Thank goodness for the rest of the staff

[Certifiable, BSN, RN]

I'm a new grad, on my first job in a specialized unit.

It's extremely stressful work (I dream about it quite often), the patients are really ill and we also get a lot of patients from other departments when they are full (which somehow happens during the night shift...) and we have a few empty beds.

Morning shift is the craziest, the patient-staff ratio is the lowest but it's crazy because that's when most of the work is done.

I'm very anxious when I'm at work, in 3 months of work, I can count on one hand the amount of times when I've had a relaxed feeling after work. Also, so often I dream of things that have happened or never happened that my sleep is never restful.

If it wasn't for the staff and their constant encouragement - I'd probably have given up by now, but they keep me going. I'm not sure that I want to stay because of the nature of the nursing that I do, but until I make up my mind I know that I have the support of the staff - it makes all the difference in the world!

But even the great staffing doesn't prevent me from being down and exhausted. It's really hard making plans with friends because of my schedule. My friends with "normal" jobs like to meet up but it's not their priority because they are not as stressed as I am -so when I can't meet people or plans get canceled it's really hard for me.

These 3 months have flown by - i'm worried that i'll blink and time will have passed, but my "down" state of mind won't have changed.