working as a private duty nurse is trying my patience and getting on my last nerve. I have a patient whose mother is extremely particular in her son's care, which is fine and understandable, but she's also had a quarter of a century of practice and experience with her son and she just doesn't get that it can take time for a nurse, especially an inexperienced one, to master all the routines and details involved in caring for him. At least to her standards.
So it's truly great that she's scheduled a long-time caregiver to assist in my training, one who's known and nursed the patient since he came home from the hospital almost 25 years ago. Really, this lady has a wealth of experience and knowledge and I appreciate all she can teach me about my patient.
What I have no patience for is 8 hours of listening to New Age mumbo-jumbo, Eastern Mysticism, numerology, and astrology. Especially as it supposedly pertains to me. I don't want to hear which of my chakras are blocked, or how I can cleanse my energy. I don't want to know that 3 and 7 are my important numbers which indicate that I am an ethereal being. Or that because I am a Pisces I am "deep water" which meshes well with the patient's "hot water".
If I'm sweaty, it's because it's hot as balls in the room and I'm wrangling 180 pounds of dead weight, while wearing my dress-code ordered scrubs, not because I'm absorbing the patient's energy. I'm not a psychic vampire, ok? Nor am I an angel. And I don't buy that you can communicate telepathically with our patient. Or that he's communicated with you in dreams. If he's constipated, we know because he hasn't pooped in awhile and he's bloated, not because his "poop points" along his IT bands and on his trapezius muscles are tight. Dietary enzyme supplements don't cure cancer. Just because I'm a massage therapist doesn't mean I believe a bunch of poppycock. Where are the studies? Show me the evidence!
8 hours of being polite and professional have damn near broken me.
How do you tell someone you think they're full of shit without completely alienating them?
3 comments:
You find another job.
There's a reason a lot of people work off by themselves, and mostly, it's because they'd get beheaded if they had any decent supervision.
There is essentially no meeting point between your state's professional nursing standards, and the hokum and hooey this person is foisting on you, and at the end of the day, you're responsible for meeting the professional standards.
If someone wants their aura recharged, put them in the shower and hand them a plugged in toaster.
Better for you, better for the patient for whom you're responsible.
It is, of course, unethical to kill your patients, but personally, I feel that offing certain co-workers should be optional, in an ends justifying the means kind of way.
That's the plan! I don't think this lady is a licensed RN any more, though I know for a fact she was one for many years.
I haven't blogged about it because I don't want to jinx it, but it looks like I'll be relocating soon to Live Free or DIE country...and I can't wait! Hematology/Oncology nursing, exactly what I want to do! With good pay and benefits! And a lower cost of living! And no state income or sales tax! w00t!
+1 on Aesop... sigh
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