Hey you!
Yes, I am speaking to you.
I have been seeing your posts online saying that you think it's time you left nursing. You are tired of all the charting, working overtime, and the long hours. You are tired of feeling like an anxious mess before you go to work. You are tired of feeling bullied.
You are tired of feeling burnout.
If there is one thing that sets me on fire it is seeing posts and hearing from nurses that their workplace and burnout is sucking the life out of them.
Because I get what it's like to be there and question if you made a big mistake becoming a nurse.
IF you have spent anytime thinking like this, there is one thing I want to share with you.
You do not have to leave nursing to escape burnout.
You can find something you love in nursing and it doesn't have to be hard to do.
Over the past year and a half I have worked with nurses on career and burnout, many of them thinking seriously about leaving the profession.
There are there is one thing that is pretty universal that we work on.
It is learning how to stop allowing the sympathetic nervous system from running the show.
If you need an A&P refresher, I'm going to science geek out for a second.
The sympathetic nervous system or the flight/flight response is part of the autonomic nervous system. It's main purpose is to respond to potentially dangerous situations so we can survive.
This is really useful when we are dangerous situations, ie someone hits the brakes in front of us.
BUT Your brain cannot tell the difference between fear caused by the place you work and fear caused by a dangerous situation. So that charge nurse you don't get along with might as well be a lion ready to eat you.
If you are feeling anxious, stressed out, overwhelmed, angry, scared, shame, or fear. You probably will respond something like:
- Confronting/yelling at someone in the nursing station.
- Avoiding someone the whole shift.
- Agreeing to do things you don't want to do.
- Freezing up.
Now I'm sure you are thinking, yes Mary, but what does this have to do with me staying in nursing?
My friend, the likelihood that you will make a good career decision is going to decreased significantly if you are being controlled by the part of your brain that just wants to make sure you don't die.
When you make a big decision like this, do not let fear make the decision.
But how do you stop this?
Learn how to activate your parasympathetic nervous system.
Where the sympathetic nervous system is fight/flight, the parasympathetic nervous system is rest/digest.
Some ways that I teach my clients to activate their parasympathetic nervous system.
1. Box Breathing - Box breathing is breathing in for the count of four, holding for the count of four, breathing out for the count of four, holding for the count of four. Repeat until you feel calmer.
2. Ask yourself powerful questions. - Inner dialogue is a skillset that requires practice, but can have powerful results. An easy way to get the inner dialogue going is to ask yourself questions like: Is this true? or Would someone who was not involved in the situation agree with me?
3. Get help if you are struggling.
One thing I tell my clients is "Don't be an island." I get we want to solve all our problems by ourselves, but sometimes the best course of action is to get help from someone who won't just validate us, but instead teach us how to look at our experience from a different lens.
I believe in you and your possibilities.
Mary B.
P.S. Hey there, thank you for reading this post. If your purpose is nursing but think you have to leave nursing to deal with your burnout, l invite you to come join the Unbreakable Nurse Society. You will get access to tools that will help you not only fix your career but help you get the the life you want. All you have to do is to click her and sign up for a free consult.
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