Whats it like being a guy in a female dominated career?

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Alright, first of all I graduated high school in 2008 and still am doing nothing with my life. Ive been thinking too hard about things and was wondering how its like being a male nurse. Im a CNA but when I worked I hated it. It was boring, repetitive, I was the only guy there, and delt with grumpy ass female employees. I like action, I hate being bored, its hard for me to keep a job because I just get so bored with things. I was wondering if this is the type of atmoshpere I would like (nursing). Trying to become a STNA made me not want to be a nurse at all. But its a completely different working evironment. Can someone help me out here

I can say that in my (pretty darn long) career, I have been a staff nurse, a manager, and even an administrator, and I can say that the better the balance on the staff, the better the care. We are 70/30 women/men. We need more men. You guys bring an aspect to patient interaction, staff interaction and general professionalism and accountablilty that women just see differently (oh I'm a woman by the way). We need more testosterone in the pool!

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Specializes in Critical Care Nursing AKA ICU.
Alright, first of all I graduated high school in 2008 and still am doing nothing with my life. Ive been thinking too hard about things and was wondering how its like being a male nurse. Im a CNA but when I worked I hated it. It was boring, repetitive, I was the only guy there, and delt with grumpy ass female employees. I like action, I hate being bored, its hard for me to keep a job because I just get so bored with things. I was wondering if this is the type of atmoshpere I would like (nursing). Trying to become a STNA made me not want to be a nurse at all. But its a completely different working evironment. Can someone help me out here

it's like dating a girl that is ALWAYS on her period...messing, obnoxious, short tempered, drama, nagging, backstabbing, needy, ruthless...bottom line it' horrible

actually if you want to work with more guys where you don't have all this drama got an ICU like CVICU or Shock Trauma ICU

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Specializes in None Yet.

I know several male nurses, and all of them are fine working in a mostly-female field. Two of them work as ER nurses; they love the excitement in the ER and enjoy working with trauma cases in their hospital in Chicago, IL. There are actually quite a few male ER nurses in this particular hospital.

My other male nurse friend works as a Primary Care NP in a small rural setting here in Kentucky....people always assume he's a doctor since he's a guy, but he works mostly with women and doesn't mind it.

It all pretty much depends on how comfortable you are working in a non-traditional field...there are not a lot of male nurses here where I live, but there are quite a few males in the NP programs here so I expect that we'll see more men going into nursing.

If you like fast-paced work or challenging work, then ER nursing can be pretty rewarding. I've also been told that psychiatric nursing also is interesting and challenging, and I would encourage you to learn more about various nursing specialties by talking with others in the field or researching.

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Check out ER and ICU. Both are fast paced and seem to attract more no-nonsense less emotionally driven female RNs. There are more men around too. I've come to work more than once to find all but one or two RNs on my unit were guys.

It seems to me that men are drawn to ICU, ER and Psych (including correctional nursing...)

We have 50/50 on our unit and most of the women have shared that they prefer it that way as it keeps the silliness down.....

I admit there are days where I feel like I am suffering from estrogen poisoning but those are very rare.

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I can say that in my (pretty darn long) career, I have been a staff nurse, a manager, and even an administrator, and I can say that the better the balance on the staff, the better the care. We are 70/30 women/men. We need more men. You guys bring an aspect to patient interaction, staff interaction and general professionalism and accountablilty that women just see differently (oh I'm a woman by the way). We need more testosterone in the pool!

Exactly what my boss says and believes....

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Working with women has been for the most part great, working for them has been a nightmare. I have had s few supervisors who were just bonkers with full blown narcissitic personality d/o.

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Working with women has been for the most part great working for them has been a nightmare. I have had s few supervisors who were just bonkers with full blown narcissitic personality d/o.[/quote']

Thats how I ended up in nursing. I was bullied out of a job by 2 narcissists.

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Specializes in Cardiac &Medical ICU, Emergency Medicine.

Like everyone has said, ER and ICU is where it's at. Super exciting.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Progressive Care.

I think a lot of this depends on where you work. As others have noted ED and ICU tend to have more men than other areas.

If you are bored, why not focus on your patients? I am in the ICU and the part I love the most is giving basic care. A properly given bath, ambulating a pt, oral care - these are critical pieces of nursing. All of our wiz bang technology is worth squat if the pt gets and decub from poor skin care and too few turns. PE, PNA, atalectasis, UTIs, decubs - these are real problems that mess people up.

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Specializes in ER, ICU.

EMS dude. You get to step in brains, wrestle with drunks, and in one day might be in a chicken factory, million dollar home, or a strip club. You will see stuff that no one in the hospital sees. You also get to help people and save the occasional life. The pay sucks but if you get some experience as an EMT, then get your paramedic you can do OK. It's perfect for the "routine" challenged person. Rural areas can be boring as the call volume is slow, but in an urban area you get plenty of action. Sounds like this might work for you.

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to the poster who said he felt he was suffering from oestrogen poisioning - that comment made me laugh and i;m a woman lol very funny

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Specializes in OR, OB, EM, Flight, ICU, PACU.......

I'm in a Medium sized Urban Hospital in the OR. There are only 1 1/2 other males in the unit(one other full time, one part time) and yes, I've had to listen to certain nurses comments about "stupid men, lazy men.....etc" , usually when they think no one can hear them. Happens everwhere. I get away with a lot more than the usual male,as being a sensitive kind of guy isn't in my makeup, and the jerks have no defense for it. They don't expect confrontation in a loud, military manner (but still done in the most tasteful, diplomatic way) when they try to pull any of their crap. You'd be surprised how they leave you alone after that. There's always Football for the Estrogen poisoning. I also like to think of myself as a Spy (014-twice as good as 007!) as there is no way, short of bugging the women's locker room for seeing at close hand, the workings of the Female of the species.

just something to think about.....

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