This week, I have learned... (5/30/15)

Nurses General Nursing

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This week I have learned.....

1. Cocaine is still a hell of a drug.

2. No matter how nice you are to everyone, there will be an "us vs. them" vibe between hospital divisions when you're a nurse. It makes me sad because I've gone out of my way to be nice to the workers of the rest of my facility. Can't win them all. :(

3. Making sure your nurse knows you have breast implants can prevent an embarrassing ICU transfer when a dislodged boob looks like a hematoma.

4. I miss night shift.

5. I'm allergic to Vicks vapo rub.

6. On a related note, I met my match in a colostomy bag and it was horrible.

7. Giving the caregiver the hand written prescriptions for the dementia lady STILL doesn't prevent an angry call from her the next day when she can't figure out which pharmacy has her meds.

8. I effing love the ED, but holy monkeys it makes me sore.

9. There really is no polite way to say, "Welcome to our hospital, new overly cocky (but strangely beautiful) 12-year old surgeon. By the way, if you don't want to get paged for the inpatient management of your surgical patients, then do us ALL a favor and transfer them to the hospitalist."

10. I feel a schadenfreude-like joy when I see the PVT is wrong, especially when people lose money and post about it on a 700-page thread that tells them what NOT to do. (Okay, that's really more of a confession than something I "learned".)

Bonus one - I've only been at this gig for a year and my already dark sense of humor has become sick to the point of disturbing.

What have you learned?

Are you off for the summer? I hope so. Maybe take a little while to recharge your batteries and keep an eye on the want ads. I'm sorry SN has been a bit of a bust for you.

Thanks. Yea, I feel like I have to give it another year, though. I am the SN in my town, where my kids go to school, so I feel bad being 1 and done.

I actually just landed a FFS home care gig. They are joined with a hospice and that's what I'm hoping to get in to eventually, but right now there is a huge need for home care in my area. I'll be training most of the summer and then stopping when school starts up again, shadowing only on the weekends, etc.

If this School Nurse/PD home care thing doesn't work out I'll head back to the hospital.

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Specializes in Critical Care; Cardiac; Professional Development.

That poor staffing, inappropriate acuity and patient satisfaction scores have forced me to admit I no longer want to be a bedside nurse. And it has me very sad.

That having children growing up and moving on with their lives when you lost a child to cancer can bring up a whole lot of grief that still lives inside you.

That a loyal spouse is worth their weight in gold.

That hardship forces us to look for redefinitions of ourselves.

That patients going through alcohol withdrawal are my kryptonite.

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Specializes in critical care.
That poor staffing, inappropriate acuity and patient satisfaction scores have forced me to admit I no longer want to be a bedside nurse. And it has me very sad.

That having children growing up and moving on with their lives when you lost a child to cancer can bring up a whole lot of grief that still lives inside you.

That a loyal spouse is worth their weight in gold.

That hardship forces us to look for redefinitions of ourselves.

That patients going through alcohol withdrawal are my kryptonite.

That's a heavy load you're carrying, love. (((Hugs)))

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Specializes in Critical Care; Cardiac; Professional Development.

Must be. Your compassion made me tear up like a ninny. Thank you.

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Specializes in critical care.
Must be. Your compassion made me tear up like a ninny. Thank you.

Now I want to hug you harder. lol Go do something purely self indulgent on your next day off!

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That poor staffing, inappropriate acuity and patient satisfaction scores have forced me to admit I no longer want to be a bedside nurse. And it has me very sad.

That having children growing up and moving on with their lives when you lost a child to cancer can bring up a whole lot of grief that still lives inside you.

That a loyal spouse is worth their weight in gold.

That hardship forces us to look for redefinitions of ourselves.

That patients going through alcohol withdrawal are my kryptonite.

This week I have learned (from reading your post) that the cross I bear isn't as heavy as others.

I'm so sorry you are going through all of this. I wish you peace in your life and a way to heal and carry on.

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Yea, um tonight I learned that thing that GrnTea said in that thread about fake nurses and the diastolic blood pressure yadda yadda.

*blushing*

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... that periods of darkness overcome us. But we are able to overcome, grow stronger, smarter and better.

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... that periods of darkness overcome us. But we are able to overcome, grow stronger, smarter and better.

Promise?

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Today I learned that if you go to a fast food restaurant at lunch time across from 2 hospitals, nurses really appreciate you letting them go ahead of you in line and then helping them carry out a whole floors order to their car.

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Specializes in Infection Prevention, Public Health.

This week I learned that some people now keep chickens as a way to reduce the tick population and, hopefully, tick-borne diseases like Lyme Disease. I'm too lazy to be a chicken farmer.

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Specializes in hospice.
This week I learned that some people now keep chickens as a way to reduce the tick population and, hopefully, tick-borne diseases like Lyme Disease. I'm too lazy to be a chicken farmer.

Me too. Plus....have you ever smelled chicken poop?!

Give me horses any day.

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