I can't stand working another shift with my ridiculous mentor

[MuckyShowerGlass]

Nursing student.

My final placement is community nursing and after the wards, it seemed like a nice break at first but my mentor is seriously fucking frustrating and I can't deal with it!

She basically faffs about so much that we NEVER finish on time. She tells me to meet her at 8.30 a time the office - I get there and wait for her only to be told by another nurse that she's in another room "furiously looking at stuff". We finally get out around 9.20am and then she's flapping saying that all her insulins are going to be late. We get back to the office at 12pm and she busies herself with cups of coffee and furiously moving bits of paper from one desk to the next, running around the office all red-faced and stressed - all the other nurses come in, have a quick lunch and then get back out again within the hour. Not us, we're still stuck there at 2.30 with 7 visits left to finish before 5.

On Monday we went to a meeting and this male nurse she's obsessed with (senior) was also there. After the meeting this bloke started heading to his car so mentor followed like a lap dog trying to make conversation. Once he'd drove off she said "we need to go back in the building, there is stuff we need to do in there" - so why the fuck did we leave??? So we go back in, faff in there for 20 minutes and then come back out, get to her car only for her to say "oh I forgot something, we need to go back in". So I follow her back in, more faffing, we get out and halfway down the path before she shrieks "shit! We need to go back in, we didn't do so and so ... " 😡😡😡😡 by this time all the other nurses that were in the meeting were long gone and back out on visits then she wonders why we never get finished on time!!

Today we pulled into the driveway of a patients house, running late as usual, she goes into her boot and says "oh look at the state of it in here!" And proceeds to completely reorganise her boot whilst the patient is stood at the window wondering why the fuck we've been stood on the driveway for half an hour.

I just can't see myself being able to work like this much longer. She's frustrating me to the point of anger. So much fucking about, timewasting and late finishes for no real reason other than she just won't stop faffing!!!

Yanbu. I had some crappy mentors as a student and inefficient ones really pissed me off. Can you go to your uni link lecturer (or whatever they're called) and report this?

I hope you're recording all your late finishes, upside is that you'll probably meet your hours quota early me have more time off. I never make my students do a second longer than they have to.

A colleague of mine is exactly like this op - same job too. Drives me crazy. I hate disorganisation.

Do you have to stay with the same mentor? Can you ask to go with different staff on some days for example the complex care nurses? It's good practice to be out with different members of the team.

How long is your placement?

Oh Christ am I your mentor?!

Does your name start with J bored? 😳

Can you subtly offer to help with the organisational side of things to help improve it...?

Dun dun DUN!

No phew! I have been a DN for many years and meant plenty of flappers in my time. My advice just smile and go with it. Placements are short lived and even if the only thing you get out of it is that you don't want to work like her it's still experience. Is she good with the patients?

Sorry, but I think you need to fix a smile on and get through the placement. Having an irritating mentor happens to most student nurses at some point in their training, and complaining only makes it look like you are inflexible and not a team player.

You could offer to pack for your visits perhaps?

Oh Jesus thank god for that!

The placement is 12 weeks. I offer to help with organising stuff but it just makes her flap even more! I don't want to report it as she's lovely and never anything but nice to me but I just find her so frustrating. Patients find her frustrating too as she just takes ages to do anything. Her people skills are not great either, she has a tendency to not listen when people are talking and to just say "umm" "yeah" etc WHILST they're talking and then reply with a totally inappropriate response when they finish which shows she wasn't listening. Example :

I'm not too bad today thanks ("umm") had a doctor's appointment yesterday ("yeah") and it wasn't great news unfortunately ("umm") as they think I might end up having to ("yeah") have my ("umm") foot amputated ... "

Mentor - "Haha! Oh dear! Did you pick up those tablets I ordered for you?"

It's really embarrassing.

There is always a nurse that flaps, I don't know why as it doesn't achieve anything.

Oh god I hate flappy mentors.
Try and arrange some spokes to do?
My uni say we only have to work with our mentors 40% of the time so if I'm not keen on mine, I'll work with someone else for the other 60%.
Would she be willing to let you help her organise stuff? Can you do some of the paperwork in the office at lunch so you don't spend as long doing it all?

Part of the joy of student nursing placements is working with people who show you how you DON'T want to work. Not bad practice obviously but I worked with a few mentors who I made a mental note never to emulate!

I have to say a public forum is not the place to air your issues.

I hope your mentor or her colleagues aren't members of MN.

If that were truly the case ChestyNut sites like this would be filled with tumble weed. Agony aunt columns would be empty and advice services would be redundant because everyone would just put up and shut up. This isn't just you however, I've seen it more and more here. Don't question the status quo, don't complain, vent or protest in any way, accept your lot in silence.

Complain, vent and protest in an appropriate professional way....

When I worked on the community I dreaded having students.
We were so busy, there was no let up and I really valued the time alone driving between visits to organise my thoughts, think about what I'd just done, and the next patient.
Having a student with me all the time, no matter how pleasant or quiet meant I couldn't do this, it was so hard to concentrate and stress levels rocketed.

Medeci I was going to say the same. I was a sign off mentor for final placement students and had them for 4 months. It's a hell of a long time sharing a car if you irritate each other!

I don't really knwo about the nursing set up but why can't you act when she is getting rather than just watching? So in the example of sorting out her boot why didn't you just go into the house and start the appointment? It sounds like a very frustrating position to be in. Aside from anything else surely it isnt safe for you to be late to see people? Id be worried about that.

I'm a CPN and I love having students. NMC mandates that only 40% of a student's time in practice should be spent being supervised by their mentor. So 2 days. Not that I only spend 2 days a week with my students but I always make sure they get experience of the whole team.
I'm not a faffer btw 😂

Have you been given a case load of your own op? May be different in Adult but in mental health the final placement is the management placement and we were expected to have our own patients we went to see independently.

If it is your final placement do you have to be with her all the time? I did my final placement in the community and got a few of my own visits for dressings etc. Also I did a lot of days with other people, practice nurse, specialist nurses etc.

Frustrating as it is, you need to suck it up and learn from it - you are learning what a shit mentor looks/acts like. Hopefully you will be different once qualified and help learners be the best they can be unlike other nurse posters who complain about having students. We've all been there

My first midwifery placement was community and I had two mentors. One I hated and swore I would never, ever be like her. The other was a delight and I wanted to be her.

That was thirty years ago and it was a good, if hard lesson in what kind of a practitioner I aspired to be.

I would say to your coordinator that whilst she is lovely you feel you are missing out on vital experience due to her inefficiency and ask for a transfer. She can just be told that you need something slightly different.

However, the way she doesn't listen to her patients is quite concerning. She may not be a good nurse at all.

Have you spoken to the team manager /your link lecturer about your concerns ? I can kind of sympathise cos I had some crap mentors as a student nurse. Having said that, now I'm a mentor myself, I have to say mentoring students is a lot of work on top of my usual workload. We don't get given any extra time or support when mentoring & some students can be erm challenging ...