the dead -- or the trail of blood didn't alert the nursing staff before the guy could get on the elevator, but that's the story as I was told.

One night when I was returning to the unit on the very same 'vator after a trip to pharmacy, the elevator light for the fourth floor came on all by itself. The elevator stopped on the fourth floor, the doors opened, and this blast of icy cold air came inside. The light for the fifth floor (my floor) went out, and the elevator started back down. It stopped on the second floor, the doors opened, and the icy cold air seemed to get off. As I stood there shaking, the fifth floor light came back on, and the 'vator went up to my floor. The doors opened, and I got out.

The housekeepers all laughed when I told them what happend. They told me the story about the dialysis patient, then advised me never to get on that particular elevator alone. "He never does that if there's more than one person," they said. I never did get on that elevator alone again -- or at all, if I could help it. But one night a visitor (who shouldn't have been using the freight elevators at ALL) told me that the elevator stopped on the fourth floor all by itself, and a patient got on. She said she didn't think anything about it at all until the elevator stopped at the second floor. She let the patient get off first, and when she exited right after him, he had vanished!

Specializes in ICU.
Some of this stuff gave me goosebumps! Except for the nun stuff Mary H. Either this nun really gets around, or we've been had! I have worked in 3 Catholic facilities and she was apparently a busy gal haunting them all in the US and Canada! The only difference I've heard is that in my present job, she is without a head! Ha! Ha!

As near as I can figure every Catholic hospital in the world comes with at least one obligatory ghost nun complete with full habit. In one hospital she is the "pale sister" another the "Blue Nun" Our older hospitals have registered nurses in veils. One common thread is that they are almost invariably kind and usually are seen to help.

My son had to go in under general anesthesia for a minor heart procedure. The nurse told us afterwards that during the procedure he woke up and started to talk. The nurse asked him who he was talking to and he pointed to the door and told her his guardian angel was there and told him he was going to be o.k. not be afraid. She asked him what his guardian angels name was and he answered Andrew. She said her and the cardiologist were pretty freaked!!

Don't know if this qualifies for the scary department but, really happened to me.

A few months ago, I had a dream about a resident I had gotten very attached to(I swear my husband will be just like him in 30 years :D ). He came to see me at home and told me "Bless you for the Angel you are." and touched my face. I woke up aorund 3:30am feeling pretty peaceful yet my face was ice cold! When I went into work that night, I was told he had expired the night before around 3am. I just about fainted!! I still dream now and then about him... always leaves me feeling calm.

PJ

ONE MORE CATHOLIC HOSP STORY: in this RC hospital several years (actually more like 20) this woman pregnant woman was given a blood tranfusion with the wrong blood she went into shock and was airlifted to Baton Rouge//but she died enroute that so far is verifible fact...but the story is that she returned to the hospital and can be seen walking the halls...sometimes urging nurses to tgo check on a particular pt STAT

I never saw her but it was a tale that every newbie to the night shift heard in great detail...I don't really believe in ghosts but i love a good ghost story

I haven't seen anything to unusual so far, but some of the other nurses in the unit have some spooky stories...

One story takes place in an ICU. On this unit all the rooms are private rooms, joined by sliding doors that lead to shared bathrooms. When this story happened there was a patient in bed one (down in a corner away from the nurse's station) one in bed two, and one in bed three. The nurse's station is probably about ten feet from room three. So, the patient in room one dies, and then the patient in room two starts screaming about seeing "an angel of death all around". Right after that the patient in room three died! Freaky!

Although not exactly scary, another nurse I work with had the idea (not sure if she thought about it on her own or heard about it from another medical professional) that immediately after a patient dies he or she loses like two pounds (not sure of the exact number...something like 2.something). She thinks that it is the person's soul leaving the body. She was talking about this one day and one doctor overheard her. He thought the weight loss was just due to loss of air from the lungs. My nurse coworker did some empirical research for a paper she had to write for school, and her findings were pretty consistent! She even found that a patient who was totally nasty during his hospital stay (and from visitor input generally mean) didn't lose any weight after he died. I don't know what it really is, but it really makes you think! Anyone else have experience or thoughts about that?

Everyone's experience and stories are really interesting...hope I never have experiences with a possessed patient or a patient who comes back to life!! Just thinking about it is scaring me!!!!! LOL

Maureen

I haven't seen anything to unusual so far, but some of the other nurses in the unit have some spooky stories...

One story takes place in an ICU. On this unit all the rooms are private rooms, joined by sliding doors that lead to shared bathrooms. When this story happened there was a patient in bed one (down in a corner away from the nurse's station) one in bed two, and one in bed three. The nurse's station is probably about ten feet from room three. So, the patient in room one dies, and then the patient in room two starts screaming about seeing "an angel of death all around". Right after that the patient in room three died! Freaky!

Although not exactly scary, another nurse I work with had the idea (not sure if she thought about it on her own or heard about it from another medical professional) that immediately after a patient dies he or she loses like two pounds (not sure of the exact number...something like 2.something). She thinks that it is the person's soul leaving the body. She was talking about this one day and one doctor overheard her. He thought the weight loss was just due to loss of air from the lungs. My nurse coworker did some empirical research for a paper she had to write for school, and her findings were pretty consistent! She even found that a patient who was totally nasty during his hospital stay (and from visitor input generally mean) didn't lose any weight after he died. I don't know what it really is, but it really makes you think! Anyone else have experience or thoughts about that?

Everyone's experience and stories are really interesting...hope I never have experiences with a possessed patient or a patient who comes back to life!! Just thinking about it is scaring me!!!!! LOL

Maureen

Okay, I'm a little confused. Did all patients lose weight except the nasty one or did all patients not lose weight?

Okay, I'm a little confused. Did all patients lose weight except the nasty one or did all patients not lose weight?
Hey Cannoli....

All the patients except one (Mr. Meanie) lost weight, presumably losing the weight due to a soul leaving a body. I guess if a person is nasty (meaning has no soul) then I guess he will not lose any weight.

Maureen

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