What is your Nursing Kryptonite?

You know, your weakness ... your one "thing" that makes your stomach flip over when you see a patient with it/them/whatever. I had my first "maggot" patient recently (maggots living where they shouldn't be, you understand), and it really grossed many of my coworkers out. I was relieved to find that the maggots didn't bother me ... apparently my only Achilles heel thus far is nasty dentures, LOL -- EWWWWW.

When I was a tech, I had a nurse offer me $5 to suction a patient because sputum makes her queasy.

Eyes are Windows to the soul and why do we want to do gtts, or lazer, or slice into someone's soul. :nailbiting:

LOL!! I had my eyes done fifteen years ago when the prevalent practice was slicing by hand. I had some Valium, and that was it.

My soul is sparkling and beautiful and now I can see auras! Woot! (Not soul auras, unfortunately, but I do see a lot of street light auras.)

For some reason, I cannot handle ear wax. Ugh. So gross.

I actually had a dream yesterday while trying to sleep (night shifter!) that I arrived to work but I couldn't hear anyone talking to me because my ears were full of green wax!! Grossest weirdness ever, I ended up walking out the ambulance doors and crawling under a fence before I woke up.

Specializes in school nurse.

1. (Don't hate) - working with quadriplegic patients; the only way they can manipulate the environment is by manipulating the people around them. Also, to me, that is a fate worse than death.

2. The nasally sound of (mostly) demented older ladies screaming "NURSE!!" repeatedly- that sound can penetrate the soul.

Dirty, scaly, crusty feet, with those yellow toenails wrapped over the ends. You know the ones. You try so carefully to remove the stiff, gray socks and the snow storm of dry skin explodes in your face. The spaces between the toes are filled with petrified globs of of dead skin, probably cemented together with urine. And the smell!

I think I just threw up in my mouth, a little bit.

Cemented together with urine?!?! O_O -_- Egad!!!

Specializes in school nurse.
Dirty, scaly, crusty feet, with those yellow toenails wrapped over the ends. You know the ones. You try so carefully to remove the stiff, gray socks and the snow storm of dry skin explodes in your face. The spaces between the toes are filled with petrified globs of of dead skin, probably cemented together with urine. And the smell!

I think I just threw up in my mouth, a little bit.

In the ED, I used to fill up washbasins with warm water and hibiclens and just place the foot in there, sock and all. It helped immediately with the odor and also "de-stickified" the sock so pulling it off wouldn't open up the inevitable wound lurking beneath...

Spinal cord injuries and TBI's in young people from MVAs. I never go home thinking about something gross but I do identify with those parents whose kid was once their former selves, that always haunts me.

Specializes in Neuro ICU and Med Surg.

Eyeballs. I hate anything to do with eyes. I don't mind giving eye drops, but hate the thought of dealing with eye injuries.

I hate ostomies too. I think it is more being inexperienced caring for them. I worked neuro ICU, and a medical floor before rapid response, so they seem so foreign to me.

I hate watching them drill into the skull for bedside EVD (external ventricular drain or brain drain) placement.

Specializes in ER.

Cyclic vomiters who come into the ER wanting Dilaudid make me crazy. I loathe them and their drama.

Specializes in school nurse.

Is there any legit indication for Dilaudid for emesis? Ever? Just curious.

Specializes in ICU.
1. (Don't hate) - working with quadriplegic patients; the only way they can manipulate the environment is by manipulating the people around them. Also, to me, that is a fate worse than death.

I actually agree - of all the quads I've taken care of, I can only think of two of them that I liked. I get that they HAVE to be assertive about what they need because they can't do it for themselves, but I really hate that bossy attitude. A please, a thank you, or a smile goes a long way.

Or just anyone who starts barking orders the second I walk in the door for the first time. That's going to bias me against them for the rest of the shift. I would really like the first thing a patient says to me to be "hello" or some other sort of acknowledgement that I am a new person and not the same person who was in the room before, or really that I'm a human being at all and not just a mindless drone who exists only to serve them.

The best thing you can do, in my opinion, is to self-acknowledge these areas and be prepared for them and make sure at the end of the day you can say that regardless of your emotions, you treated the situation as you would have treated any other situation. How do you deal with these weaknesses?

I so agree with this comment. I've told this story before but first day of nursing school, our instructors told us to identify our biases and be prepared to talk about it next class.

Medical Kryptonite is something we don't find out about until we've worked for awhile in nursing but still, there are some things I've never liked much.

Feet. Mucous. Vomit.

Specializes in Special Procedures.

Can I just say HOLY crap for a moment? I nearly called this post "What is your Achilles Heel" ..... And then settled on kryptonite.... And then our shared aversion to dentures??? I also don't bat an eye with maggots in nasty wounds and am an ER nurse.....

Are you......... Me?:eek:

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