Delirious by 8pm...

Last night upon arriving at work and going to my pod, a strange thing happened.  There are different stages of nurse emotion I experience through the night, which usually go something like this:

7pm - when I come on - motivation/energy (I have coffee)
8-10pm -- still good, pretty motivated (the coffee is still in my system) increasing stress level with increasing patient load
11-12:30 - - Hanger sets in (hunger + anger), empathy decreases, maximum irritability
LUNCH between 12-2
2am-4am - - depression, fatigue, least motivation, all empathy gone, things are funny
5am - Yay!  It's morning time!  A small return of energy, still no empathy
6am - BREAKFAST, cafeteria opens!  (My favorite part of the day)
6:30am-7:05am - time stops, we usually get really busy and run in circles get ambulances and patients in through triage and we die a little inside until the next shift comes out. (empathy still gone)


Well, last night I went straight from 7pm motivation to ALL THINGS ARE HILARIOUS by 8pm.  I think it was because we were so busy and I was in the psych pod and all the patients were so ridiculous I just skipped all empathy decreases and went straight to sitting and laughing at everything.  We had two patients tied to their beds in restraints, drunk patients everywhere, adults yelling "mama!" over and over again, patients trying to fight other patients, patients from the prison and jail, sobbing patients, patients talking to imaginary friends, patients puking and peeing in the bed and ambulances rolling in with patients drunkenly yelling "I'm home!" and trying to fall off the stretchers as they came through the doors.  Plus we were short staffed.  Wonderfully I skipped irritability and increasing stress level and I thought everything was pretty darn funny.  It also was a life-saver that one of my good buddies was my other pod mate. 

Later in the morning another friend and I made individualized anger flow charts and gave them to each other so we can try to figure out why the other person in cranky/angry and how we can fix it in the future.  My solutions to the various anger-causing issues I have included sleep, chocolate, Midol, homicide, and "brush your hair, put your chapstick on and PULL YOURSELF TOGETHER!".  Most of hers revolved around wearing pretty shoes and/or sweatpants.  She is not a nurse, she works in the registration side, so this could be a possibility for her. 

so good

This is THE BEST

http://improveverywhere.com/2013/11/19/harry-potter-in-real-life-movies-in-real-life-episode-8/

sayings

I remember hearing some of these for the first time and thinking "what in the world????"

13 Southern Sayings That The Rest Of America Won't Understand

http://www.businessinsider.com/southern-sayings-2013-10

cruel, cruel world

Last night I got stuck working on one of the more cruel nights of nursing...daylight savings time.  As if 12 hours are not difficult enough, on this special night at 2am we all get to watch the clocks turn back an hour.  It is like being trapped in a nightmare. Also, the computers all go down so we have the added misery of paper charting then trying to convert all the paper charting back to electronic charting once the computers are back to working on top of it.  I had it pretty easy this time, not going to lie, as I was in triage so I just had to hand write the complaint and vitals instead of typing them.  The fact that I was in triage tonight and the fact that I was in triage the night the little old constipated lady came back in for a digital dis-impaction makes me think the ER gods are looking out for me...every once in a great while ; )

On a happier note here is the sweet and precious fur baby sporting an early 2000's Abercrombie zip up jacket.  If he doesn't melt your heart nothing will.