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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To be pissed off at being 'just' a nurse?

613 replies

bottleofwater · 18/12/2017 22:45

Three times in the last week Ive had different family members making sarky comments regarding some recent achievements & promotion at work.

Usually comments along the lines of "Oh Florence Nightingale you will be telling the Doctors what to do now" " You will be a surgeon in no time" & " What do nurses know about blood pressures, they are not doctors".

Im so fed up of how its like being a nurse is rubbish & that only Doctors are of any value Angry

Also comments regarding how I dont make the same amount of money as other family members but thats probably another thread!

Not sure what they think nurses actually do but aibu to be pissed off at the constant sneering at me?

OP posts:
SunnySkiesSleepsintheMorning · 19/12/2017 00:13

YANBU. Nurses are a valid, important career choice and they play a key role in what keeps the NHS wheels turning.

SleepingStandingUp · 19/12/2017 00:18

My son spent half of his first 18 months in and it of hospital. Longest stay was 4 months. Nurses were our saviors, our sanity, our angels. Of course the surgeon was the one who saved his life with numerous operations - but he is a surgeon not just a surgeon because he isn't a brain surgeon or an astronaut. The nurses what had over my son and were instrumental in keeping him alive, in giving his medicines until we'd been there that long they just handed them over to me. When the heartless doctor made me cry the nurses picked up the pieces and stuck up for me. When the surgeon gave me bad news the nurse sat on the floor with me whilst I cried. They helped hold him down for cannula's and gave him cuddles when they'd had a bad day and laughed and talked to me. They dealt with the line infection that could have been serious. They listed when I tried to get the surgeon to see he was getting worse. They are not just nurses because they aren't all PICU nurses (the highest level of awesomeness for nurses- sorrynotsorry) or doctors or lawyers or teachers.

And our HCA were also wonderful - they were never just HCA's because they weren't nurses PR doctors or teachers. They were our HCA's.

Next time one of your stupid family end up in hospital, we all know who will be taking care of them.

SleepingStandingUp · 19/12/2017 00:22

No yanbu but tbf you are able to do less than a Dr.
I've met and fair few doctors who were able to do less than our nurses!!

Ellie56 · 19/12/2017 00:23

The correct response to this is, "Better to be just a nurse than just an arrogant twat (like you)."

Nursejackie1 · 19/12/2017 00:24

Basically how a conversation goes with a doctor we call to the ward ..Tell me about the patient ..... Then, so what do you want me to do ? Nurse..please prescribe. ...... dr says OK and doctor signs and leaves ward

CoolCarrie · 19/12/2017 00:27

Ignore them and well done to you.

Nyx1 · 19/12/2017 00:28

OP congratulations on your promotion
Nurses are extremely skilled and doing a job that gets harder all the time
Anyone who is not respectful of your line of work is not very bright frankly.

nocoolnamesleft · 19/12/2017 00:28

Can we please stop putting each other down? Doctors and nurses have complementary sets of skills. Which when working closely together provide the best care for patients.

RestingGrinchFace · 19/12/2017 00:30

I take it your family are predominantly professionals and very insecure about it? Or have you done better than them and they are bitter about it? I can understand that being a nurse doesn't carry the same prestige as being a doctor (although if you live in Britain being a doctor isn't really a big deal anyway, at least not in the way it is in different countries where they get paid decent wages so the comparison is a bit pointless surely?) but that isn't really a justification for making derogatory comments/generally being mean. Quite frankly I don't see what difference it makes what any if you do for a living. You may be 'just' a nurse but they don't even possess basic manners.

PinkJeggings · 19/12/2017 00:31

@Bettyspants You, as a nurse, do not do the same job as a registrar! Shock

crunchymint · 19/12/2017 00:31

So sorry you have a family like this. My father thinks nurses are angels and that being a nurse is about the best job a woman can do.

Tomselleckhaskindeyes · 19/12/2017 00:34

After being in hospital with a seriously ill child I can honestly say the nurses often had more idea than the doctors. When a doctor couldn’t get there the nurse practitioner was in charge and was brilliant.

laudanum · 19/12/2017 00:39

Nurses are the absolute BACKBONE of healthcare. Nobody is ever just a nurse. I hate it when folks say shit like that.

Whiterabbitears · 19/12/2017 00:41

YANBU OP my in-laws do this to me all the time, constantly belittle me and say I wipe arses for a living Hmm. Even worse I'm not a not a 'proper' nurse because I'm an RMN. I don't talk about my job anymore because I get angry and they seem to think that's funny.

Janetjanetjanet · 19/12/2017 00:42

Nurses are heroes and should be paid a hell of a lot more.

Viviennemary · 19/12/2017 00:47

Well five pages of mostly praise if not worship of nurses should be quite enough for one night. till the next hard done by overworked underpaid nurse comes on whining about not being appreciated. What is it with nurses.

Whiterabbitears · 19/12/2017 00:53

vivienne
What is it with you? What exactly is your problem with nurses? What do you do for a living? Quite frankly you are speaking out of your arse.

Ali1262 · 19/12/2017 00:59

You are definitely not being U, it was "just" a nurse that found a tumour behind my stomach while doing an ultrasound. I owe that nurse my life as within 3 months of finding it I had my surgery and they found that it had grown to the size of a man's head and my veins and arteries were wrapped around it. So if she wasn't such a great nurse I wouldn't be here so don't listen to them, see it in the face of every patient you help and their families, as they are the ones that truly know how valuable you are.

Viviennemary · 19/12/2017 01:05

It just annoys me that nurses think they are a cut above everyone else and need praise and validation and told how wonderful they are. They are no better and no worse than any other hospital worker or indeed any worker who helps to keep the country running smoothly. I'd say the problem is not with me but with nurses who constantly crave praise and have gigantic chips about being inferior to doctors.

Whiterabbitears · 19/12/2017 01:10

It sounds like you have a gigantic chip and you know absolutely nothing about nursing or what it involves. How arrogant of you to dismiss PP stories of how nurses have helped them or their loved ones, you sound very bitter and ignorant.

Stompythedinosaur · 19/12/2017 01:11

But no one on this thread has said that nurses are "a cut above". They have said that nursing is a separate profession to medicine, and a necessary and valuable profession (i.e. not "just" a nurse).

I'd be interested to know how you formed your opinion about nurses.

drinkswineoutofamug · 19/12/2017 01:14

Can I say that I'm just a hca, on a busy icu unit.

Stompythedinosaur · 19/12/2017 01:20

Health care assistants are actually the unsung heroes holding the NHS together in my experience.

SleepingStandingUp · 19/12/2017 01:26

drinkswineoutofamug see my eArlier post. Not just HCA's. Our HCA's. Sure your patients and their families feel similarly

LunaTheCat · 19/12/2017 01:44

Being a nurse is absolutely an honourable thing - when you are sick a comforting, reassuring, knowledgeable nurse is everything. The last time I dealt with a nurse was at a walk in clinic when I had absolutely awful abdominal pain. Her knowledge and kindness meant everything.
People who spend their life looking down at others are often covering up a deep inadequacy in themselves IMHO. ( from just a doctor)