Saturday, June 16, 2007

I hate day shift

Every once in a blue moon I will work a day shift (7am-7pm), and today is one of those days. There are a handful of reasons why I generally prefer night shift over days.
1. The phone does not ring as much on nights with people calling to ask silly questions (ie - what type of training is available for a 16 year old that wants to babysit - we are a childbirth center, if they are over 3 weeks old we don't have much to do with them).
2. Patients who come in at night usually have a legitimate complaint. If any pregnant woman walks in the door of the ER and she is over 28 weeks, they have to see us for an assessment. Even if she is there for dental pain. These type of patients usually come in during the day.
3. I am paranoid that I will over sleep, so I do not sleep well and tend to wake up every hour or so after 2 am to look at my alarm clock.
4. There are too many extra people milling around during the day - housekeeping, administration, etc.

Now here is why I hate working this particular day shift (today).
1. At 8 am a nurse from another floor came over to drop something off and started talking about how she is trying to get pregnant. It has been TWO months and she is starting to complain that it is not working out with her schedule. She also mentions that she wants to "be done with the kid thing" before she is 31. She feels it would just be too awful to be 50 and have kids still living at home. I have no sympathy, and I almost got up and walked away.
2. Someone calls and asks us how to read a pregnancy test. Her friend brought(stole?)her some tests from the hospital where she works, but they don't come with instructions. It was an excruciating conversation because she was not being clear with describing the windows. (caller: "there is an up and down line and and side to side line" me: "which line is in which box" caller: "they are in one box" me: "so you have a plus sign in one box" caller: "I guess" me: "That sounds positive, because it is a positive sign. Why can't you buy a pregnancy test so you have the instructions?" caller: "yea, that is what I thought I would do next" me (in my head): "then why the hell did you call?"
3. I'm going through charts and find out there are at least 3 women coming in over the next few months that are having their second baby since we've been trying.
4. One of those women gave her other two children up for adoption - so why is she pregnant AGAIN!
5. It looks like it is beautiful day out today and I cannot spend it with my family.
6. As suspected EVERYBODY at work knows about the IUI and I have had a million questions about it. My supervisor called from home to ask me about my vacation (I think this was really just a decoy for her real question), and the second I paused she blurted out "When do you find out?"
7. I'm in a lot of pain today. I'm using my hot pack every hour or two.

My hopes were up last night. As I was getting dressed from getting out of the shower, C happened to walk by. He stopped in his tracks and said "well those are different!" Now that comment will get any one's attention. According to C my areola appeared darker and larger - he said to trust him, he notices these things. I did convince myself that there was a difference, but it seems to have gone away (or was never there at all). So back to twoweekwait.com to see if that is a common early symptom. Not so much - a later one maybe, but not this early. Well, my hot pack is beckoning to me again.........

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