Unwilling link in the enabling chain...

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Specializes in school nurse.

Witnessed an 8th grader doing a bad "sick" impression the other day - bad in that she was trying her best to channel a kindergartener's affect when they're not feeling well.

Oh, and she arrived first thing before even going to class. Guess mom hadn't fallen for the act earlier at home.

It was not a good look on her, especially when she was seen merrily bouncing down the hallway later with some compatriots.

Getting more and more discouraged at how the health office continues to morph into a "Get Out of Class Free Card" for a select (non-sick) portion of the school population.

Anyway, rant over...

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I so feel this post!!! Listen, these kids cannot help how manipulative and dramatic they are. Adults have allowed them to become this way. Kids jobs are to push boundaries, it is up to us to draw a line in the sand. I feel like I try to but boy is it tough and the burnout is real!!

I am 6 weeks into my 14th year as a school nurse and am just feeling DONE!

The kids are needy because the adults in the building have gotten so much younger, needier and have little to no common sense.

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YES! We're only on week 5 and this is already the year of the fakers. All new students who think they can pull one over on me. I had a student make up a whole story about hitting her head then exhibit very specific, subjective characteristics of concussion. Nice try. Our school installed high res camera on our field. We watched the footage. No head hit ever occurred.

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6 minutes ago, BiscuitRN said:

YES! We're only on week 5 and this is already the year of the fakers. All new students who think they can pull one over on me. I had a student make up a whole story about hitting her head then exhibit very specific, subjective characteristics of concussion. Nice try. Our school installed high res camera on our field. We watched the footage. No head hit ever occurred.

NIIICCEEEE!!!!!!

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49 minutes ago, EnoughWithTheIce said:

these kids cannot help how manipulative and dramatic they are.

Because the adults in their lives are manipulative and dramatic too!! I am case managing a student and his mother is new to the district and actually said to the school nurse today "You will all have to get use to dealing with me. I WILL make sure my son gets everything I request on his IEP". Word.for.word

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13 minutes ago, MHDNURSE said:

Because the adults in their lives are manipulative and dramatic too!! I am case managing a student and his mother is new to the district and actually said to the school nurse today "You will all have to get use to dealing with me. I WILL make sure my son gets everything I request on his IEP". Word.for.word

And what is so sad is that these requests are more likely about her needs instead of her son's.

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Specializes in pediatrics, School LVN.

The other day I walked into the office 15 minutes before school started, there were 3 students all claiming not to feel good. I took temps, no fever, of course, so I said "I'm not calling anybodies parent before school has even started, go to class." Shockingly non of them came back.

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Specializes in school nursing, ortho, trauma.

i have begun making more calls, especially for my dramatic students that come in 2-3-4 times for their stuffy noses and minor gi upset (probably nerves). I always preface it by telling the student "I have no reason to send you home at this time, but i'll gladly call home and let them know you're not feeling well" then when i get a parent i open with " Sally's been here several times complaining about XXX, I don't have any reason to require you to pick them up at this time, but wanted to let you know that they felt poorly enough to make multiple visits about this". Most of the time, the parents say "ok" and know to expect a call in anything changes for the worse (it usually doesn't). I try to make these calls in front of the students - especially the older ones. If i get the parent's voice mail, i leave a very plain message to call me regarding their child. I'd say over half of the messages i leave don't get returned.

I've begun doing this out of necessity. A few parents who think that i am their child's personal medical concierge got their panties in a bunch when i didn't call to report that I saw their children for their 4-day old colds and Itchy throats that had improved after drinking a little water. Now they get called and i can hear the annoyance in their voices when I call, but you asked for it, you get it.

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Specializes in Peds, MS, DIDD, Corrections, HH, LTC, School Nurse.
45 minutes ago, Flare said:

i have begun making more calls, especially for my dramatic students that come in 2-3-4 times for their stuffy noses and minor gi upset (probably nerves). I always preface it by telling the student "I have no reason to send you home at this time, but i'll gladly call home and let them know you're not feeling well" then when i get a parent i open with " Sally's been here several times complaining about XXX, I don't have any reason to require you to pick them up at this time, but wanted to let you know that they felt poorly enough to make multiple visits about this". Most of the time, the parents say "ok" and know to expect a call in anything changes for the worse (it usually doesn't). I try to make these calls in front of the students - especially the older ones. If i get the parent's voice mail, i leave a very plain message to call me regarding their child. I'd say over half of the messages i leave don't get returned.

I've begun doing this out of necessity. A few parents who think that i am their child's personal medical concierge got their panties in a bunch when i didn't call to report that I saw their children for their 4-day old colds and Itchy throats that had improved after drinking a little water. Now they get called and i can hear the annoyance in their voices when I call, but you asked for it, you get it.

I feel your pain, Sir!!!

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Specializes in Psych, Addictions, SOL (Student of Life).
22 hours ago, MHDNURSE said:

Because the adults in their lives are manipulative and dramatic too!! I am case managing a student and his mother is new to the district and actually said to the school nurse today "You will all have to get use to dealing with me. I WILL make sure my son gets everything I request on his IEP". Word.for.word

As the mother of an about to graduate High School student with an IEP I have to remind people that the student should have all the accommodations listed on the IEP. I was never obnoxious about it but I was great difficulty getting his needs met in Public School. Once I enrolled him in Private School everything changed as the private school had a resource teacher who checked in with us regularly

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2 minutes ago, hppygr8ful said:

the student should have all the accommodations listed on the IEP.

I am guessing that your IEP requests were reasonable le and made sense. These ones were like "everyone will speak to my child respectfully. My son can have as many servings of lunch from the cafeteria as he wants/needs", etc.

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We had a request once for an IEP that nobody from the SPED department was allowed to speak to him. Still trying to figure out how that would work......

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