I don't think OP is changing her story, it's just that the slightly different meanings of phrases like "to her face" vs "in front of her" vs "in her hearing", and the different ways people interpret these types of phrases, have resulted in some confusion.
From what I can make out, though please correct me if I've got this wrong, OP:
OP, staff member 1, and staff member 2 were talking together.
The patient who had just self-harmed wasn't part of the conversation but was nearby where she would probably be able to hear what was said.
SM1 said the patient was attention-seeking, which OP interpreted as a derogatory or at least unhelpful remark, rather than purely an objective clinical analysis.
SM2 told SM1 to be careful what she was saying, and OP interpreted that as a warning not to say these things in front of the patient, but not as disapproval of the comment itself.
OP was there and we weren't, so while her interpretations might be wrong, it could be she's in a better position than we are to interpret intention and underlying meaning, because she can incorporate tone of voice, facial expressions, the rest of the conversation, the characters of the other staff members, the ward staff culture, and so on.
If staff members are describing a patient who has just self-harmed as being attention-seeking in a dismissive or derogatory way, somewhere that the patient can hear, that's not just professionals being accurate about patients' motivations or making neutral and astute observations. It's more like trying to make the patient feel that they're not going to get one over on these staff. Whether it's technically correct or not, the term attention-seeking has incredibly negative connotations. There are better ways to talk with people about the function of their self-harming behaviour and the needs it helps them fulfil, and better times to do it. You wouldn't call someone an attention-seeker where they could hear unless you wanted them to know you thought badly of them.
I've been a patient on several psychiatric wards and I've seen how different the staff culture can be on different wards, and how much it affects patients and influences patient behaviour. I've seen how staff steeped in a particular ward culture can perpetuate that culture in newer staff, either by normalising certain behaviour and teaching how things are done there (explicitly or by example), or causing staff who don't fit in to go elsewhere.
That ward staff culture can be one of respect and understanding for the patients, calmness, sometimes kindness, de-escalation, fairness, integrity, and so on, or it can be one of favouritism, arse-covering, knee-jerk escalation, disrespect, etc. — or something in-between, or something different.
If OP has moved from a ward with one type of staff culture to a ward with a different type of staff culture, my guess would be that it's probably not just this one conversation that's prompted this post, more like lots of little things and the whole atmosphere on the ward, with this as a definite thing she can point at.