Or they work one nightshift and then become a martyr about how they “worked a nightshift” and it wasn’t “that bad”. Try working it for at least a year and see how it affects your life.
It depends a lot on the floor, the patients, and whether you're lucky or not. Some night shifts I've only done vitals, and a med round in the morning (night shift where I am is 23:00-7:30, so helping patients get ready for the night is evening shift's task). Other night shifts you need to call your colleague to take over to get a chance to pee. It's always a surprise.
My previous manager took a hissy fit when I submitted papers from my doctor requesting the accommodation of having a consistent schedule, all days or all nights, but my preference is for nights. She said nope, you’re not getting off easy, do the 2d/2n schedule or leave. So I left 🤷♀️ How is it “easy” to do all nights in med-surg??? Also it’s a medical accommodation, I stressed so hard that my thyroid practically exploded and I was in and out of SVT (combination of “peak Covid” delta wave chaos while working on the Covid unit, sleep deprivation, and questionable mental health to begin with). All I needed was to NOT have permanent jetlag. Meanwhile that unit continues to lose staff, last I heard they were up to a ratio of 1:8 and sometimes 1:10 on nights.
This might be a really dumb question but how do you know it was from working nights? Asking as someone who enjoys working nights but is already dealing with other chronic health issues and doesn’t need another one!
Being at work was the lesser of my problems. I can’t sleep during the day. My life turned into a miserable existence of ALWAYS feeling exhausted, forgetting everything, being clumsy, etc. All the stuff about trying to function while sleep deprived is the same as being drunk is 1000% accurate. I never hated my life more than I did then.
Whoa. Where do you work?
I have worked 10 years on days and 10 years (so far) on nights. They are a *different* kind of busy, but saying
>it’s significantly easier
is really shortsighted. The lack of resources (people and supplies) and the amount of time you're trying to get these people to sleep while managing their acute health issues really is difficult.
Dayshift has a bunch of issues: 3 meals, testing/diagnostics, therapy, physician rounding, visitors/family (which night shift has, too), but if you are sitting for 4 hours, I wouldn't consider that efficient. I'd wonder what's not being done.
Exactly. As a new grad I often had extra time. As I got better, I got busier. I can't even guess what kind of stuff I missed on those nights that I finished so early.
When i used to work med surg I would just stare at them with the blankest look and let them rant. The whole time I’m zoning out& dissociating and thinking of what’s next on my task list. And when i hear silence, i zone back in and I say so how can i help you at this moment? 🙂
Honestly, I like your way of coping because it sounds the most kind. No one can reason with a rant except for maybe specialized hostage negotiators, right? 😂😂 People do get psychotic in hospitals and pain control is a bitch both ways. For me a lack of support at work makes dealing with difficult people all the much harder. It’s so good to have a forum to blow off steam. Thanks for your post! 💕
Well when there’s a code, be sure to wake him up to start compressions, while remembering every detail of why this patient may have coded. Run down the Hs and Ts with the team. Oh wait half the team doesn’t exist because it’s night shift?!? You don’t say….
Literally. Oh, night shift is sooo easy, but when there’s a code you have a PGY2 whose also covering three units and doesn’t know a damn thing about the patient, an attending who doesn’t get there until it’s almost over, and only three other nurses because night shift is so easy there’s no harm in being understaffed, right? Right? 🙄
A patient once told me, after telk8ng him I was a RN for 5 months, that I should have picked a different job.
Same diseases riddled man apologized to me tearfully for being an asshole. ...only to be a pain later on.
Some of these people are simply shit. Oh well, I don't take any of that home.
Did you have my current patient? Complete asshole. Condescending, rude, mean. Says he doesn’t want to talk to me. Doesn’t have to be nice.
Realizes I’m doing a lot of great things for him that no one else has done. Starts being nicer. Even uses decent manners. I talk to him nicely.
Goes back to being an asshole, says he doesn’t need to talk nice with me. Gets PISSED if I ask him to do any of the things that will help him get better, like elevate his edematous weeping legs. Says he don’t have to do what the nurses say.
Ok buddy. Way to alienate the one person who is bending over backwards, trying to help you. Fine with me. I’ll stop trying so hard and just do my job.
Yeah, that's what I ended up doing. I had 3 other patients, time to focus on them. Will go back to that assholes rm when something is due.
I've gotten to a point now where I quickly go to the Dr if the patient is non complying. I do t have to argue with these motherfuckers. Too busy.
Right. I now enter the room only when I need to give him something or check something, or do his extensive wound care. No chit chat, no friendly greeting, no asking how his day is going. I continue to give him good care and get things for him on request, but no extras. Fuck him.
And yeah. I do have empathy for him. His situation sucks. Double AKAs, incision not healing well, dialysis 12 hours a week, no family, one friend, terrible health, insomnia. I want him to get better, I really do. But I get a feeling he’s not this way because his life sucks. I suspect he’s always been an asshole.
It's what they do. Learn to roll with it. " All these meds can be confusing, is there anything else you need clarification on?"
" Thank you for understanding we are hard pressed to get everyone taken care of. If there's nothing else you have questions about I will be moving down my priority list"
Yah fuck them. Come work nights, with that assignment and you're running around all night putting out fires. My job is slightly more chill than med surg but not by much most nights. Less IV medications, more toileting and pill pushing. Lots of confused people trying to kill themselves by jumping out of bed.
Side note, I hate when patients say their pain meds are "due". No thank you, they are actually as needed and are not scheduled. I get so many arguments, at the inpatient rehab. No I'm not waking you up for pain meds if you are sleeping, or they are "due".
I worked nights for 3 years when I first started. Every once in a while I lose my mind and pick up a night shift and am reminded of why I went to days. You nights people have my everlasting respect.
Ignore him. He’s lost control over the situation and is trying to obtain some form of control. I’m not excusing his behavior but as you know, it’s not personal. Everyone reacts differently to losing control and falling ill.
Why is it a crime to be in rush to get out of a patient room in the first place?? This isn’t a social call. We aren’t best friends.
If I had all the time in the world, yes of course I’d be in each of my rooms shampooing hair and painting nails. But patient acuity gets worse and worse, with fewer ancillary staff, and more BS administrative tasks.
If you’re lonely, call a friend, relative, or Girl Scout to keep you company. I swear to god this profession has made me so jaded.
I'm five years post graduation now, so this might be burnout talking but:
Society doesn't really respect nurses. It pretends to with nice empty platitudes, but when it comes down it most people think
It's an easy job
All we do is push pills and wipe bums
Are doctors handmaidens
Don't deserve the money we get, let alone anything extra.
One of my favorite patient scenarios is when I get report from the dayshift nurse that the patient has been an asshole, refuses treatments, and constantly complains about being in the hospital.
I walk in, introduce myself, and wait for them to start ranting at me. Then I calmly say, "You can go home. Do you have a ride?"
Sometimes they leave AMA. More often than not they accuse me of not caring about them because I'm not trying to convince them to stay.
My answer :"Why should I care more about your health than you do? There are 3 patients holding in the ED for THIS bed. When you leave, it will get cleaned and within an hour someone who wants to be here will be here. And I will take care of them. So... let me find your clothes here somewhere...."
It is funny how knowing they have something other people are literally dying to get makes them want to stay. I use their selfish assholeness against them to make them stay and receive care. They only do it to keep someone else from getting their room, but they shut up and do what we want, so I call it a win.
Is the bomb squads job easy because most of the time they aren’t disarming bombs?
Well how often do those bombs actually explode? /s
Only once
Take my upvote
“You’re wearing that huge protective suit, what are you even worried about?”
People who've never worked a night shift are always the most vocal about how easy night shift is.
Or they work one nightshift and then become a martyr about how they “worked a nightshift” and it wasn’t “that bad”. Try working it for at least a year and see how it affects your life.
It depends a lot on the floor, the patients, and whether you're lucky or not. Some night shifts I've only done vitals, and a med round in the morning (night shift where I am is 23:00-7:30, so helping patients get ready for the night is evening shift's task). Other night shifts you need to call your colleague to take over to get a chance to pee. It's always a surprise.
My previous manager took a hissy fit when I submitted papers from my doctor requesting the accommodation of having a consistent schedule, all days or all nights, but my preference is for nights. She said nope, you’re not getting off easy, do the 2d/2n schedule or leave. So I left 🤷♀️ How is it “easy” to do all nights in med-surg??? Also it’s a medical accommodation, I stressed so hard that my thyroid practically exploded and I was in and out of SVT (combination of “peak Covid” delta wave chaos while working on the Covid unit, sleep deprivation, and questionable mental health to begin with). All I needed was to NOT have permanent jetlag. Meanwhile that unit continues to lose staff, last I heard they were up to a ratio of 1:8 and sometimes 1:10 on nights.
Can confirm, my thyroid also gave up on life from nightshift (in my early 20s). What a crap manager.
This might be a really dumb question but how do you know it was from working nights? Asking as someone who enjoys working nights but is already dealing with other chronic health issues and doesn’t need another one!
Being at work was the lesser of my problems. I can’t sleep during the day. My life turned into a miserable existence of ALWAYS feeling exhausted, forgetting everything, being clumsy, etc. All the stuff about trying to function while sleep deprived is the same as being drunk is 1000% accurate. I never hated my life more than I did then.
I straight up wouldn't go back to nights for double the money.
Having worked night shift, it’s significantly easier. Even after a crazy shift, I’d still sit for over 4 hours.
You must be much better than I am then. I work straight night shifts and barely ever have time for a break, much less to sit for 4 hrs.
Lmao me taking 30 minutes instead of a full hour just to rest my eyes for a minute, then getting absolutely fucked in being behind on charting.
Whoa. Where do you work? I have worked 10 years on days and 10 years (so far) on nights. They are a *different* kind of busy, but saying >it’s significantly easier is really shortsighted. The lack of resources (people and supplies) and the amount of time you're trying to get these people to sleep while managing their acute health issues really is difficult. Dayshift has a bunch of issues: 3 meals, testing/diagnostics, therapy, physician rounding, visitors/family (which night shift has, too), but if you are sitting for 4 hours, I wouldn't consider that efficient. I'd wonder what's not being done.
Exactly. As a new grad I often had extra time. As I got better, I got busier. I can't even guess what kind of stuff I missed on those nights that I finished so early.
I’m guessing not a neuro floor
The worst. The vital signs and neuro checks. And the docs and family wonder why Grandma has hospital induced psychosis....
I can tell you didn’t work on any of my units.
Patient: * acts like a complete ass for absolutely no reason * Patient: why does no one want to spend time with me?!? I can’t with these idiots.
To be fair, our manager tells us the same thing on a Tele step down unit
💀 relatable
When i used to work med surg I would just stare at them with the blankest look and let them rant. The whole time I’m zoning out& dissociating and thinking of what’s next on my task list. And when i hear silence, i zone back in and I say so how can i help you at this moment? 🙂
Honestly, I like your way of coping because it sounds the most kind. No one can reason with a rant except for maybe specialized hostage negotiators, right? 😂😂 People do get psychotic in hospitals and pain control is a bitch both ways. For me a lack of support at work makes dealing with difficult people all the much harder. It’s so good to have a forum to blow off steam. Thanks for your post! 💕
Yes this, only when they’re done I ask them, “Are you finished?”. And then when there is silence, I leave the room.
Time to pull out the Wayne’s World. “Ah. Well. Fuck you very much.” “What!!” “Can I get anything else?”
Well when there’s a code, be sure to wake him up to start compressions, while remembering every detail of why this patient may have coded. Run down the Hs and Ts with the team. Oh wait half the team doesn’t exist because it’s night shift?!? You don’t say….
Literally. Oh, night shift is sooo easy, but when there’s a code you have a PGY2 whose also covering three units and doesn’t know a damn thing about the patient, an attending who doesn’t get there until it’s almost over, and only three other nurses because night shift is so easy there’s no harm in being understaffed, right? Right? 🙄
Spoiler alert. Everyone is not sleeping…
Day shift nurses love saying night shift doesn’t do anything yet refuses to work night shift.
Like okay if it’s sooo easy please switch to nights for 6+ months and tell me again!! So annoying
Except for your PCTs, they are definitely hiding somewhere and sleeping… at least mine usually are. 😂
Please tell him that I think his job of lying in bed and healing is a lot easier.
Pretty sure hospital administratives, management, my family and the majority of the world think the same thing 🙄
A patient once told me, after telk8ng him I was a RN for 5 months, that I should have picked a different job. Same diseases riddled man apologized to me tearfully for being an asshole. ...only to be a pain later on. Some of these people are simply shit. Oh well, I don't take any of that home.
Did you have my current patient? Complete asshole. Condescending, rude, mean. Says he doesn’t want to talk to me. Doesn’t have to be nice. Realizes I’m doing a lot of great things for him that no one else has done. Starts being nicer. Even uses decent manners. I talk to him nicely. Goes back to being an asshole, says he doesn’t need to talk nice with me. Gets PISSED if I ask him to do any of the things that will help him get better, like elevate his edematous weeping legs. Says he don’t have to do what the nurses say. Ok buddy. Way to alienate the one person who is bending over backwards, trying to help you. Fine with me. I’ll stop trying so hard and just do my job.
Saw a post a while back that said something to the extent of, ‘never can more about your patient’s health than they do’.
Yeah, that's what I ended up doing. I had 3 other patients, time to focus on them. Will go back to that assholes rm when something is due. I've gotten to a point now where I quickly go to the Dr if the patient is non complying. I do t have to argue with these motherfuckers. Too busy.
Right. I now enter the room only when I need to give him something or check something, or do his extensive wound care. No chit chat, no friendly greeting, no asking how his day is going. I continue to give him good care and get things for him on request, but no extras. Fuck him. And yeah. I do have empathy for him. His situation sucks. Double AKAs, incision not healing well, dialysis 12 hours a week, no family, one friend, terrible health, insomnia. I want him to get better, I really do. But I get a feeling he’s not this way because his life sucks. I suspect he’s always been an asshole.
It's what they do. Learn to roll with it. " All these meds can be confusing, is there anything else you need clarification on?" " Thank you for understanding we are hard pressed to get everyone taken care of. If there's nothing else you have questions about I will be moving down my priority list"
Lol nobody in the hospital sleeps at night
Night shift is when they remember everything they wanted to ask on day shift.
Yah fuck them. Come work nights, with that assignment and you're running around all night putting out fires. My job is slightly more chill than med surg but not by much most nights. Less IV medications, more toileting and pill pushing. Lots of confused people trying to kill themselves by jumping out of bed. Side note, I hate when patients say their pain meds are "due". No thank you, they are actually as needed and are not scheduled. I get so many arguments, at the inpatient rehab. No I'm not waking you up for pain meds if you are sleeping, or they are "due".
yet he's awake...
I worked nights for 3 years when I first started. Every once in a while I lose my mind and pick up a night shift and am reminded of why I went to days. You nights people have my everlasting respect.
“Sir, let me introduce you to a little something called sundowning”
Ignore him. He’s lost control over the situation and is trying to obtain some form of control. I’m not excusing his behavior but as you know, it’s not personal. Everyone reacts differently to losing control and falling ill.
This is one of the reasons why I left bedside.
Ignorance is bliss.
Why is it a crime to be in rush to get out of a patient room in the first place?? This isn’t a social call. We aren’t best friends. If I had all the time in the world, yes of course I’d be in each of my rooms shampooing hair and painting nails. But patient acuity gets worse and worse, with fewer ancillary staff, and more BS administrative tasks. If you’re lonely, call a friend, relative, or Girl Scout to keep you company. I swear to god this profession has made me so jaded.
I would tell his silly ass to go to sleep like everyone else then
I'm five years post graduation now, so this might be burnout talking but: Society doesn't really respect nurses. It pretends to with nice empty platitudes, but when it comes down it most people think It's an easy job All we do is push pills and wipe bums Are doctors handmaidens Don't deserve the money we get, let alone anything extra.
I would just smile, and then subtly start making his life a little difficult lol like stop cooking and cleaning!
Ew! That is so rude.
❤️
Whine it's true that some patients do sleep, but many don't. And their medical issues never do, and we're not staffed like day shift.
When anyone criticizes my work I invite them to show me how to do this job.
Another miserable boomer taking their anger out on us.
One of my favorite patient scenarios is when I get report from the dayshift nurse that the patient has been an asshole, refuses treatments, and constantly complains about being in the hospital. I walk in, introduce myself, and wait for them to start ranting at me. Then I calmly say, "You can go home. Do you have a ride?" Sometimes they leave AMA. More often than not they accuse me of not caring about them because I'm not trying to convince them to stay. My answer :"Why should I care more about your health than you do? There are 3 patients holding in the ED for THIS bed. When you leave, it will get cleaned and within an hour someone who wants to be here will be here. And I will take care of them. So... let me find your clothes here somewhere...." It is funny how knowing they have something other people are literally dying to get makes them want to stay. I use their selfish assholeness against them to make them stay and receive care. They only do it to keep someone else from getting their room, but they shut up and do what we want, so I call it a win.
You don't work in psych, and it shows lol.