WHY are nurses so catty??

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I swear sometimes i don't know WHY i'm in this profession. My mom works at a job as a RN and was limping one day. Her knee bothers her from time to time, etc...she's overweight (and working on it) but it gives her trouble at times. Instead of someone ASKING her what was wrong, one of the nurses ran to the manager and told her that my mom couldn't "keep up" and didn't seem to be quick enough for the job cuz she seemed disabled. This is a NEW job for my mom, so she's still on orientation technically. The manager called her in and made her take off today to go to Occ health and have it tested so she could be cleared to work. WTF?? She told her "we'll figure out what to do pending what the doc says." so she didn't work today and lost that time worked. Of course she went to occ health, the Doc tested her etc...and cleared her no problem. She told him she was excercising, walking and taking meds for it. Forgot to wrap it that day, but was not having any trouble SINCE that day. I have 2 problems with this. 1 is that NOBODY asked her what was up with her knee that day. NOBODY. 2 is that the manager just jumped on it because of what this other nurse SAID. WHY do nurses feel like they have to police each other's performance? UGH i'm just disgusted.

:angryfire I agree, when i was still green, i worked stepdown and icu, the one lpn that worked there took it upon herself to tattle on everything i did.I would ask questions, but apparently, i asked toomany, Any way this started, well before i became a nurse, before i ever knew she existed, apparently my husband beat her brother up years ago when they were teens, and she saw may last name on my badge, and made my life hell, from then on. i was eventually told to quit or be fired. so i stayed out of hospital's pretty much, since then. :angryfire

So, her being mean to you had nothing to do with being a nurse.

steph

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Specializes in Med-Surg.
:angryfire i agree, when i was still green, i worked stepdown and icu, the one lpn that worked there took it upon herself to tattle on everything i did.i would ask questions, but apparently, i asked toomany, any way this started, well before i became a nurse, before i ever knew she existed, apparently my husband beat her brother up years ago when they were teens, and she saw may last name on my badge, and made my life hell, from then on. i was eventually told to quit or be fired. so i stayed out of hospital's pretty much, since then. :angryfire

so one nurse mistreated you. so now you judge a profression that "nurses eat their young"?

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I dont look down my nose at my fellow nurses, i was just saying of an instance , where all the nurses on that floor ate their young . even the one supervisor told me that. it was not just the one nurse. but, we all should be compassionate and understanding with all of the green nurses out there that are full of questions and tentative.

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i am out there only for my fellow man or woman. that is why i'm a nurse. that is my end objective.

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I have to agree. Women are more catty than men, and nurses are sometimes more catty than common. I think this is because they have a hard and serious job, so when they have something to say to they say it (except not usually to their patients). No beating around the bush. I work at a state mental hospital on an all male ward. I once saw a nurse totally bash another one into tears because she "hid out" for most of the day, in front of all the staff and patients. Way unprofessional.

I have been a nurse for more then 35 years. And I have worked in many different areas, including public health and hospital administration. I have also worked with other professionals. Nurses are no more nor any less catty then any other profession I have had to deal with. People tend to base their opinions on one or two experiences. Correctly or incorrectly. :balloons:

grannynurse

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Specializes in Med-Surg.
I dont look down my nose at my fellow nurses, i was just saying of an instance , where all the nurses on that floor ate their young . even the one supervisor told me that. it was not just the one nurse. but, we all should be compassionate and understanding with all of the green nurses out there that are full of questions and tentative.

I'm sorry, just was trying to get a feel for what you were saying.

I've worked in toxic environments myself and had to leave two charge nurse positions because of the people I worked with (this primarily unfortunately was CNA's and not profressionals). So I'm not naive enough to think there aren't problems out there. I just choose not to blame it on gender. And so far, I'm still in the profression without thinking nurses are catty or eat their young. Those there are plenty of vultures out there. :chuckle

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Specializes in Telemetry, ICU, Resource Pool, Dialysis.
:angryfire I agree, when i was still green, i worked stepdown and icu, the one lpn that worked there took it upon herself to tattle on everything i did.I would ask questions, but apparently, i asked toomany, Any way this started, well before i became a nurse, before i ever knew she existed, apparently my husband beat her brother up years ago when they were teens, and she saw may last name on my badge, and made my life hell, from then on. i was eventually told to quit or be fired. so i stayed out of hospital's pretty much, since then. :angryfire

What a loser (the LPN, not you nurse1995!) to pick on you because your husband beat up her brother when they were kids!! I swear I know people like that!

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Specializes in Cardiac.
I have been a nurse for more then 35 years. And I have worked in many different areas, including public health and hospital administration. I have also worked with other professionals. Nurses are no more nor any less catty then any other profession I have had to deal with. People tend to base their opinions on one or two experiences. Correctly or incorrectly. :balloons:

grannynurse

I have, by far, more than one or two experiences. People usually don't have such strong emotions over an incident or two. I'm talking 10 years of experiences. Too many to count, in different hospitals, on different floors. People aren't being biased for the sake of being biased. They are responding to a fact that they have seen and felt.

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Female nurses are catty because they are women, and frankly, many women are catty. Male nurses expect anyone who takes a job to be physically able to perform. It's not personal. In fact, the NM is doing her job by sending the newly hired RN to get eval'd. If the new RN can't physically do the job, now is the time to find out. Again, it's not personal, it's business.

Not to get into stereotypes, but this is only an issue because most nurses are women. Women look at this problem and see an injustice to the individual. Men look at it and see an injustice to the team.

Meow.

Pete Fitzpatrick

RN, CCRN, CFRN, EMT-P

I absolutely agree because women are naturally competitive people especially at the job. Take it from a woman who knows, other women (not all of them) are always looking for a way to make themselves look better then you even if it means putting your job on the line. Women can really act like backstabbing b****es sometimes. :nono: :nono:

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You meant ' babies ' right? :chuckle

Z

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Specializes in Psych.
As an FYI and PS.......I have very strong feelings about this issue because I am 6 months out of my former job WITH a work related injury from an angry, aggressive co-worker that body slammed me, causing 2 cervical disks to herniate and now a dx of Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy. For 2 years my supervisor and I went through proper channels, memos and enough documentation to choke an elephant and finally closed door meetings with our board, only to have my being injured by the trouble maker when she was in fear of losing her job and ultimately, my supervisor and myself losing our jobs instead! This female individual is the classic codependent, passive/aggressive BULLY. I found tons of info online about bullies in the workplace to show our board and make my case. I called the police everytime I came in and found she had ransacked my desk again. I had surveillance set up in my office too. CSI would have been proud. The bully won. I now spend my time learning to deal with the injustice of it all and a day filled with searing pain in my arm. It is time for the bullies to go away or play nice.

Could you have called the police and had her charged w/battery?

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Specializes in RN, BSN, CHDN.
From dictionary.com

"Subtly cruel or malicious; spiteful".

What does it mean in the UK?

Catty in the UK is quite a mild description used to describe an off the cuff remark, we would probably use the word b**chy rather than catty.

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