I couldn’t come with a better title.
As previously explained, I changes wards, a doctor working for more than 35 years at my old unit wrote me an excellent recommendation letter and I went my merry way to my new ward, hoping to find something new.
I introduced myself to nurses and some doctors there. Because the nurses were yelling and punching tables, something I’d never seen from nurses, I started a conversation with the doctors about what abbreviations they use there (completely foreign to me), if they allow their nurses to take blood samples or arterial and venous blood gas probes, to decide if a patient needs blood cultures, to do an EKG without consulting a doctor first, what emergencies they have there…
I had lucky with one of the doctors who answered all my questions.
The next day, my new boss comes to me saying people complained about me talking to the doctors, accused me of playing being a doctor.
I asked if the doctor who answered my questions, Schimdt, complained. My boss refused to identify the person who complained.
My reaction to that was to say that this person could have talked to me instead of escalating, I also told my boss that I’m going to ask no matter what because I want to be a better nurse and the best suited people to do that are doctors (because most of the nurses only want to gossip, whereas doctors are more cerebral and explain correlations, I didn’t say this out loud).
His answer was telling me to stop talking to the doctors, otherwise there would be consequences.
2 hours after he left an Anesthesiologist I didn’t know came to check some PCAs, so me being me, started asking questions about the device and given that I’m thinking about studying medicine I asked about it and he told me where he studied, what he did afterwards, started showing me the documentation anesthesiologists use.
This is something I cannot avoid, I like talking to smart people. My new boss seems to be like my old one, only wanting dumbed down nurses.
Other nurses I asked at the unit told me that no, I’m not supposed to be smart, but just a drone.
It’s ridiculous I have to censor myself. The best I can think of is to play theatrics while he’s at the unit but be me when he leaves.
If you claim I’m talking to the doctors as an excuse not to do my job, you are wrong. I need the money and I use my downtime to learn.
It’s true that people believe what they want to believe and judge you in 5 seconds.
Is there a better strategy than playing theatrics?
This is an important thing to consider. I think what I would suggest is find a way to get impartial people together and talk to . People who will actually be honest with you and tell you hey this is what’s really going on. I’d say make friends at work this will take time. Then ask them. Another suggestion is sometimes one hospital will put out calls for nurses to come in and help out from another hospital. Sometimes they will call other states. Volunteer for those jobs. Usually those jobs last from one to three months. At the end of that period of time to sit down with your bossand your coworkers and ask them about this. I mean, you are now leaving their unit. Maybe they’ll be completely honest with you and say yes you are a great person or maybe they’ll say holy crap. You never stop talking you’re really annoying.