Nurses Always Seem So Happy (Part 4)

Like every other morning I sit awaiting my handover at 7.30am. I expect to me moved and become the care assistant but I am not. I sit there and hear out handover. I am unsure of some of the patients because I was moved yesterday. It is the usual people today, Sister Poppins, Mrs F Flat another nurse and a care assistant. The care assistant is not from this ward as she works for the bank. My patients are as usual very dependent and some are quite ill. I carry on with my duties and have decided it is best just to avoid Sister Poppins. The other female nurse has been absent for months and has come back but I have never met her. She pulls me aside asking if I am enjoying the ward and I mention how I love working with the patients but I do not think Mary Poppins likes me as she never speaks to me unless she thinks I have done something wrong. The nurse appeared to be a very nice person she had red curly hair and looked like a female version of Gene Wilder the comedian. She told me she was absent because Sister Mary Poppins drove her to a nervous breakdown. She said she could not prove it because once someone is mentally ill they are labelled and truths can be distorted. She told me she had bills to pay and couldn’t face coming back here but she had no choice. I asked her why she didn’t leave. She said Sister Poppins would not give her a fair reference and because she was absent for so long no one would want her. She said she planned on being there for around three months then try to move. She stated that she would now be saving all the facts in a diary as her union had asked her to do. She put on a very straight face as she began to roll out advice like she had saved it up for months to tell others. She said, ‘now my advice to you is move wards, as quickly as you can. While you are here stay away from Sister and her F Grade. The F Grade is her eyes and ears and she comes over as caring but she is not. Oh and if you need anything on no account ask the Sister because she will do nothing for you. One final thing, if you are not in a union get in one now’. Sister turned the corner and we both parted company. I felt a bit scared by what she had told me. I had already had unfair and inaccurate comments added to my personal file. I digested the information while I worked. I always smiled at the patients no matter how I felt. One very frail little elderly lady smiled at me and said, ‘you are a lovely girl dear, always smiling. Nurses always seem so happy.’ I must have hidden a lot of my hurt very well. I made it my duty to never ever take what was happening to me out on the patients.

Patients versus Lockers

When I could hide away from Poppins and F Flat I would be the nurse that could care for the patients ensuring no detail of their care was overlooked. Sometimes it was hard because I would be so busy dealing with the patients that sometimes the ward could get a little bit cluttered. I was just one pair of hands. My priority has always been the patients. Once they are settled then I can tidy up. Sister Mary Poppins would get very annoyed if the ward looked in the slightest of a mess. She came behind the curtain where I was bed bathing a patient with the help of a care assistant and moaned at me for making a mess. She told me to stop what I am doing and clear up the lockers. The patient was naked apart from the towels covering her. I never answered back to Sister but felt this was extreme and this went against my practice. I said to the care assistant that my plan is to carry on with this patient then clean the lockers. I thought about my own rationale and I would never leave a patient naked on a bed to do something as trivial as clean a locker. The care assistant looked worried and said maybe we should do what she says. I said that I would not. As the morning wore on I was left alone with the patients and the care assistant was told that she had to work with the other nurse. I had no help with mobilising patients with severe mobility problems and I needed the help of another, this was moving and handling policy. I could not get organised because I had no help. This meant a couple of patients had to be left in bed and I really struggled. I went through to ask if I could get some help and was abruptly told that I would just have to manage. Sister shouted abruptly at me, ‘just do what you can for now’. So I did and by lunch time those patients still needed help to get out bed. I did all the other things I could and even tidied up.

Only In Dreams in Beautiful Dreams

Mrs F Flat came through and said you should have had all this done by now. I said I would have done if I had help. She told me it was all down to my organisation and I was not very good at it. She said, ‘I see you are still unable to do a bed bath properly.’ Mrs F Flat had no children and did not do a degree. She gained her nursing qualifications through the previous route. On the other hand I had many qualifications and I had children. Studying for a degree while caring for children is very demanding, how dare Mrs F Flat say I had no organisational skills! I was taught bed baths many years ago, so I also did not accept that I did not know how to give a bed bath. Mrs F Flat took over the care of my patients informing me all the time about how poor my practice was, making me feel like a real loser. She said that Mary Poppins needs to have a word with me after lunch. It was time for lunch and I did not have much money but I need to go to the canteen because there is no staff room in this ward to sit and eat sandwiches. Mary Poppins will not allow staff to have a room to sit and relax on breaks. I walk to the canteen and look outside to see that it has been snowing. The ground looks lovely all thick with snow. There are a few patterns of footsteps in different directions. I stop for a few minutes and gaze outside an open door. There was quietness and although it was cold the air was good. I could smell the food from the canteen but I wasn’t hungry. The cold air made my eyes water. I thought about what my footsteps would look like as I walked out towards my car and away home. I thought about sitting at home by the fire with the cat curled up on my knee. Simple life is what dreams are made off and my dreams were locked up in a box and it felt like Sister Mary Poppins held on to the key of that box and would not allow me to have it. This blanket of snow did not stop me from going home the reality of living costs did. I sat down in the canteen to a plate of pasta. I ate a little bit and sipped some tea. I sighed heavily and looked up to see my friend. She came straight over to me with tears in her eyes. ‘What is wrong?’ I asked. She sat down informing me that she will be leaving, that she could not take the bullying anymore. She informed me that her Sister was screaming in her face and that she kept picking on her. She started going though her story and I knew it was bullying. I asked if she had done anything to solve it. She said that she had taken steps but nothing was being done by managers. I asked if she was in a union. She said that she always meant to join but nothing could be done for her as bullying is hard to prove. I wanted to tell her about what I was going through but I couldn’t make her feel worse. This was my friend and I have never seen her like this before. I felt sorry for her but already knew nursing was not the career that it was portrayed. Programmes on television such as Holby and Casualty show nurses working as a team without staff shortages and bullying, I have saw these programmes with staff having the odd exchange of words. To me, a nursing environment like that portrayed in these programmes would be a heavenly place to work. The public have no idea what goes on and we are gagged from saying anything.

The Hogwarts Dunces Cap Goes Too..........

I go back to the ward and straight into a meeting with Mary Poppins. She had again become Professor Umbridge from Harry Potter. Her frog eyes staring at me as though I were a fly that she thought would make a snack. I expected a big long tongue to appear out of her head and I would be swallowed in one. She had been eating her lunch in her office and had obviously just finished, I could smell soup and the crumbs of bread were lying on her desk. I awaited her conversation but she did not speak. She stared at me and then filed through some papers. This was more about her manner; she was not really reading the papers as they were upside down. She kept looking at me up and down but did not speak. She started by saying, ‘I have been hearing your practice is not up to scratch’. She stated that Mrs F Flat had reported me as being unorganised. I explained that this morning there was no-one to help me and I had asked. She put up her hand as though I were not allowed to speak. She went on to state that I was wrong to disobey her when I was told to clean the lockers. She came out with a list and stated that this would also go on my record. I told her that these were wrong and everything else had explanations. She turned to me and said, ‘I do not want to hear it.’ I did not get the opportunity to explain. My side of the story was but a whisper in a crowded room. What was the point of trying to explain? I was obviously stupid and despite my education and prior experience I was sitting here wearing the dunces cap. My stomach ached and I did not know why? I have been getting headaches too but I am sure I am just dehydrated. I went out to the patients and smiled. There was an elderly lady with big bright eyes she was very ill but smiled through all her pain and never complained. We had lovely talks and she had this perfume that always reminds me of her to this day, a perfume called ‘Maybe Baby.’ She would spend all morning putting on makeup and doing her hair it would take her ages but she insisted nobody should help her. Her nails looked lovely and if it was not for the oxygen tubing going into her nostrils it would be hard to believe she was ill. She said that it is her perfume that makes her feel as though she were complete. Today she had turned a corner and became worse. She cried at the thought of leaving her family. I wanted to make this lady better again but I couldn’t. She informed me that I have been wonderful to her. Her family all came in and there was a well of emotion. They asked all sorts of questions of me and I had the doctor speak to them and made them all tea and coffee. They sat by the patient’s bed as she deteriorated. This is the point in nursing when I feel so helpless. After the patient died I cleaned the patient and brushed her hair. When she looked presentable I gave her a little of her perfume, ‘Maybe Baby’. As usual I felt the lump in my throat.

You Should Have Joined The AA

I give my handover to the night staff who listen intently as I inform them off the patients. Only one staff member is from this ward the rest are bank staff. The nurse says she is leaving to go to another hospital as the absence rate is getting high and everyone is leaving. She smiles saying that she never works daytimes here because of Sister Poppins and Mrs F Flat. She said she caught sight of Mary Poppins today stuck in her car on a slip road with her hazards on. The nurse said it looked like she had broken down. She said that all the other cars were beeping their horns at her. I leave the hospital at the end of my shift with my car keys in hand ready to make my getaway. The snow was deeper now and as I was driving home I could see all the snowmen lined up in gardens like sentries. Everything looked bright and it made me smile to be going home to my fire.