Things that gross you out....., my "problem"

Long Term Care Columnist / Guide · Jul 30, 2004

I used to be the biggest wuss you ever saw when it came to vomit---the smell, the sight, and especially the sound was more than I could handle. I didn't even have to be sick myself.......all it took was knowing someone else WAS, and I'd be right alongside of 'em, heaving up my toenails out of sympathy!!

That said, the only way to get over something like this is plain old exposure: the more often you see it, hear it, smell it, the more likely it is that you'll get over your fear and loathing. Before I went into nursing, I couldn't even stand to deal with my kids when they got sick..........one time, my oldest daughter (then 5 or 6 yrs old) ran from her bedroom to the bathroom, projectile vomiting down the entire 30-foot length of the hall. All I could do was to cover the mess with paper towels, spray lots of foofoo in the air (which made the entire house smell like somebody puked in a vase full of flowers) and wait for my poor husband to get home from work so HE could clean it up. I just couldn't......I'd have puked for sure if I'd even tried! :imbar

There are, of course, those things which we NEVER learn to handle with grace, no matter how many times we have to deal with them. Maybe puke is yours; grotty dentures and feet are mine :uhoh21: But even so, you'll eventually learn to get past the initial gagging and deal with whatever comes up (oops, no pun intended---really! :chuckle ). Trust me, we nurses have our little weaknesses just like everyone else.......we weren't born with cast-iron stomachs, and if you ask any nurse, they'll tell you the same thing---there's just some things that make us turn green and question whether that corn dog we had for lunch is going to come back for an encore!! :chuckle

SoulShine75 · Jul 30, 2004

I used to be the biggest wuss you ever saw when it came to vomit---the smell, the sight, and especially the sound was more than I could handle. I didn't even have to be sick myself.......all it took was knowing someone else WAS, and I'd be right alongside of 'em, heaving up my toenails out of sympathy!!
That said, the only way to get over something like this is plain old exposure: the more often you see it, hear it, smell it, the more likely it is that you'll get over your fear and loathing. Before I went into nursing, I couldn't even stand to deal with my kids when they got sick..........one time, my oldest daughter (then 5 or 6 yrs old) ran from her bedroom to the bathroom, projectile vomiting down the entire 30-foot length of the hall. All I could do was to cover the mess with paper towels, spray lots of foofoo in the air (which made the entire house smell like somebody puked in a vase full of flowers) and wait for my poor husband to get home from work so HE could clean it up. I just couldn't......I'd have puked for sure if I'd even tried! :imbar
There are, of course, those things which we NEVER learn to handle with grace, no matter how many times we have to deal with them. Maybe puke is yours; grotty dentures and feet are mine :uhoh21: But even so, you'll eventually learn to get past the initial gagging and deal with whatever comes up (oops, no pun intended---really! :chuckle ). Trust me, we nurses have our little weaknesses just like everyone else.......we weren't born with cast-iron stomachs, and if you ask any nurse, they'll tell you the same thing---there's just some things that make us turn green and question whether that corn dog we had for lunch is going to come back for an encore!! :chuckle

LOL! That sounds just like me. This is going to sound terible but I made my husband come home from work on his lunch break once to clean up a mess my son made in the bed. I just COULDN'T do it. I covered it up with towels until he got there. I actually got plastic sheets to go under their cotton sheets so I wouldn't have to scrub the mattresses (sp) anymore. :imbar My first day as a na at a nursing home this woman got sick on the floor, bless her heart and all I could do was look at it. Like it was some gigantic spider coming towards me. I felt paralyzed LOL. :uhoh3: I had to ask the nurse to deal with it, she just laughed at me. I've had to deal with pt's biting me, cursing me, poo poo, all that and I handled it with much grace but vomit just makes me fall apart. I may not show it on the outside but on the inside I'm dying. My families first question to me when I told them I was going to be going to nursing school was...how will you deal if someone throws up. (They all know me too well) I shrugged it off, "Oh, i'll be fiiiine!" But in the back of my head I was asking the same question. They just looked at me like this...:stone I'm sure I'll get use to it............someday. My luck my fisrt clinical will be someone who pukes and I'm going to have to do SOMETHING about it or else i'll fail. He he. Thanks for sharing your story, I'm just glad i'm not the only one.

studentnurse74, LPN, LVN · Jul 30, 2004

Diahrrea does it for me. :eek: :eek: :eek:

The smell, the texture........ugh............

Altra, BSN, RN · Jul 30, 2004

SoulShine, I'd gladly clean emesis for you if you'd take care of the phlegm & respiratory stuff ... I like to think I have an iron stomach but that stuff just does me in. :uhoh3: :rolleyes:

SoulShine75 · Jul 30, 2004

SoulShine, I'd gladly clean emesis for you if you'd take care of the phlegm & respiratory stuff ... I like to think I have an iron stomach but that stuff just does me in.

I'll take that over throw up, any ol' day. Too bad we won't be working together. That would be a great deal. :chuckle

shape0fmyheart · Jul 31, 2004

I'm like you, I can do everything else but vomit. I've even been working full time at a daycare on and off for 2 years now and anytime one of the kids throws up I'm out in the hallway calling my boss's name. They all know that I'm in nursing school and they laugh whenever I need someone else to come clean up the mess. Everybody always asks me "What are you gonna do when you're a nurse?" and I honestly don't know. I don't even have to see someone getting sick, just hearing it is enough to make me gag. A few weeks ago one of the children was on my lap laying on my shoulder as she started to heave, I got her up and turned just in time that it only got on my arm.... I actually didn't gag but I still went to get my boss to help clean it up. I washed my hands and my arms about 200 times that day and even sprayed myself with lysol, I was so grossed out! haha. Luckily I haven't had to deal with it in clinicals yet.. I'm just waiting for this semester, peds and ob... I'm sure I'll see some vomit.

Saved_by_Grace · Jul 31, 2004

Hey I'm in Ky too...near Paducah. I think we all have a phobia of some sort or another. I too am a phlegm-a-phob! Hoping to overcome it.....Good Luck!:)

RNSuzq1, RN · Jul 31, 2004

Hi Christy,

Have to agree with you that vomit is the worst for many of us. For whatever reason - when you see someone throwing up, the smell, sound, etc. - our bodies respond and it's hard not to lose your lunch along with the other person - yuck. When my boys have been sick - I just hold my breath and clean it up as quick as possible (unless my husband is around and I can get him to do it - hey, I gave birth to them, cleaning up their throw up is the least he can do..) :chuckle

I worked very long hours in an ER in the Navy for a few years seeing and smelling some pretty awful things and at first couldn't believe that my co-workers could actually "eat dinner" during our breaks. I'd grab a diet-coke and stand outside gasping for fresh-air (I lost tons of weight - but not the best diet plan).. Anyways, I eventually got used to it all and was able to go from helping with some procedure to eating a sandwich - you just get used to it, it's part of the job and you have to eat to keep up your strength.

Not sure if the rest of you are like this - but if I'm the one throwing up, it doesn't bother me. When I was in the final stages of labor with our last son I was sick as a dog. My very young OB Nurse was holding the emesis basin for me and I could see she was turning "Green" - I told her I'd hold it myself and boy was she happy, lol...

I'm not afraid of the blood and guts I'll see, but I still get gagged when someone vomits and hope I can overcome that. My Sister In-Law has been an ER Nurse for 20 years and said if she doesn't finish her 12 hour shift with vomit, blood, urine, etc. all over her scrubs - she feels like it was a slow night... :chuckle We'll get past this I'm sure... Susan

Gompers, BSN, RN · Jul 31, 2004

I spent a year working as a CNA during nursing school, and I saw more disgusting things than I could ever have imagined. I don't know how I got through some shifts, to tell you the truth. The nurses (and I'm referring to 90% of the nurses in this one particular hospital, not ALL nurses) would never help the CNAs with this kind of "dirty work" so I usually was left to clean the whole thing up myself. Once I couldn't take it and put a mask on before entering a room to clean this one patient who had been vomiting and having diarrhea - and was left in it by the previous CNA! The nurse manager came after me and chastized me about how unprofessional I was being, and how I was disprespecting the patient by wearing a mask. I told her that I felt the nruses and previous shift CNAs were being unprofessional because they knowingly "dumped" this patient on me with absolutely NO help. I said it was going to take me an hour to clean him and his room up, so unless she could find someone to help me, that I was going to wear that mask because it was the only way I was going to get the job done! I knew they wouldn't fire me because they desperately needed me, and she just walked off in a huff. Never had trouble with her again, and when I left to get another job a year later, she actually begged me to stay. :uhoh3:

My solution was to go to the NICU, which was what I wanted to do in the first place. It's so much easier to handle baby puke, poop, mucous, and infectious wounds. It's on a much smaller scale and you can clean anything up yourself in less than 5 minutes.

Daisy9739 · Jul 31, 2004

I know this is going to sound weird, but for me... its urine.

I don't know why, it just is. I have dealt with blood, loss of limbs, vomit, diarrhea, phlegm, you name it, I've seen it. And nothing bothers me except for urine. I think it's because some have the worst fowl smell, and it's not like other fluids that are thick. Urine is such a fine liquid once spilled it can absorb. Which has already happened to me once. Once I took a urine sample from a pt. and she spilled it on me. :angryfire UHHHH maybe it's me, but I can't take urine.

SoulShine75 · Jul 31, 2004

I spent a year working as a CNA during nursing school, and I saw more disgusting things than I could ever have imagined. I don't know how I got through some shifts, to tell you the truth. The nurses (and I'm referring to 90% of the nurses in this one particular hospital, not ALL nurses) would never help the CNAs with this kind of "dirty work" so I usually was left to clean the whole thing up myself. Once I couldn't take it and put a mask on before entering a room to clean this one patient who had been vomiting and having diarrhea - and was left in it by the previous CNA! The nurse manager came after me and chastized me about how unprofessional I was being, and how I was disprespecting the patient by wearing a mask. I told her that I felt the nruses and previous shift CNAs were being unprofessional because they knowingly "dumped" this patient on me with absolutely NO help. I said it was going to take me an hour to clean him and his room up, so unless she could find someone to help me, that I was going to wear that mask because it was the only way I was going to get the job done! I knew they wouldn't fire me because they desperately needed me, and she just walked off in a huff. Never had trouble with her again, and when I left to get another job a year later, she actually begged me to stay.
My solution was to go to the NICU, which was what I wanted to do in the first place. It's so much easier to handle baby puke, poop, mucous, and infectious wounds. It's on a much smaller scale and you can clean anything up yourself in less than 5 minutes.

THe NICU is one of my first choices when I graduate, God willing. Not because all the messes are on a smaller scale, although it helps, but because helping a sick baby get better would be the most rewarding thing in the world to me. I have twins who were born pre-mature and had to leave the hospital without one of them. Thanks God to those nurses who cared for my little angel. He's great and never has had any major illneses.