Sure to Get Flamed for This

[Kyrshamarks]

I am sure I am about to get flamed for posting this, but I feel the need to anyways. I have been seeing these threads talking about bullying and teachers or preceptors hating the students, and new nurses or abusing them because of some perceived slight or injustice. Well guess what?

The world is a hard cold nasty place that does not need to be polite to you or worry whether your feelings got hurt and you feel offended. You need to grow up and realize that the abuse that you claim is rampant, or the bullying that you experience all the time is not their problem, but rather your problem.

I see so many posts about this and I wonder how some of these people have survived as long as they have. School is tough? Deal with it. You think that someone else is getting it easier? Well too bad, they may be but no one ever promised you everything would be fair. You have to learn that there is inequality in life. It's how you overcome that inequality that matters. It teaches perseverance.

Abusive teachers? Maybe they are trying to get the best in you to come out. What you think is abuse maybe is pushing you to your limits, to get you further along in your potential. So your feelings got hurt at school, grow up, feelings get hurt every day.

Your preceptor is unorganized and does not like you and bad mouths you to your manager, and all your patients love you but no one at the hospital sees how great you really are?

Well your preceptor may actually have great time management skill, but when having to slow down and teach someone their job, things do tend to get disorganized. You may be part of the blame there.

Did you ever stop to think that you are the proverbial monkey wrench in a well oiled machine? The need to teach you, and I realize you do need to learn, can be very time consuming. They may tell your manager that you need improving or that you are not advancing fast enough. They may be all smiles to you, because they want to support you and keep you positive, but they need to tell the manager how you really are.

Speaking of orientation, how often have I seen statements that say the other nurses are not supportive and will not answer questions. Have you ever thought that maybe you are asking TOO MANY questions?

After a bit it may seem that you are not retaining the info provided and everyone gets tired of answering the same questions over and over. Part of learning is knowing when to shut your mouth and just watch. It has been said by people wiser than me that the only question you should ask is the question that you already know the answer to. If that does not make sense to you, think about it for a while and you might just be surprised that a light comes on.

So basically what i am saying is grow up and act like the adult that you are. Life is not fair, school is not fair, work is not fair. You just have to learn to deal with it.

[jadelpn, LPN, EMT-B]

The problem is multi-faceted. Nursing schools are more interested in producing revenue than nurses. So they skimp on clinical experience and focus on touchy-feely "you set your own learning goals" kind of crap. People who got weeded out in the bad old days now manage to become "nurses" even though they aren't prepared to nurse. Conscientious people become nurses, too, but have to overcome their lack of clinical experience. That's why we get so many threads from new grads, saying "Help, I'm drowning" and "Maybe I'm not cut out for this." That's because there's now a huge gap between school and the work world.

But thinking about this in an alternate way, We have a get the patient's in, get em out. Computers that have check-boxes and prompts. Key phrases, and scripts.

There is such a huge disconnect between a generation of nurses focused on patient outcomes based on skills, and newer nurses who learn a completely different set of skills for the illusion of patients who are made to feel that regardless of care they receive (or lack thereof) gosh darn it, they have some incredible power that the unit revolves around them--or gets dinged on surveys that reimbursements are based on.

Further, we have students who do everything on a computer, (and most get their books on a computer) spell check, grammar check, spark notes, search engines....with a few clicks all of the information they need are right there. Communication is by texting, and information is sent via emails.

I often wonder if facilities did you tubes on clinical skills and had it as part of orientation, we would have more clinically proficient new nurses. They as a general rule, most do not have a face to face interaction with anyone.

As a multi year nurse, this can be overwhelming to me. I need a face to face interaction to really sense where someone is going with a conversation. No such deal with younger people. They do not "get"a number of the social mores or what professional interactions can mean, as the computer doesn't often convey tone. So one corrects a preceptee, and it is overwhelming. It perhaps would be better to text corrections.

With all that being said, this is supported by a great deal of managment. The "best" nurses are the technically savvy ones, the ones who can and do follow the best and newest ways to get a patient to "press like" and move on. Inquisitive to a newer nurse means that theory is the basis on which they can search engine to debate a point--otherwise, really, if they are checking the correct boxes you will get the pop up of "adding this to care plan/problem list".

At the end of the day, no one cares if the patient is ready to be discharged. No one cares if they really "get" how they are to care for themselves. No one cares if they "know" what meds they were given, as long as they were on time and with a smile. The priority is "I have the time" and "managing up" (or whatever the new key term is on convincing a patient that the nurse coming on is the right hand of God). We manipulate patient's feelings. We do not wipe butt, we kiss it. And we can not blame that on anyone more than corporations having more priority than old fashioned good clinical skills.

[Selfie]

. I believe the OP was talking about a very specific type of person and is probably a great preceptor.

I’m curious as to what you read in the OP’s post that led you to conclude that “the OP is probably a great preceptor.” ?

I’ve seen this written on AN before by other posters as well- e.g. “Susie a great nurse.” (Direct quote, but name changed) Derived from an anonymous post!

I’m baffled every time I see something like this- on an online anonymous forum.

[OCNRN63, RN]

Thirty eight years ago, when I started nursing, we newbies respected the experienced nurses, looked up to them and aspired to be just like them. The experienced nurses who took time to show us stuff were thanked copiously and we never, ever disrespected them. Consequently, they looked out for us. Things are so much different now.

This reminded me of a nurse I looked up to when I was a student. She was probably in her late 50s-early 60s; you know, the age when she should have stepped aside to give a new younger, thinner, prettier nurse her job. (/sarc) This nurse was very knowledgeable and had excellent rapport with her co-workers and the physicians. I wanted so much to be just like her.

​If she were working today, she wouldn't get the respect she deserved. Today having years of experience doesn't mean what it used to.

[BSNbeauty, BSN, RN]

This reminded me of a nurse I looked up to when I was a student. She was probably in her late 50s-early 60s; you know, the age when she should have stepped aside to give a new younger, thinner, prettier nurse her job. (/sarc) This nurse was very knowledgeable and had excellent rapport with her co-workers and the physicians. I wanted so much to be just like her.

​If she were working today, she wouldn't get the respect she deserved. Today having years of experience doesn't mean what it used to.

Agreed. But it goes BOTH ways. You have earn respect in order to receive respect. Like another poster said, respect shouldn't be given based on how many years of experience you have. Everyone should be respected from new grads, to janitors, to dietary personnel, doctors, patients, etc. I was brought up to respect everyone, not just based on how old they are or their experience.

[FlyingScot, RN]

Agreed. But it goes BOTH ways. You have earn respect in order to receive respect. Like another poster said, respect shouldn't be given based on how many years of experience you have.

There is a big difference between respecting someone and acting respectfully. There are many people I have run into for whom I do not nor ever will have respect but they'll never know it because I treat them respectfully.

There are certain people you will meet in life that actually do deserve your respect from the get go and that includes people who are older, wiser and more experienced. Until they prove otherwise that is. Case in point. Did your parents have to earn your respect?

[openyourmind]

Everyone deserves respect, that is the problem. Why should respect only be given to a certain few? Save that for TRUST. Everyone needs to earn trust, not respect. If by respect you mean ADMIRATION, that's something else, and is also earned. You don't go immediately admiring everybody, just those who have worked their way to being an admired person.

[nurseprnRN, BSN, RN]

Oh I totally get it now! It's not the rapist's fault you're being raped, it's your fault you are being raped. And it makes it totally okay because they are having a bad day!

Let's continue to victimize the bully and see where that gets us. 

Not to put too fine a point on it, but there is a very clear definition of rape-- sexual penetration of the victim's body (lady parts, mouth, orifice) by anything (member, fingers, object) without consent (refusal or inability to consent by reason of age, disability, cognition, or level of consciousness).

There is a good definition of bullying, which my colleague RubyVee quotes often. On the other hand, there's a very large disparity of opinion on whether rudeness, curtness, brusqueness, or bad management is or isn't bullying, and that, being an opinion, is very much in the eye of the beholder, and the internal response to it is very much within the recipient's control.

[AmyRN303, BSN, RN]

Everyone should be respectful to everyone, in a perfect world. I am an older new grad, and my parents were old school (my mother is Canadian and my father is a southern gentleman.....I didn't get away with one bit of disrespect or rudeness as a child)

That being said, not every person one will encounter in life is respectful, or eternally patient, or even kind. I believe we all could benefit from practicing some anti-fragility. At one point in my life, it was very easy to hurt my feelings. I'm a sensitive person, and I tend to try to be very sensitive to the feelings of others. Then some really difficult things in my life happened, and I find myself not easily bruised anymore. I'm far from a "suck it up, buttercup" personality on the average, because I know that some people are more fragile than others. But I do believe there are times which call for putting on "the big kid undies" and gutting through. I've worked with people who are brusque at best and downright nasty at worst. I've worked with some wonderful teachers and some who don't have the ability to teach.

Some people are difficult to deal with, plain and simple. I think going into nursing with the thought in the back of one's mind that it is a profession in which bullying exists in a league of its own (horrible crusty old nurses that eat their young!) is counterproductive for new grads. I am sure that there are legitimate claims of lateral violence, and I am not denying that they exist. I also, however, think that the cries of "bully!" are sounded very often, which leads to a Peter and the Wolf environment. Not every "mean" person is a bully.

[openyourmind]

Not to put too fine a point on it, but there is a very clear definition of rape-- sexual penetration of the victim's body (lady parts, mouth, orifice) by anything (member, fingers, object) without consent (refusal or inability to consent by reason of age, disability, cognition, or level of consciousness).

There is a good definition of bullying, which my colleague RubyVee quotes often. On the other hand, there's a very large disparity of opinion on whether rudeness, curtness, brusqueness, or bad management is or isn't bullying, and that, being an opinion, is very much in the eye of the beholder, and the internal response to it is very much within the recipient's control.

Again, you don't know what I've experienced so I am not sure what point you are to prove here, fine or not. It's beyond offensive when people tell victims of these things that they don't know what they are, by defining them.

[TriciaJ, RN]

If you have that many negative experiences at work, perhaps you need to do some self-examination and figure out what you're bringing to the table. Bullying exists, but not to the extent that it's complained about on AN. If you've never backed down, perhaps that's part of the problem. As a new employee, you don't know everything about your job; you're not expected to. But if you don't back down when told you're wrong, you will probably never fit in to the work place. That's not something to be proud of, nor does it mean you were bullied.

Sadly, the preceptor's job IS to teach nursing, because nursing schools aren't teaching it these days. And while no orientee should be fearful of asking an intelligent question, it is something else again to expect to be spoonfed. Preceptors who become frazzled as they teach are NOT in the wrong business. We are nurses, not teachers. Not everyone is allowed a chance to opt out of precepting, and even nurses who are poor teachers have plenty of information to impart to their orientees. It is the job of the orientee to learn . . . a good teacher would be nice, but it's not always feasible. You still have to learn.

I can't like this one enough.

[eagle78]

Again, you don't know what I've experienced so I am not sure what point you are to prove here, fine or not. It's beyond offensive when people tell victims of these things that they don't know what they are, by defining them.

The poster is not discarding your feelings, no one can do that. I think what is trying to be conveyed is you have the power over your response to the feelings.

[TriciaJ, RN]

Again, you don't know what I've experienced so I am not sure what point you are to prove here, fine or not. It's beyond offensive when people tell victims of these things that they don't know what they are, by defining them.

No, we don't know what you've experienced and no one here is addressing what you've experienced, so none of these posts are about you personally. So please don't be offended when we speak in generalities.

The fact is, most of us have encountered people who cry "bully!" every time they're told something they don't want to hear. This is an affront to anyone who has actually been bullied. Rape is a horrendous experience, and when people compare any unpleasant interaction to being raped, they are way over the top and need to be called out on it.