What is your "thing" and how do you deal with it?

[Robin Verde]

One of my nursing instructors once told me that every nurse has their one "thing" that makes them completely gag and want to vomit??. Hers happened to be emptying colostomy bags. She dealt with it by using peppermint or lavender essential oils in her mask. I have discovered mine...sputum. I have been taking care of a gentleman who has quite a productive cough. Whenever he coughs he then has to spit out a large amount of sputum in a basin. I then obviously have to empty the basin rinse it out and give it back to him. His doctor asked for a sputum specimen to send to the lab. So this time he had to spit it into a cup and I had to put that into a specimen jar and send it to the lab. It took forever to get it into the specimen cup because it was super thick and stuck to the sides of the cup. Although I didn't throw up, I was gagging so hard, I peed a little ????. I can completely understand the need to get that out of the back of his throat because I have chronic post nasal drip myself - it's so gross. My question is how do you deal with your "thing" and what is it?

[beekindRN, ASN, RN]

Burns. I can deal with gangrene, I can deal with wounds, I can deal with pressure ulcers. But ugh, burns freak me the heck out. I even skipped class in nursing school that day.

But mine is fairly easy in that I deal with it by not working a burn unit ?

[Pepper The Cat, BSN, RN]

NG tubes.

hate them with a passion!

I can handle colostomies, trachs, suctioning, but NG tubes not so much.

[KellyMPH]

Vomit. The moment the pt mentions nausea I am on it so fast with the Zofran. I also offer it when pt asks for pain meds like oxy, dilaudid, fentanyl etc. The day I get a patient with intractable vomiting I really dread! I can handle poop, trach stuff, colostomy bags etc. Doesn't phase me.

[Lunah, MSN, RN]

Moldy dentures. Hurk.

Huge thread of this here, there are some good ones:

[BlueShoes12, BSN, RN]

Oh, one more to add - the worst gangrenous foot I've ever seen. Whole foot was black up to the lower leg, complete with maggots. We have a small unit and you could smell it from one end of the unit to the other. I started gagging every time I got near that end of the unit, even after we stole some peppermint oil from pharmacy and I rubbed it under my nose so I could barely smell anything!

We've put leeches on, used maggots on wounds once - I find all that stuff really interesting and normally like wound care and dressings. Normally smells don't bother me, but that foot got me.

[Oldmahubbard]

Patient has been continuously incontinent of urine for weeks and does not allow herself or even the room to be cleaned. This LTC. I cannot enter. I will puke

[Rnhopeful23]

vomit gets me every time ???. Hate the smell and definitely hate the sound of someone actively vomiting. once a patient mentions they are nauseous i am out of the room so fast, fortunately i am a CNA right now so i can just let the nurse deal with it?. Also i agree feet and the mouth are some of my others but more tolerable.

[Joplinj]

Sputum and vomit- worst things ever. Not sure that I am dealing with it at all- I always do my best to avoid. Ha!

[Daisy Joyce]

People coughing up sputum.

I deal with it by looking away.

But when I was pregnant, I had this sweet LOM who would cough up every morning, and no amount of looking away could help. So I just gagged in the bathroom when he wasn’t looking.

[Cricket183, BSN, RN]

14 hours ago, Pepper The Cat said:

NG tubes.

hate them with a passion!

I can handle colostomies, trachs, suctioning, but NG tubes not so much.

I’m right there with you Pepper The Cat. I can handle vomit, feces, colostomies, wounds, trachs, sputum, etc but have me drop a NG tube and the patient starts gagging, so will I! And taking one out with the slime and snot on the tube...UGH!

I also struggle with eyeballs and mouths (injuries in particular) but I can usually manage a brave face.

[NurseSpeedy, ADN, LPN, RN]

Nursing gag me thing: flaky feet when changing socks-flying through the air-yuck-is back away as much as possible and hold my breath. Never gagged, just grossed out by flakey foot issues.

non nursing gag me every time-cat poop-darnit kitty burry that stuff...makes me wonder how healthy organic grain free cat food really is-smells like he died and practically kills me every time! Human poop doesn’t phase me.

[JadedCPN, BSN, RN]

I refer to this as someone's "Nursing Kryptonite." I am always curious to hear what it is.

For me, it is big nasty stage IV type of wounds. The kind that you'd find maggots in - that's why I could never work adults, I would legitimately NOPE myself out of that room and lose my job.