Now We Are Ten

 

Sonofagun. Past it, in fact. As of early last month.

Didn't even notice in all the hubbub of normal life.

We are also damned near the last and only ER nursing blog that's not happygas and rah-rah pablum still in existence. Shrtstormtrooper, God love her, keeps plugging away on her blog, and more regularly, we confess, than we have on this one. But she sounds about ready to throw in the towel on the ER, and make a mental health move to something less soul-crushing. Time will tell.

We didn't realize ten years' time would get us the Sole Survivor crown in this endeavor, and as we said, we haven't been nearly as prolific or consistent dropping in over here as we have at our other endeavor.

Part of that is because after the first year or two, you've seen almost everything you're ever going to see in the ER, for 95% of patients. A sprained knee or appendicitis is exactly like every other one. (Thank heavens.)

The other 5% is unbelievably hilarious, jaw-droppingly horrific, or mind-bogglingly weird (sometimes all of the above).

But we've got, according to the Social Security Administration, probably another decade of shoveling coal down here in the boiler room before we can think about docking this battleship and getting off. And if we hit the Powerball tomorrow, while we love the job, and most of our co-workers, we'd leave skid marks out of the parking lot, and send the night shift a prepaid food truck every night for a month as a goodbye present, and never think about it again, unless writing a book or a script.

And sleep soundly every night, and walk around with a smile on my face every day afterwards.

But we took care of another...seventeen patients just last week, directly, and saved at least three of them from dying that day. And that part never gets old, no matter how tired we are of the drunks, addicts, and drug-seeking @$$holes who waste our time and effort, society's money, and their own lives.

So we're not going anywhere, anytime soon. Including online.

Just disappointed currently, because of having a preceptee/new grad for a couple of months, who was learning the gig ahead of schedule (95% her, and 5% us), and then was taken away and farmed out to good nurses and bad for the next two months, and is now struggling, hesitant, had her confidence shot, needing extra time in orientation training, and may possibly crash and burn, because manglement does what it does deaf and blindfolded, and can't figure out why they keep losing 90% of their new grad trainees, when they keep turning them over to nurses who couldn't teach their way out of a wet paper bag, let alone imbue a new grad with the skills to do this job. We could teach a motivated monkey to do it well, but we're not somebody's bestie, and thus not liable to get that opportunity again.

That absolutely and quite simply sucks.

And it's unethical, unlawful, and sadly against hospital policy to take the guilty jackholes into the supply room and do some one-on-one wall-to-wall counselling, to teach them the error of their ways.

That's a notable pity as well.

Because I like my job, and I'd like to download some wee quantity of what I know and learned in the last nearly thirty years doing it, before it's too late. But I don't love that enough to ride that concern right over the cliff.

And the Flying @$$holes always self-select for more Flying @$$holes, and can't figure out why better quality people always end up leaving, or not getting on their team in the first place. 

Said every staff member at every hospital since Florence Nightingale was a new grad.

At any rate, since noticing the recently passed blogiversary, we are entitled to a party and some cake. And many happy returns of the day.

Best wishes to all who drop by here, and a commendation to those who continue to fight the good fight, in the professions and careers that matter, to the highest extent humanly possible in this lifetime.

What do you do at work? I save lives. 

You too? Pretty effing awesome resume, right there.

Milestones

 

21 years in the ED as of last Monday. (Yep, my first day in the ED was the morning of 9/11/01; the planes were crashing into the WTC as I was driving to work.)

27 years as an RN next week.

If you really don't love the job, no amount of money is worth it.

For some people, a year is too long. For others, after 40 years, they're just getting into the groove.

Find something you love to do.

I swore as a student I'd never be one of the bitter old burnouts I met who hate everyone, and suck at the job. But remember, some people need compassion manifested as tough love, not as fluffy bunnies.

Blogiversary

Has it only been a year? Really?

Seems like three.

And looking over to the right, as noted earlier, four more blogs have pretty much died (I removed GuitarGirl RN, the link is dead and it's gone).

Swear to Buddha, blogging the Emergency Department is like crossing the plains and following the bones of the unsuccessful pioneers.

Ever a glutton for punishment, after doing ass-kicking Level I Trauma to start my career, I may be returning to it again soon. It should at least give me even more to write about, as the second time around I'll take better notes. And no discernible uptick in human intelligence nor behavior has been noted, whether one refers to patients, family members, staff, or management.

See you in the trenches.