Tossing Your Cookies...

RheatherN, ASN, RN, EMT-P · Jul 16, 2009

So yeah, i can deal with anything!!!! i have seen so many surgeries, crave to see more, huge wounds, packed them, unpacked them, picked them.. you name it, its great...even huge clots from women that are having problems with the nasty smells the women who have left a tampon in and 'forgot' about it and have 'done things' and its get lodged in and smelled that.... (NASTY BTW!!!).. but today. funny that i see this thread today of ALL days>>> i had a guy w/ only 3 ft of bowel left d/t so many surg's...this colostomy bag is about 15 inches long. it FILLS with stool. now it doesnt smell bad or anything, but to hold the container for him to empty it and when i went to flush it was the worst thing i have ever ever ever had to do. when i was dumping it, i had to deep breath and try and NOT lose it. i have never had a prob, i was totally thrown that this did this to me!

oMG! thanks for this thread today of all days!

-H-RN

JB2007, ASN, RN · Jul 16, 2009

Cleaning BM out from under the nails will make me want to toss my cookies everytime. I had to clean out old dried up BM out from under one of my resident's today and I was gridding my teeth together to keep from loosing it.

Also, dumping vomit into the toilet will make my stomache roll. I can hold the pan for you while you vomit, but when it comes to dumping it into the toilet someone else will have to do it.

jnrsmommy · Jul 16, 2009

i can handle it all...sputum, bleeds, vomit, feces, nasty tumors, wounds - you name it.
but.
show me a clogged toilet and i lose it...
which is precisely what i did at one special clinical.
the toilet was filled w/toilet paper, urine and feces - to the brim.
one look and i vomited, and the bowl ranneth over.
ugh...i am getting queazy just thinking about it.
leslie

Leslie, I was reading my husband some of these posts, and he about lost it when it came to yours. Thank you :bowingpur

The things that make us go:barf01:

ShelleyERgirl, LPN · Jul 16, 2009

Excessive earwax, had patient eat his after irrigating his ears and then showing him how much i got out. Everything else, bring it on!

prowlingMA · Jul 16, 2009

My first day on a new job as a Med Aid in a LTC I had a bad flu and should have called in but didn't because it was my first day. I am standing by the med cart watching the MA and all of a sudden by vision goes black and I wake up on the floor. How embarrassing.And on my first day.

This is actually a routine for me. The last three new jobs I have had I was sick on the first days. Either flues, colds, etc.

Usually I can see anything, blood, BM, no problem. But vomit makes me sick. Just hearing someone vomit makes me sick.

RainDreamer, BSN, RN · Jul 16, 2009

i can handle it all...sputum, bleeds, vomit, feces, nasty tumors, wounds - you name it.
but.
show me a clogged toilet and i lose it...
which is precisely what i did at one special clinical.
the toilet was filled w/toilet paper, urine and feces - to the brim.
one look and i vomited, and the bowl ranneth over.
ugh...i am getting queazy just thinking about it.
leslie

Toilets do it for me too! Toilets and snot :barf02:

Acosmo27 · Jul 16, 2009

im still in nursing school, but sputum really really gets to me. I went to see one of my patients get an esophageal stent, becuase of an esophageal cancer diagnosis. There was A LOT of suctioning involved, and getting back to the unit, I lost it... my stomach contents that is. Not pretty. Ive never been known to throw up because of gross things.. this was a first for me.

AllSmiles225 · Jul 17, 2009

To put it quite bluntly while I was in LPN school two things used to make me WRETCH! First off stool is not my speciality.. I don't think anyone particularly cares for cleaning somebody up who has c diff and massive diarrhea but I dry heave every single time. Best trick I know is to put some Vicks under your nose before going into the room and roll the patient the other way so you can do your dry heave thing without the patient seeing. Bedpans I am COMPLETELY SCREWED--I can not dump them in the toilet--I actually want to die if a patient needs a bed pan because all of the splashing dumping it back into the toilet just makes me want to "toss my cookies." I usually have a friend do it for me and I will do whatever it is that they hate for them. I always feel bad about that but its my bodily reaction and nothing that I can control. The other thing that I ALMOST passed out for..I actually was convinced that I was going down was in the OR during a total hip replacement. Orthopedic surgery looks like a freakin' Home Depot, literally drills, pins, screws fragments of bone flying.. the sound of the drill going through the bone..oh gosh just thinking about it im seeing spots..in any case I was getting weak in the knees and doing the whole wobbling around in a circle deal and my preceptor asked me if I wanted to leave and I was like "uh huh" and I NEVER went back into another orthopedic surgery. I saw other surgeries including C-sections & a mastectomy and I was fine with those it was just the sound of drills that made me want to faint. Needless to say I start RN school in September and I hopefully will not be attending any orthopedic surgeries!

Dalzac, LPN, LVN, RN · Jul 17, 2009

I can deal with just about anything but once in a great while a GI bleed would get me, but the one thing that I have actually passed smooth out, was brain matter. For some reason it will render me helpless, pass out, vomit, everything involved with massive head injury gets me.

One of the funnier things was I worked with a nurse who could not deal with stool impactions and would pay me $5 to take care of it for her.

DeepFriedRN · Jul 17, 2009

Trach loogies...eeewww.. :barf02: The only time I've ever almost lost it though, was doing post-mortem care. A stomach cancer pt whose family would NOT leave..(poor things, they were really distraught). By the time we got in there, waaayyy too long had passed. We turned pt, and some of the foulest smelling fluid in the entire universe ran out of pt''s mouth.. It was black. OMG. I had to leave the room so I didn't throw up. It was bad.

WalkieTalkie, RN · Jul 17, 2009

A very demented patient had just crapped all over her sheets with diarrhea. It was pretty much from mid back to toes. The smell alone was in my top 10 list. I've worked on floors with liver patients and those with GI bleeds, and this was much, much worse than those.

Anyway, it was during my med-surg clinical, and my friend and I offered to help our classmate clean her up. As we're holding her over and wiping her, the lady gives me a nice titty twister. Meanwhile, I'm trying to pry her hands off of me while still holding her leg up. We slide the new sheet on and pfffffffffftttt, another large pool of poop that smells like hot garbage appears.

My other poor friend is holding her over on the side, I'm still holding her leg up midway in the air and trying to prevent another titty twister, and the girl who has her runs over to the trash can, starts gagging, and actually pukes. We were all laughing and gagging so hard that half of the floor's nurses and students came down to see what was going on. Once the smell hit them, they did not enter the room. My poor friend had to walk out into the hall, regain composure, and then enter the lady's room again to finish the cleaning.

The best thing about this? After we were all done, the patient says "Why does it smell so bad in here, I think you stink!"

WalkieTalkie, RN · Jul 17, 2009

My personal "tossing cookies" thing is colostomy bags. I've seen and cleaned up everything from GI bleed, c. diff, pseudomonas sputum, rotten crotches, yeasty beasties under large folds, even rotten wounds with maggots in them. Those are nothing compared to the way a colostomy bag grosses me out.

When I was a tech, we had to empty all the drains on the floor for when the nurses did their 8 hr I&O. I used to pay or bribe my friends to do the ostomies. Now that I'm a nurse, I really do try to do my own, but sometimes I will have to ask for assistance, especially if the patient is awake, because I know the look on my face gives it away... and it often leaves to dry heaving. There's just something not quite right with having poop in a bag!