Monday, September 14, 2009

The button....

One of the joys of having a baby is moving from the Labor and Delivery floor to the Mother/ Baby floor. How great would it be to work as a nurse on that floor? Sure moms are tired, sore and sleep deprived, and maybe a little anxious about the new bundle, but for the most part they are pretty accommodating right? Because they are happy.
I think I am a pretty good house guest. I for the most part don't like people to do things for me, so I thought I was being pretty accommodating during my stay there.

You see my sister is a nurse, so I have the utmost respect for nurses. I know how hard it is to work 12 hour shifts. And to be perky and upbeat the whole 12 hours would be hard on anyone. Nurses in my opinion are champs.

For the record, my Labor and Delivery nurses were OUTSTANDING. I was expecting it to be my sister but because she came down with a terrible cold the night my water broke, she wasn't able to be there. But I loved my Labor and Delivery nurses they were so helpful.

Now the Mother/Baby nurses, that is a totally different story. Granted I had some great ones who were so awesome, and I was so glad to have them. But going back to what I was saying before, I was a fairly accommodating patient because I never really asked for anything other then my ice packs and Motrin. And believe me if I could have gotten those myself I would have.

I didn't ask for an abundance of snacks or sodas. I always allowed them to come and check Axel and I at their convenience. But what I DID do was I pushed the nurse button, and apparently that is just not ok.

Big deal right? That's what the call button is for after all correct? You have the light button, the TV button and the nurse button. But apparently you are not allowed to push the nurse button.

Here is how it all went down.

It was sometime during the early morning of my 2nd day in Mother/baby. I was sleeping and it was about time for my Ibuprofen. So I pushed the convenient button on the wand in my bed with the picture of the nurse on it. A voice on the other end answered "Yes"

And I politely asked if my nurse could bring me my Ibuprofen now.

A few minutes later my door swings open, my curtain is pulled briskly open and a short Hispanic lady rushes over to the side of my bed. She takes my cradle with my sleeping babe in it and shoves it over away from my side. She then shoves the breast pump (they put there) against his cradle and then reaches behind me, grabs the nightstand and pulls it forward making sure to hit it against the wheels on my bed before getting it into place by my side. She grabs the phone on the nightstand and picks it up and says "DON'T PUSH THE BUTTON." she then points her angry finger towards the whiteboard and says "SEE THOSE NUMBERS? USE THOSE NUMBERS TO CALL YOUR NURSE, NOT THE BUTTON, DON'T PUSH THE BUTTON."

She then stormed out of the room.

At first I was shocked, and I felt so humiliated. Here I thought I was being so accommodating to my nurses. I had no idea I wasn't supposed to push the button on the bed.

I was hurt and felt so dumb! After that every time that lady came in to my room she reminded me to not push the button. Every time she reminded me I felt more and more ridiculous, like I was the lady who doesn't get it.

So moral of the story, when you stay in the Mother/baby wing DON'T PUSH the BUTTON. Or you might get yelled at by the Button Nazi.

8 comments:

Leslie said...

No, no, no. Moral of the story: slap the obnoxious, RUDE nurse for being RUDE and endangering your child. Then politely tell her that you would have been happy to call the number instead of push the button if someone had told you that you should. Then request a different nurse. Then give her a swift kick in the tush on her way out the door. (Or have your husband do it, since he's more agile than you are at this point.)

Oh, and don't forget to take every single little disposable item in your room/bathroom with you when you leave. You're paying for that you know.

THAT'S the moral of the story.

:)

KaSs MiLeS said...

oh my gosh, i would have totally pushed it again and asked for a new nurse!!! what a beast!! i would have hit it every hour and tell say, "oh really? oops. didn't get it the first time you told me when you almost killed my baby!!"

Angie said...

I pushed the button all of the time. It totally makes sense to push. Why couldn't you??? That's just weird. I would have said something. I can't believe she did that.

Melonius said...

i think you should send your dad back to give her swift kick. that was so not appropriate.
seriously, you might think about writing a letter.
so not appropriate.
does hillary know who she is??

Emily said...

That is horrible and unacceptable. You should definitely write a letter. That is not okay to treat a patient that way. So sorry you had to deal with someone like that.

Jess~ca said...

I am SO glad that someone didn't yell at me for doing that! I could barely sit up in bed LET ALONE get up and walk over to the phone to call for pain medicine!! She was seriously a Jerk!

(You can, if you remember her name, write a letter and have it put in her record....)

Shanna and Brad said...

That is ridiculous! I would have definitely asked for a new nurse. Sorry you got treated that way.

darcie said...

aaah, i'm catching up. axel is DARLING! especially considering he's a month early. so handsome. also, did anyone every explain WHY you can't push the button? it just goes to show, no matter what your day has been like, you never have an excuse to treat someone badly.