What Would You like People to Know About Your Job?

RN-Our 12 hour shifts are really 13 - 14 hour shifts spent most of the time running our @$$ off at times without even a lunch break. Then we go home and care for our family for the hour or two left of the evening, go to bed and back to work. We don't get weekends or holidays off.

When you see nurses at the nurses station and you think that we are just hanging around, what we really are doing is making calls to the MD, waiting for important information about your loved ones health, charting, discussing a patient's condition, faxing something, maby stopping after 10 hours of running to catch our breath and destress a few minutes.

We are here to help you get better and I will do the best I can to get to your call light the minute before you ring it, but if I am in another room doing CPR on another patient - I am sorry, your need, unless it is life or death will have to wait until I revive the patient in the next room. My job is not to wipe your @$$ if you are perfectly capable of doing that yourself. Of course if you are too ill or have a condition that prevents you from managing your own hygiene I will be glad to assist you.

We sometimes go an entire 12 hour shift without peeing!

We get yelled at by patients, doctors, other nurses, patients a.nd patient's families for things that are not our fault and we just grin and bear it, well most of the time
We get the cold shoulder if we call out sick even though we may have a temp. of 105 degrees

Please do not yell at me because the doctor, lab, another department etc... screwed up - Nurses really do take the blame for everyone else's misdeeds. Please don't call me and ask for water, and after I run around getting you ice, cup and water and bring it too you, don't ask me to get you some crackers and then when I bring them to you ask for something else, Please ask for everything at once, it will save me a lot of time and you will benefit because I will beable to spend more time with you.

We do not get paid enough for what we do.

Inspite of all of this most nurses were meant to be nurses and we love our patient's even the grouchy ones. We will go miles to protect and advocate for you, even though you don't know it. We really are they eyes and ears for the doctor, I can't tell you how many times a doctor has said to a nurse, "what would you do", "what do you think we should do", what do you think is wrong with her" I am serious, they don't know it, because we are very crafty in the way that we are the ones that tell the doctor what to do.

We save lives, treat pain, treat all your conditions and ailments and we really do care. It is not a job that you can do unless you really want to do it.

Oh, and I forgot we frequently talk about bowel movements and other gross things at the dinner table!

Funny, when I read the title I was going to answer about how HARD teachers' jobs are. Then, I saw the link. I don't even need to read it because I already did awhile ago.

I think what I want people to know most about teaching is it is *just* my job, not my life. Yes, I am devoted to your kiddo during the school day. But, just like you, I want to get home to my three children. I need to leave work everyday by 4:00 because I am breastfeeding my baby and need to get home to feed her. My son is in OT for sensory needs. I am a solo parent at night. I have three-year-old twin boys who are full of energy. In a nutshell, my family is my life. Your kid is a part of my job, but I can't wait to get home to my kids every day. So, if I don't get that test graded fast enough for you, it's probably because I'm exhausted from getting up twice every night to feed my baby.

Somewhere along the line, it was decided that teaching was easy. People seem to think that just because we get summers off, our job during the school year is easy.

This article was awesome and there were a lot of great responses in the comments section, too.

Right now, I'm taking a break on Mamapedia. After this, I am going back to grading papers and planning for next week and writing evaluation reports and differentiating curriculums and preparing for two meetings tomorrow. I work incredibly hard because I believe in what I do and I believe in the children in my care.

What do I really want people to know about my job?? It's not as easy as you think it is. Sure, there are bad teachers. But there are also bad doctors, bad lawyers, bad store clerks, bad waiter/waitresses and bad parents. Like Amyj156, I am incredibly devoted to what I do and it's insulting when people just write it off because "you are so lucky to have your summers off".

Now it's time to get back to work. Sigh.

I do medical billing. During the big unemployment boom, a ton of people went to school for it. People think it's an easy job or that they can do it from home. The coding part is difficult, the details of which insurances cover which codes and diagnoses are even harder. If you have different types of providers it gets even more challenging. It's very detailed work that requires a lot of thinking. If you don't have a nanny and/or a completely separate office space, it's nearly impossible to do from home, especially if you have to make phone calls to patients or insurance companies. I can do some paperwork and data entry from home but not much. It's definitely not a job for just anyone! If you deal with patients you have to be good with people as well as the paperwork, which is a very fine balance of skills.

Amy:

You need to move your link to the SWH so your post won't get pulled tomorrow when the monitors are back to work!!!

Teaching is a lost art. Many teachers hands are tied. They can't hurt Johnny or Susie's self-esteem and have to give them good grades. They have to teach the SOL's instead of what kids really need to learn!!

ETA: Recruiting isn't as easy as people think. You must be able to talk to people, get information from them and since I recruit people with high level clearances, to get their information can be hard. Placing them - to make sure the position is RIGHT for them - not to just put a body there is not easy!

I love this article! I home-school my kids, and so in a sense I am in the teacher role, and I can tell you I get tons of criticism for what I do. I can't imagine getting it from 30 kids parents. I love teaching my kids and I love teaching in general, and I applaud those who do in a school setting! Overall in any job I think people are grossly under-appreciated. I am not sure what has happened to our society, and there are definitely people who don't care/don't work hard, and just get by, but the majority people do care, and do work hard. But most of them never get a pat on the back for what they do. Even though I don't have a real job, I work all day most days teaching my kids and no one ever says good job, or good work. And I think it is sad that people don't get that feedback. I am a firm believer in paying things forward, as in we reap what we sow, and i have been blessed tremendously in my life, but I still forget often to appreciate things, especially people. And yet I see things like this and it reminds me to make sure I take the time to appreciate the things others do, to appreciate the their work in the word, all of it, work/home/family. Thank you for posting this!!!!

Can you post the article?

One of the things I do is distribute for a multilevel marketing company. The only reason I do it is because I have spent a great deal of time investigating it and the products and know they are far superior to others. I have also seen first hand what they have done for myself and others. I love helping others, that is also why I became a personal trainer. MLMs are legitimate businesses and the model is even taught at Harvard. Of course there are some MLMs that are sleazy and give the others a bad name. That is true of any type of business.
I'm certainly not doing it to "make money off my friends," nor because I enjoy being treated like a used car salesman with cheap cologne and body odor.