Aibu to want to leave nursing because people are so fucking rude!!!

[Rabs6]

Iv been nursing for 11 years, worked hard for my nursing degree and am currently studying for my masters. Bare minimum I do about 2hours a week of continuing learning just to keep up to date with what's going on in my field.
Im good at my job and have lots of knowledge.

The problem I have with my job isn't the pay or the hours it's the fact that about 70% of the patients I see or their families are fucking horrible!! At least every day I get spoken to like shit from at least one person I'm trying to help and I'm so sick of it!!
In what other job would you work so hard to have such little respect? And why do so many people feel its OK to use their nurse as an emotional punch bag!!!

Op, which field are you in? I do wonder if that might be the issue ( though I of course understand that nobody should be treated like this in any area) Are you working for example in an area where there’s a lot of elderly patients? Are there low staffing levels? I’m just trying to wonder why people perhaps are more stressed?

I think we should bring in a sort of conscription when kids turn eighteen, and that everyone should be made to spend two years working in customer/public facing roles. Maybe then people would think before being so bloody rude in the future. (I’m only half joking).

I was in hospital last year and also three years previously and some of the ways people were talking to the staff was horrific, including a woman on my first stay who,

Rang the bell for the nurse to move her fork over to the other side of her tray.

Rang the bell at 3 in the morning wanting cups of tea.

And when she was making her demands suddenly stopped and said “look at me when I speak to you nurse!” .

For the record, she was perfectly capable, had managed to get up and down to the day room and had been merrily eating packets of crisps and the like all day which it seems she was perfectly able to feed herself.

I think she was just generally obnoxious though, she demanded the window on my side of the room be closed because it was cold, even though her’s was shut. And when I pointed out to the nurse that I really need the window open she said “well you’re just going to have to realise that one of us is going to have to compromise.” It’s as well for her that I was being discharged that day or we were going to fall out.

I’ve seen patients be rude wen they’ve had infections and so on and really couldn’t help it, and even the staff have realised that. But this one was different. I don’t care what was wrong with her, there really was no need for her to be such a miserable bitch.

I work in an opticians and the abuse is constant.you can tell the people who've never worked in customer based rolls before because they're all assholes. Me and my friends joke that you should never marry someone who hasn't worked in a retail job before

I think anyone in a customer facing rolemgets this, but of course hospital staff have to deal with a patient 24/7. As a member of the public I was waiting at a concession stand in a supermarket just before lockdown, where an older woman was being obnoxious to a young male member of staff who'd become from a different department to try to help her. In the end he explained that he was trying to do her a favour and there was no need for her to be rude. She argued that she wasn't, so I piped up 'you are, you're being really unpleasant.' She just stood there, mouth agape, then shut up. I think it helps if witnesses don't just stand there and tolerate it but of course it wouldn't always be safe to do so.

Actually I found that during lockdown customers had to be nice with the whole key worker scenario but now it's all easing off the mouthy customers have come back with a vengeance, they're ready to argue about anything and everything

I used to work as a legal secretary and the abuse from clients was really hard to cope with. It was a case of 'shooting the messenger' when I told them that their solicitor had a client with them and could I take a message?

The irony was that a lot of the things that they were calling about could easily be dealt with by the secretary, but they wanted the 'organ grinder rather than the 'monkey'.

But at least for me, it wasn't personal. It was a lot worse for the solicitors themselves, who often worried about being sued.

I work in a nursing home and I completely get this. And yes, I fully appreciate that people who are poorly aren't always going to be pleasant, just because sometimes they feel so shit in themselves. But Christ almighty, basic manners appear to have gone out the window.

I go to answer a bell, the person (full faculties) will either just stare at me or bark "tv remote, blanket, toilet....or whatever" at me. No please, no Thankyou. Families are just as bad, rolling eyes because I say I'm just going to get help because I can't take your parent to the loo on my own, won't make the rules change so that I can do it. There's only so many of us on shift, therefore you may have to wait a few minutes. I'm sorry, this annoys me as well, but I'm not the person to hate because of it. Equally, no I can't provide tea and biscuits to you and your kids who are using the garden like a climbing frame, we're having outdoor socially distanced visits for a reason and we are not a free cafe. --

I'm not seeing my family or friends in order to keep your mum safe, please can you just be a bit nicer and keep that in mind.

I do understand how hard it is for people to not be able to hug their relatives, but we're not doing it to be horrible and us private care staff are struggling too, we've just not had all the idolisation that the NHS has, despite dealing with actual covid cases unlike Sandra in the office at the local hospital.

Feel better now, thanks.

@Pinkstars2501 couldn't have put it better myself!