Work woes

[Bellefleur14]

Hi all,
I returned to work in April when my dd was 9 months, it's part time in a school. My little lady attends nursery for childcare.

Since starting nursery she is ill a lot so I have had to miss a few days off work.. currently having one right now. It also took ages for her to settle and she still screams when dropped off now. It breaks my heart and keeps me up at night. I have been thinking of leaving work as by the time I pay childcare I don't even earn that much and with overtime my partner can make what we miss.

I do have a nice job in my own little 2 year old room and I love the kids and staff but it feels wrong to be with other people's children while I've left my own crying with somebody else.

I felt pressured by work to go back full time from now which really upsets me as I don't want to be a weekend mum and honestly couldn't manage cooking/cleaning etc as partner does nothing!!!! I have told work this and they said they can look at flexibility but I feel guilty messing them about and being off a lot- is it acceptable to miss work a lot for your child's illness? I honestly don't understand what I'm supposed to do?

I kind of feel in a dead end job too so was thinking if I left of studying nursing, something I have always wanted to do- I told work this and they said it would be a shame for me to not work with children and why don't I do my PGCE .

I do think it would be a shame to leave my job but my pay is shit, my daughter is an emotional wreck when I leave her, my house is a disgrace and I am just stressed to the max, I feel like a massive failure for not being able to manage everything. I just don't know if it's worth it? Or is it just because I have not gotten back into the swing of things yet?

[Bellefleur14]

Sorry for the novel

[HouseOfGoldandBones]

Sounds to me like you have a couple of issues.

Firstly that you have to do all of the housework & that you were pressured into going back to work, and secondly the issue with your DD being very emotional when she goes into nursery.

Would you want your DD to attend nursery even if you weren't working? If so, you would have that issue anyway. If it helps my DS would scream blue murder when I dropped him off, but was absolutely fine when I left. I think I made it worse, because I got over emotional, and it just became a vicious circle.

This will get better, and DC's are always ill a lot when they first start nursery, with all the new germs. This will settle down too.

Sounds to me like your work really appreciate you, and having a term-time only job will be a god send to you when your DD is older.

Are there other issues with DP?

[Bellefleur14]

Thanks for the response.. I have worked with children for about 9 years and have seen how quickly they settle so logically I know this should not be an issue but I just dwell on her being upset.

I think working with some not so great staff over the years has given me trust issues with the nursery. She is never there unless she has to be, even when we pay.

It is a nice job, I feel awful when I'm off and they say it can't be helped but I feel like they think I'm messing them about!
The term time is great! And when I'm working I make so much more of the time spent with my dd.

It took 3 years to get pregnant so I genuinely appreciate time with her (mostly) and feel guilty leaving her. Someone once said they don't know why people have kids and dump them in childcare and it stuck with me!

Partner is useless!!! He is kind of like a background presence and tbh things have been loads better since I have realised this.

[3princiepies]

I had a busy shift at work and I wanted to let off steam so I wrote it down to tell you all about it...

An Unusual Shift.

The shift started at 7:30 pm, I walked in to the hover lift lifting a patient off the floor. He is a confused man who had slipped off the edge of the bed. A staff nurse had cancelled her bank shift and an agency nurse had picked the shift up. All the day staff had had a busy shift resulting in the ward being a mess notes everywhere, things not been put away.
I was in bay 2 a full bay and two side rooms, I received handover and started by putting a few jobs on Patientrack. The confused gentleman wanted attention all the time constant reassurance, I called his wife to come in to hospital to sit with him a while, she was more than willing and came 15 minutes later.
I carried on with the observations and medication round all my patients had their own issues. Bed 2 was pre op he had pain in his ankle but codine and oramorph both made him feel so sick he refused to take them. I had explained we can ask the pain team to come tomorrow to discuss other options of pain management. Bed 3 was a gentleman who was having investigations for his groin and leg pain. He was a very polite man very quiet I gave him pain medication and updated him we are waiting for the General surgeons to come to see him but I will probably be Tomorrow Monday morning. Bed 4 was admitted with back pain after slipping down three steps at home he was very anxious as he is the main carer of his wife who was now home alone. He needed to see the physio in the morning to hopefully get discharged. Bed 5 had an infection in his elbow and was on iv antibiotics. His canular had began to hurt him so it needed to come out and have another one inserted to continue his treatment. Bed 6 was an elderly gentleman who had had a Hemi a few weeks ago he was medically fit but needed a package of care to go home. This gentleman believes in giving praise when it is due. He speaks very highly of every staff member and says what he thinks. Bed 7 was the confused patient who had slipped off the bed he is awaiting an operation on his shoulder as he has bone Mets and he had fractured his shoulder. His wife and Daughter were with him and we was talking to him and he was settling down a little. I got him his regular medication and pain relief and he settled down. Side room 3 was a gentleman in under the alcohol team he was on a Dols resulting in him not having capacity and we couldn't let him off the ward. This made him angry and argued with us. I made him a cup of tea with some biscuits and gave him his librium from from his regime. He was pacified for now. Side room 4 was off the ward.

I completed my medication round and mixed my iv antibiotics after the Night nurse practitioner had re inserted a new canular for bed 5. I glanced at the clock it was 11pm 3 and a half hours had gone in an instant through being so busy.

The agency nurse and I counted the controlled drugs in the cupboard, another nurse did the checks on the crash trolley which needed a few thing which was out of date resulting in her going to the emergency drug cupboard.

Everyone on the shift was working together to give the best care for for all our patients. I work on a busy ward and I can honestly say everyone on the ward wants the very best for our patients and want our ward to be the best place for them to come to. The health care assistants are amazing they all work together to enable all the cares and patient turns are done on time. This personally helps me as a staff nurse as cares co inside with medication rounds and it enables you to carry on and not get distracted.

Throughout the shift we had 3 admissions one discharge and 2 bed moves. We put my bed 7 in to bay 1 as he was climbing out of bed and he is bed space would be more visible in there. A new patient came in to bed 7 I did his nursing admission remembering the care plan checklist. The patient was prescribed iv fluids so I commenced them and explains his plan for an aspiration on his ankle in the morning. The agency nurse got an admission a man that was in an RTC and needed log rolling by 6 of us. We all worked together to get him settled on his bed and completed a body map.

We went on our breaks in pairs not everyone likes to go together so we go in the day room and store room. We have a chair on the store room and relax for an hour and put our feet up. We have been told we can't sleep so I go on my phone and watch something I've missed on catch up.

When returning from my break we was told about another admission an elderly gentleman who had had a fall at home. We only had side room 1 available but it wasn't suitable for this patient so we changed the earlier admission in to the side room not practical at half past 5 in the morning as we had to wake him up but the man was in A&E waiting to be admitted.

Before we knew it is was 6am throughout the night as well as the two new patients admission paperwork I updated 9 other patients care plans and put an entry in each patients medical notes of a summary of the shift updating staff for the next shift of any new events. At 6am cares and turns that are due are commenced and any iv antibiotics that are due for morning. We give out extra pain relief to the patients that are in pain and help to sit people up who needs it for breakfast at 7am. We log rolled the new patient for pressure relief and made sure he was still in the correct position.

I really was a busy night but as we all worked together helping each other when needed we managed to things done. 7:30 am came and the day shift were on the ward such a relief to see.

The ward manager came in and handed me my mobile as I had borrowed a charger to charge it up and forgot about it. She stated "don't do it again or the will be trouble." She also pull me aside to comment a chair was seen in the store room do I know why. I lied said "no" I know I shouldn't have lied but her tone of voice told me she wouldn't have liked my answer. The ward Clark had told tales on us and told her about the charger and chair as soon as she arrived on the ward. Personally I makes me upset how someone can purposely tell something to a manager to get people in to trouble instead of telling the people themselves.
Never has the manager walked in and asked us all how has our night been and thanked us for running the ward smoothly over the night. She is very quick to spot mistakes like if boards have not been updated with the day staff nurses name but never sees how hard we all work or how we care for our patients.
The ward if full of hard working people and I enjoy working there but it is very disheartening when you never get anything in return.

[midsummabreak]

Yep, I used to work as a nurse & not having any thanks from miltary style nurse managers was typical and frankly very shit considering everyone worked so hard & often under great pressure. Doesnt mean getting poor pay rates for tireless child csre workers who care a great deal about their jobs and the babies & children they look after is particularly great either though.

[midsummabreak]

From what you say I would stay firm about working part time & if you want to, start applying for training in whatever job you wish ( nursing if thats your thing? ) , so sometime in future you can start training/ studying part time if you wish. Lovely you have such a strong connection with your bany, dont feel guilty about that and about feeling upset about baby's seperation anxiety. Its all ok. Im sure baby is well looked after, but of course baby misses Mum & Dad at 9 months

[Bellefleur14]

I think that when reflecting if I could stay part time and study that would suit me perfect, I just need to do my top up then could do the PGCE so would only take 2 years.

I was really keen to study nursing then do health visiting but I think I would miss actual working with the children, my job can be fun, loving & caring.. I don't think health visiting would be quite the same and I would miss my terrible twos!

I think it's just back to work stress and dd not happy about back to nursery so making sure I know it.

[Bellefleur14]

Thanks for your replies!