I Hate Crying (in front of people)

Today was a kind of rough sort of day.

It involved a patient who is in so much pain he was begging for help. Looking me right in the eyes and telling me he couldn't take it anymore. He just couldn't handle it anymore. Begging me to make it stop.

From there it only got more and more out of control. I found myself spiraling, loads of things to do, but just little things. It was like, "Ok, well I'll change this dressing and then I'll go for my break" and then as soon as the dressing was done there was an order for an IV bolus on another patient, pain meds for the first patient, then the next patient needed paperwork filled out, then it was 11 and time for blood sugars and some 11 o'clock pills and then another patient needed a bolus and the first patient needed some more pain medication, and then some doctor asked me questions about the patient and I have no idea what the answers are, then the patient in pain is complaining about his catheter so I irrigated it, and then bladder scanned him, and then more pain meds, then it was lunchtime meds, and then another patient went for a test and he had a stupid reaction to the meds they gave him in the test so had to be monitored closely, and then needed a bolus, and then in between that I was trying to get my charts done. And then more pain meds for my patient in pain. Then it was 3:30 and I was giving report to the next nurse and thinking of all the things I didn't get done and didn't know about my patients.



And during all of this I was constantly asked by staff if I was doing ok, and if there was anything they could do for me...and I was always "Fine" and I didn't think there was really anything they could do. It wasn't like there was a million things I needed to do at once, it was just a million things one after the other. And everytime I was asked how I was doing, I got a little bit closer to crying. They tried to get me to go on my breaks, and I just got even closer to crying.



And then the real kicker: when you are so worn out, you can barely keep from crying because you are so incredibly disappointed in yourself (despite the fact that you know your expectations are a little too high) and then someone tells you that your patients wife told them that you've been a really good nurse. Who does that? Who tells you nice things when you know that you are the worst nurse in the history of the planet? Because when you are at the end of whatever it is that has gotten you through the day so far, those nice things that you should be proud to hear are actually the hardest things to hear.



The only worse than nice things at that point would be bad things.



And I don't know if this is normal, or if it's just me. It's happened before. In my 2nd year of nursing school my patients wife told me I'd be a great nurse at a time when I felt things were out of my control and I just made it out of the room before bursting into tears. And I hate crying in front of people. It just sucks. My eyes go all red, and my face gets blotchy, my voice gets high pitched, and i get sniffly. Words don't come out properly. It's just a mess! Believe me! If you knew I was crying when I wrote that last paragraph (the one that is a paragraph, not the one that is a sentence) you'd have stopped reading the blog and run for the hills.

Anyway, for some good things about my day (the last 3 days actually) check out this blog ! It's great. I promise!
Goodnight for now, and I promise I'll update sometime and it won't be ridiculous whining/venting.