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.

[didi768]

Little rough yes but we must define many words. Bullying to one means something totally different to another and yes, sometimes constructive criticism is not abuse or bullying. There are just way too many different personalities in this world and it's always hard to read people, especially in typed correspondence. I remember thinking my shadowing nurse hated my freaking guts, that I was always in her way, that she was slamming my ugly face to all her buddies behind my back. But the thing is, it's hard to train someone when you are sickly busy yourself!! The answer? Trainers need more MONEY!! No one should have to train someone else, even in homecare when you get a new nurse coming to replace you, without MORE MONEY!!! It's only fair. Especially when you can't finish your OWN work on time due to the ditzy new nurse lol. MONEY IS THE ANSWER. ALWAYS.

[Tenebrae, BSN, RN]

..... That's the word used these days for people who aren't nice to us.)

It may well be. Its not to say though that bullying doesnt happen.

[nurseprnRN, BSN, RN]

I am on a Scouting list and there's been a thread there going on the "Lord of the Flies" thing that sometimes comes up in a group of unsupervised boys. This isn't really like what we've been discussing, but this post made me sit up and say boy howdy.When you get to the last paragraph, stop and see if you can recognize something in your workplace.

> A real man doesn't bully others. Real men stand-up to bullies and, if

> they can't help to reform them, tear them down so they can't continue to

> engage in bullying. There is nothing specifically-feminine about

> wanting to be treated with basic human dignity and respect.

This is 100% correct -- but there is a grain of truth in Randy's admitted "out there" post. Bullying has become the latest piece of the "less than zero" tolerance movement (you know, the "rules" say that the 1st grader who points his finger and says "bang" must be suspended for three days for using a "gun motion" at school). Right now, anything that is said by one child to another that is interpreted as "mean" is labeled "bullying" and the "offender" is in big trouble. The boy who tells another who is blocking the aisle between desks to "move your fat butt" gets hauled to the office because someone took that not-perfect application of "excuse me" to be "bullying." It's a continuation of the downward spiral we are in, where no one is wrong or does anything wrong but must find someone or something else to blame when something happens.

So yes, stand up to bullies -- but first make sure there is a true pattern of bullying and not just an isolated incident where someone did something dumb and got called on it (i.e., the Scout who dumps the whole pot of pancake batter on the ground is probably not being bullied if one of his patrol mates yells at him and calls him an idiot for not paying attention).

[himilayaneyes]

I believe that nursing students and new nurses have the responsibility to know their resources (e.g., research, med-surg nursing manual, etc.). You shouldn't just ask a million and one questions but take the initiative to do some research into topics yourself as well. New nurses need to learn to deal with constructive criticism. However, the criticism must be constructive..a learning experience..and not simply an attempt to berate/belittle someone. We have all been new at some point and everyone learns at a different pace. People who don't like to teach should simply refuse to precept/teach and if forced to do so...well find a new profession. The "young one" you're eating may just be your nurse one day and I hope to God for your sake that you treated him/her decently.

[MissyWrite]

Horizontal violence/ lateral violence/ workplace bullying is a real problem.

A group of prominent healthcare experts and management consultants associated with the Lucian Leape Institute, at the National Patient Safety foundation, issued a report in 2013 condemning the “emotional abuse, bullying, and even threats of physical assault and learning by humiliation [that] are all often accepted as ‘normal’ conditions of the healthcare workplace.” -

Bullying decreases job satisfaction and morale and increases absenteeism (Chipps & McRury, 2012)

Almost 21% of nursing turnover can be related to bullying (Johnson & Rea, 2009)

60% of new RNs who quit their first job in nursing within 6 months report that it is because of being bullied

Replacing one nurse can cost up to $88,000 USD (Jones, CB, 2012)

In a study on workplace bullying, most of the respondents reported being bullied by the charge nurse, manager, or director (Johnson & Rea 2009)

One in six nurses (13%) reported being bullied in the past six months (Sa & Fleming 2008)

Bullying of nurses leads to erosion of professional competence as well as increased sickness, absence, and employee attrition (Hutchinson et al., 2010; Johnson, 2009)

Bullying victims may suffer stress-related health problems, such as nausea, headache, insomnia, anxiety, depression, weight changes, and alcohol and drug abuse (Townsend, 2012)

Nurses who survive bullying early in their careers tend to carry their learned behaviors with them. They accept the bully culture as part of the job and eventually may choose to bully other nurses (Townsend, 2012)

[JustBeachyNurse, LPN]

Not all those who submit articles are writers or on staff at AllNurses. The OP has a tendency to post "colorful" articles.

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

I believe that nursing students and new nurses have the responsibility to know their resources (e.g., research, med-surg nursing manual, etc.). You shouldn't just ask a million and one questions but take the initiative to do some research into topics yourself as well. New nurses need to learn to deal with constructive criticism. However, the criticism must be constructive..a learning experience..and not simply an attempt to berate/belittle someone. We have all been new at some point and everyone learns at a different pace. People who don't like to teach should simply refuse to precept/teach and if forced to do so...well find a new profession. The "young one" you're eating may just be your nurse one day and I hope to God for your sake that you treated him/her decently.

What makes you think it's even possible to refuse to precept or teach? And that "well find a new profession" is pretty arrogant, ignorant and wrong-headed. Very few of us can afford to up and quit our jobs and find a new profession because we don't like one aspect of our jobs. It's not all that intelligent to even suggest such a thing.

[didi768]

I was one of those abused by my first head nurse at the VA Hospital in 1987. She yelled at and embarrassed me continually throughout my first 6 months of working there. She would yell at me in front of all staff and doctors too. How I stayed I will never know, but I did and became an excellent Ortho nurse despite it. If it happened now, I would have gone home crying and quit!!! It was terrible.

[shatikaz]

HAha never saw this post till now. In my opinion, nursing is learned in the clinical setting by way of experience. You get science from the text but nursing is an art. This is the reason why no one nursing practice is ever the same as another. That being said, the preceptor orients a preceptee to environment, policy, and protocol. Bullying has nothing to do with being able to admit wrongdoing. As I stated, "no one should have to go to work and deal with people making comments about their sexuality, going behind them to change rates on their patients IV pumps or shutting them off, hiding the keys to storage rooms, fabricating stories which call a person's ethics and competence into question, or physical violence." Nowhere here says anything to support you hypotheticals. What I stated were real events that actually happened. And maybe in the name of "having to learn" (lol!) you are ok with being called names, having your patient or yourself at risk for injury, or arguing against falsified statements, but I am not and never will be. That is what I never stood for. And btw, I am doing quite well, much to these "nurses" dismay, and have earned the respect of my peers and superiors in how I handled these frauds. And since I NEVER BACKED DOWN from the HAZING BS, I have maintained by own integrity.

[Kyrshamarks, BSN, RN]

It has been a little over a year since I posted this thread. I thought it might be fun to come back to it and see if some of the nurses that were "new" nurses that made a few comments still feel the same way.

I know that I still feel the same way. There are people that cry bully too much, and that there is such a thing as too many questions. I still feel that people should look up the answer before asking and try to get validation or not for their answer.

[ktwlpn, LPN]

We've got a new generation of Special snowflakes in the work force...Totally lacking a work ethic,the worst attendance records I have seen in my years of nursing.Call offs are rampant,we are mandating almost daily.15 years ago mandating was RARE....I am officially now " to old for that"

[Not_A_Hat_Person, RN]

Complaints about spoiled young people are just another sign that you're getting old. Next is obsession with your bowels.