I’m not necessarily quoting Jerry Maguire but everyone’s had occasion to think of a come-back and then say something entirely different. In my employment and for nurses everywhere, it’s a uncommonly frequent fact of life at work. When it comes to mean patients, insane families, and spoiled doctors sometimes it seems like every other exchange leaves the nurse with a feeling of, “That’s what I should have said.” Sometimes your learned response leaves you and your filter fails you. It happened to me just the other day.
I was in the add-on room working through a merciless row of neurosurg cases. I hate neurosurg. Our anesthesiologist was one of the ones notorious for not helping the staff with getting ready, not organizing his time so he’s the right place at the right time, and pleading out of any heavy child lifting by a convenient flre-up of mysterious back pain. The anesthesia tech was still setting up the anesthesia machine, the CRNA was drawing up drugs, I was drawing up the antibiotics and the other nurse was wheeling in the equipment when he came in and said, “So are we ready?” We? We? The use of “we” requires the speaker to be involved in the group not be talking at a group. In this case, it required the speaker to have lifted a finger to get his room ready for the case rather than going out to the break room to devour anything edible. It requires the speaker to have a record to being someone to work with not someone notorious for standing in the hallway talking as small nurses struggle by pushing heavy beds and not lifting a finger to help. It requires some involvement.
There was a moment of silence and then I heard my brain say, “What do you think?” Clearly, if useless in every other way, he could use his eyes and see the four people working to get the room ready and not sitting around having tea and scones. He doesn’t do a thing and then bothers us with some useless question as if asking him to look around and use the brain he’s clearly so proud of to arrive at the appropriate conclusion.
A burst of laughter told me I’d actually said that out loud. I heard him say, “Well, that wasn’t very nice,” and a moment later left the room. I finished drawing up the stuff, cued the computer record, helped the tech finish up, made sure my scrub person was ready, and checked with the CRNA. Then, finally ready since rooms don’t make themselves, amazingly, I went out to the holding area. There he was, reading the chart. Wasn’t that his job to have done that before checking the room. I wasn’t mad, though, these things happen so often, it’s not worth being bothered, but these guys do need to be snapped every once in a while before they become completely spoiled. And no one deserves to be treated like the help, even if they are the help.
He helped me push the bed back. I’ve never seen him do that before.
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