What's Your Sign Baby?

[AutumnApple]

Something that was said on another thread reminded me of an incident I had when I was on clinicals as a student.

Sock puppets.

Got your attention?

Here is what happened:

My clinical group was doing it's rotation on a M/S unit with tele. This specific unit utilized Telemetry Techs (is that the right word?). The techs would watch the monitors, take care of beeping that was just a result of the pt disconnecting (for instance, to go to the bathroom) types of things and of course alert the nurse if there was a problem.

One of the techs was a middle aged man, I say....oh, 35ish. He was always joking with the nurses which at first seemed nice. We can all use some humor in the day, right? Not his humor. I noticed the nurses often gave him the cold shoulder, or just gave him one word responses while he was carrying on. To be honest, his jokes weren't funny so, I wrote it off as that being the reason for it all.

Nope. There was more. He was a creep. One day he kept following me around with a sock puppet and flirting with me. The sock puppet would say "Hey, you're cute" then he'd apologize for his friend's rudeness. On and on he kept going and all my social ques that he was annoying me went ignored.

Then he started with the "Hi, I'm ToeRiffic, what's your name? I like long walks on the beach, country music, romantic dinners at McDonald's................."

Thank goodness the nurse assigned to the patient I was watching stepped in at this point. She was so casual and smooth about it too: "Oh, hi Autumn. I see you're going to do the dressing our patient is ordered. Why don't you go introduce yourself to the patient while I get your instructor so she can have a little chat with our tech here. I'll be in to join you in just a few."

I loved my clinical instructor at the time. She was detail oriented without being OCD, if that makes sense. Smart too, loved how she always seemed to know what was going to happen before it did. Well, I don't know what she said to that tech but for the remainder of our rotation that semester, he never once rose from his seat or approached another student.

So, we're all aware of how nursing is often turned into a sex symbol thing. Some in the general public still believe this nonsense and think all flirting with nurses is always appreciated.

What's your story about being flirted with while you were nursing?

What'd you do?

[djh123]

One of my residents in her 90's told me that if she was quite a bit younger, she'd marry me. Then, to my surprise, when I came back a few days later after being off, she remembered having said that and said that she was out of line and so on. I told her I actually appreciated *both* comments. :^)

[kakamegamama]

35 is middle aged? OMG. Perhaps I should quit now while I'm ahead.

ETA: I didn't see the other posts regarding this. No, 35 is not middle aged (and my age doesn't bother me either). 50s is more like it. 35 was middle aged about 30 years ago.

50s is more like middle age? I thought 60s were :)

[Spidey's mom, ADN, BSN, RN]

50s is more like middle age? I thought 60s were :)

Yeah, I still have a 15 year old at home and I'm 59 . . . I think I'm middle-aged but I'm probably older than that. Not elderly . . .yet.

[MikeyT-c-IV]

I had an elderly pt try to set me up with her granddaughter

Hehe, I've been in the same scenario. Sometimes Grandma's can be ornery in regard to this topic, too. :)

[caffeinatednurse, BSN, RN]

I was taking care of a middle aged, A&O male patient when I worked as a new grad on a medical-surgical unit. Came in for bedside report with the leaving nurse, and everything was fine. Came back later with my preceptor and everything was fine. When I came in the third time, I was by myself. I proceeded to do my assessment, and I literally had my stethoscope on his chest when he started hitting on me. I redirected the conversation. He kept prying with personal questions. Asking me if I was single, why I wasn't in a relationship, telling me that I was a very pretty nurse and that I shouldn't have any problems finding a BF, asking how old I was "to see if he had a chance." (A little creepy considering I was 23 at the time but looked maybe 16.) I kept trying to divert the conversation back to him, his health, his medications, etc. but he persisted.

I broke off the conversation, walked out of the room, and straight to my preceptor. I'm normally a very calm and quiet person, but my face was red and I was clearly upset. I told him what happened, and that the guy was still persistent after redirecting him several times. I'll never forget my preceptors next words, "So he's gonna be like that, eh?" He then took over that patient's care. I passed by the room about an hour later when my preceptor was in there and couldn't help but glance in...I've never seen a man look so disappointed before in my life. I guess he didn't like having a male nurse. :)

When I was in the ICU as a student nurse, it was pretty much par for the course that a demented patient would grab a body part, make an inappropriate comment or try to set me up with their family members. It's easier, in my experience, to redirect a patient with dementia than it is to convince an A&O patient who has been watching too much of Grey's Anatomy that I'm a professional nurse, and not a Hollywood nurse.

[HeySis, BSN, RN]

omg how did you keep a straight face?

I grinned ear to ear, and I think that was the response he was looking for because he seemed to relax after that. The biggest kicker is there was "no size difference" between the two men... just their interpretation.