Grow up people!

As a child have you ever entered a class halfway through the year?  It's a complicated process as you have to figure out quickly who is who.  Who is the bully running things through fear and intimidation?  Who is the good guy who will stand by you and be a friend?  Who is the back stabbing tattle tale that will inspire you to get into trouble and then rat you out?

On the surface it sounds like it would be easy to figure out, but all of these people look the same.  When they talk to you they all talk the same and they all seem to want something from you.

Well... it seems that I've entered my own private viper pit sandbox at the prison.  The Nursing Staff.  Office Politics is something that I honestly have trouble figuring out.  Most of my previous jobs didn't involve this type of childish behavior... or if they did I was so low down the totem pole that it didn't effect me personally.  My philosophy has always been on the simple side... do my job well, do what my supervisor tells me, try to help my supervisor an any way possible.

The only job where this philosophy failed me was my last photography job in a  portrait studio.  I honestly believe that it failed me there not due to politics, but because I had a insecure back stabbing studio manager.  She saw me not as an asset to be groomed and utilized but as a threat to her own little fiefdom who could almost outsell her using good photography and honest selling techniques instead of the deceit and trickery she used.



The problem I have at the prison though is that I don't even know what the 'sides' are.  Hell... I'm not even sure who my supervisor is, what their responsibilities are, who they report to, how my job is rated or how I can help them do their job!  I guess I need to diagram out how the medical staff works at the prison... maybe just in explaining that I can figure out somethings myself.

The prison I work at used to be two separate facilities.  Abut 10 years ago they combined into one unit separated into the North side and the South side.  They're still fenced off separately, but they're connected via the 'Dog Walk'.  The dog walk is just about what it sounds like... an area fenced off (with razor wire!) and locked on either end with gates.

The North side houses prisoners that are Level II through Level V.  So far as I know the Level of a prisoner is an indication of his violent tendencies.  The more violent and dangerous, the higher the level.  The higher the level, the less likely they are to be released.  Most Level V prisoners are lifers and they know that acting 'good' won't get them out of the prison.  The North side has five blocks.   Blocks 1 through 3 are Level II and Level III prisoners, where Blocks 4 and 5 are Level IV and Level V prisoners.  The health center on the North side serves all of the blocks, but Blocks 4 and 5 have their own nursing staff present for most of the day.

So working on the north side you can be in the health center where the dole out meds to Blocks 1 through 3, deal with health maintenance issues (annual health screens, entrance and exit health interviews, and smaller health issues like muscle aches and injections), and health emergencies (chest pain, assaults....).  You can also work in Blocks 4 or 5 where you dole out meds to that block and deal with their health maintance issues.  Emergencies in Blocks 4 and 5 are met form their resident nurse, but ultimately sent to the health center as they have more staff and equipment to deal with it.

The South side houses prisoners that are Level I.  They are non violent offenders and often parole violators.  They are at the prison for a far shorter time but there is an equal number of prisoners on the South side as there are on the North side.  There are 8 units on the South side and all health issues are handled at the health center.  There are no 'resident' nurses working in one specific unit.

So... as an RN I can work "On the North Side", "In 4 Block", "In 5 Block", or "On the South Side".  My orientation started in 4 Block (which evidently is strange to have an orientee start there), moved to 5 Block, and ended up with me on the South side.  A couple weeks ago I was told that my final position would be on the second, or afternoon, shift on South Side.

Quick aside... I've now written South Side enough that I can't get this damned song out of my head:

Southside by Moby (featuring Gwen Steffani)

Back to Prison....

When I interviewed for this job I spoke with the facilities health unit manager (the big kahoona for nurses), and one of the nurse supervisors.  When I came in for my first day that nurse supervisor was gone on a special assignment, so I was shuffled around by another supervisor.  When I came to the South Side, I was introduced to the third supervisor whom I was told would be MY supervisor on the South Side.  But I was told that by other RNs... not by her or any of the other supervisors.  In fact NO supervisor has come up to me and said "I'm the person that you will report to".

I would assume this last supervisor is ultimately MY supervisor as she is the only one that works on the South side.  Both of the other supervisors work on the North side (one in the health center, one in 4 Block).  Just to make it more complicated though, this supervisor on the South Side shares an office with the facility's health unit manager (the supervisor to all three supervisors?).  

As if that wasn't enough confusion, each supervisor has their own little domain of control.  The one that works in 4 Block does the schedule for all nurses.  The one in the North side health center does all the grievences and disciplinary action.  The one in the South side health center (my supervisor?)... well she doesn't seem to do much.

Even something as simple as calling in is complicated.  I asked my supervisor (?) who I should call in to.  I don't plan on calling in, but I do drive about an hour just to get to work, so the chances of me having an accident or other delaying problem means I should have my bases covered.  Well... I can call in the supervisor on 4 Block as he would be responsible for getting my shift covered.  I can call in to her as she's responsible for the nurse that ends up covering my position.  I can call into the supervisor at the North side health center because she's more likely to be at her desk (I have to speak to someone personally and not simply leave a voicemail).  And if all that fails I can call in to the facilitiy's health unit manager.  Oy Vey!

Now... I explained my work ethic (be good at my job, help my supervisor, help my co-workers).  Normally that's the limit of my invovlement.  I'm not here to specifically impress my supervisor's supervisor as I assume that if I impress my supervisor they'll pass that up the chain.  But at the moment, I'm a contract employee.  I don't yet work for the State.  I want to, and therefore I have to impress the person who will eventually choose to hire me.  And who is this important person?  I have no fucking clue.  So... I have to impress everybody.

That, I believe, is where I dipped my toes into office politics.

The supervisor that makes the schedule has me working on a particular set of weekends.  Last week he called me up on my day off and asked if I would switch which weekends I'm working.  While it would effect which Michigan Football games I'd get to watch (and not in a good way!), I told him that it didn't matter to me and I'd work any schedule that would help him out.

Hey... if I can impress him by being flexible on my schedule, then that's a win win right?  Well it seems that it was a win for him and a lose lose for me.  The most immediate effect for me was that I no longer had to work this weekend.  YAY!  Not only a weekend off, but the first weekend of the College Football season!  But also BOO!  I was previously scheduled to work on Saturday and now had hte day off.  That changed my 40 hour work week into a 32 hour work week.  He also gave me Labor day off.... but didn't give me another day to make up for those hours lost, so therefore I'll only be working 32 hours next week.

I had to call in one day last week as I had to go to a clinic for my follow up needle stick apointment.  I didn't get to choose where I would go as it was a workers comp issue and my contract employer decided where I would go.  With that taking a day (un paid of course) I will now be working three weeks with a day missing.
The other boot of this lose lose issue hit me this week.

As an RN in the South side healthcenter, my main task is to take care of inmates health conserns.  I see them for their annual health screening, I see them for any emergencies, I see them for any follow up visits.  There are meds to pass out, but the LPNs generally take care of that.  Passing meds is a big deal though as there are about 1000 inmates that get meds at the med line.  So it takes 2 LPNs about 2 hours each to pass them out.  The LPNs also generally take care of the diabetic line.  There are about 50 inmates that have to come up to the health center two or three times a day to take their glucose reading and get their insulin.  The LPNs job is to write down the glucose reading (the inmates are allowed to take it on their own under the watchful eye of a correctional officer), and to hand out needles to those who have to take insulin.  There are also about 5 inmates to have the nurse draw up their insulin either because they don't see well enough to do it on their own, or they aren't trusted enough to do it on their own.

The LPNs do have some other tasks, but there aren't many as the med and diabetic lines take up the majority of their shift.  When we are short an LPN, an RN steps in to do the job.  So naturally I'm expected to be trained on these processes.  While I was in 4 and 5 Blocks I handed out all the meds and handled the diabetic lines.  There obviously weren't as many inmates to handle, but I was fully able to keep up with it and still do the other RN tasks.

So a couple weeks ago I was asked to help out in the med line.  I hadn't been orientated to the medline (where do they keep the meds? how are they organized? which window passed out which meds?) and I had been told that passing meds out on the South side was a nightmare when compared to 4 and 5 blocks.... so I told them that I wasn't comfortable doing my first med pass without at least someone watching over me.  They had an LPN stay over on a double shift (she loved the chance at overtime) and she gave me the dime tour and watched over me, making sure I did a good job.  She was impressed with my ability (it sin't a nightmare compared to 4 and 5... in fact it's easier!) and said she'd tell the supervisor that I did a good job and could do it on my own next time.

On Tuesday of this past week I was told that I would be in the medline training with another LPN.  I wasn't happy to hear this.  First off... I don't like passing meds.  It's dull.  It doesn't take any judgement and is a repetitive task that goes on and on and on for hours.   Secondly, I thought that I had already had my training and I would be good to go on my own.  But I'm not here to rock the boat, so I accepted this training with as much poise as I could.  I told the LPN that was training me that I was already comfortable doing medline and if he wanted to sit back and just watch, then that would be fine by me.  I figured I could fly solo and still have a backup.  He did just that... he sat back and watched me rock out that medline.

On Wednesday I was told that I was in medline.  Again.  This time an RN would be watching over me.

What the fuck!?  I've now done the damned medline twice.  Both times I did it efficiently, quickly and without error.  Both times I had someone watching me and they both said that I did a perfect job.  So why the fuck did I have to do this again?  Well it seems that word got out that the LPN just sat back and watched me, and that they (who are they?  I have no clue... maybe my supervisor) thought that I might need some more help.

Fuck it.  I can't really complain without being a whiner, and we all know that whiners don't get hired in.

And even though the LPN was criticized for sitting back and watching me the RN did even less.  He watched me as I set up the medline and then left me alone for the rest of the day.  Sure, he poked his head in a few times to make sure I was doing OK, but he didn't even stay in the same room as I.

I made it clear to those around me that I wasn't happy doing this.  I could do it and would feel fine stepping in and doing the medline when needed... but I wasn't needed now (they let an LPN go home as I was doing her job that day!).

Thursday was my day off (where I was called by the supervisor about the schedule) and then I came back to work on Friday.  I was looking forward to getting back to RN work and working through the entire Labor Day weekend.  But guess what happened?

I WAS IN THE GOD DAMNED MOTHER FUCKING MED ROOM AGAIN!

I was obviously upset when I saw where I would be and two of the RNs took me aside to give me a 'pep' talk.  According to them I pissed off my supervisor (the one that works in the same building), and that she was punishing me by putting me in the medroom.  They had no idea what I did to piss her off, but said that my best option was to take my punishment and just be quiet about it.

Sadly I didn't have any choice about being quiet... my supervisor had taken the holiday weekend off and won't be back until next Wednesday.

And don't think that I was in the medroom because there wasn't an LPN around... there was and he now had nothing to do all day.

Between the monotony of setting up the medline, the monotony of running the diabetic line, and the monotony of passing out the meds I looked at the scheduled tasks for the next few days.  This is the list of what nurse is doing what.  We are each assigned our 'call outs' (that's when an inmate is called to the healthcenter and can be just about any issue that is scheduled), and we are each assigned our 'tasks'.  The tasks for the RNs are either ER (the one ultimately responsible for any emergencies) or simply call outs.  Normally we only get this at the beginning of our shift, but because our supervisor was off for the weekend she had made them up for Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and even had a preliminary one for Wednesday.

Here are my tasks:

Friday:  Medline and Diabetic line.
Saturday:  Nothing
Sunday:  Nothing
Monday:  Nothing
Tuesday:  Medline and Diabetic line.
Wednesday:  Medline and Diabetic line.

That is how I found out that I had the weekend off.  Did anybody send me an email saying that because I was switching weekends that I would not be working Saturday, Sunday, or Monday?  No.  Did anybody call me?  No.  Did anybody leave me a note?  No.  If I hadn't taken the initiative to look at the schedules (schedules that are normally NOT available to look at) I would have driven in Saturday afternoon only to find out that I am not supposed to be there (which by the way would have meant me missing part of the Michigan game... the only good thing about NOT working that day).

Needless to say I'm not happy about this.  Sure, watching football all day yesterday (from 9am to midnight baby!) was great, but it cost me over $200 in lost wages to do so.  Watching the race tonight and grilling with the family tomorrow will be good, but having both of those days off will cost me an additional $200 in lost wages.  And even when I DO get back to work I'm still in somebody's dog house for doing something.  I can only assume that the 'something' I did was agreeing to help out and switch weekends off.

So in short, I tried to go good and am getting punished for it.  God I hate office politics.



And as long as I'm complaining about work I'll go ahead and let off some more steam.  I can't believe just how bitter and frankly mean spirited the nurses are that I'm working with.  Not all of them, but the bitter nurses out number the 'good' nurses by about three to one.  I know I'm working in a prison, and I know that part of my nursing job that is different from most nursing jobs is picking out patients that are trying to get something for free.  Normally this would be something like drug seeking behavior, but in the prison the patients are seeking something else... attention.  Coming up to the healthcenter means coming up to an air conditioned area (important when it's almost 90 degrees outside and no other building has AC), and it also means dealing with somebody that is going to care for them.  I'm already pretty good at picking out these people and quickly sending them on their way.

But some of the nurses assume that EVERY inmate that comes up to the healthcenter is faking an injury and therefore should be treated like a piece of shit on the bottom of your shoe.  These nurses talk down to the inmates, they dismiss any symptom that can't be objectively observed (which means dismissing anything like pain or discomfort out of hand), and they act like their ultimate goal is to get these inmates out of the health center as quickly as possible with as little care as possible.

That's just fucking cold.

I know that when I work on any patient here, that I'm working on a thief, a drug user, a drug dealer, a person who's assaulted another person, a murder, a child molester, a rapist, or any other number of people that end up in prison.  But just because they are convicted felons, and just because SOME of them are trying to con the health team doesn't mean that they are ALL faking illness or injury.  There was one inmate that wanted to be seen because of a severe rash on his inner thigh.  The nurse went to see him in the waiting room instead of bringing him back into the health center.  She told him that if he came back she'd have to charge him and that unless he had a boil that was draining that she wouldn't do anything for him.  The charge is only $5 to be seen for a non emergency, but keep in mind that the inmates only earn eighty eight cents a day.  So would you go in and pay to NOT get help when it costs you a weeks wages?  I know I wouldn't.

So the inmate went back to his bunk.  The following week he came back for the same rash (a rash that he's now had for at least a week!) and was told the same thing.   When he came back this past week, the rash had opened up int some boils and was now draining.  Normally when a boil bursts and leaks, it's leaking some blood and some puss.  Puss is nasty and normally is yellow to yellow/green.  This was brown.  This was serious.  This was MRSA.

If he had been seen, it would have been clear that this wasn't a normal every day rash.  It more than likely could have been cultured and when it was found out to be MRSA it could have been treated with some serious antibiotic pills.  But now that it was open, he had to be given special treatment... daily dressing changes, special meds, and special ointments.  And because it had been open while he was in general population four of his bunk mates (the ones that helped him out) now have to be treated as well with powerful oral antibiotics.  These are the same antibiotics that kill most of the bacteria in your digestive tract... so when you poo, it's almost completely diarrhea.

All because this cold hearted bitch wouldn't see him when he came to the health center for help.

And I swear to God these same nurses are quick to tell me how easy every other nurse has it, and how difficult their job is.  I've now done most of the jobs that all of these nurses have talked about. I am in no way as good as they are at doing the jobs they've done for years.... but having done all of them in a few short weeks I can tell you honestly that all of the different nursing jobs have their advantages and they all have their disadvantages.  I wouldn't call any of them easy, but neither would I call any of them difficult.  But I swear if you talk to any one nurse you'd think they were Jesus Christ being crucified for all of our lowly sins.

And the ones that aren't bitter?  Well they (we?) all have one thing in common.  We're all relatively new.  The most 'experienced' nurse that isn't cruel or bitchy has only two years of nursing experience and only one of that is in the prison.  There are still a handful of nurses that I haven't met (most of them in the North side health center), so maybe that's where the 'good' nurses end up... but I doubt it.

I'm surrounded by bitchy, holier than thou, cruel nurses and evidently I'm supervised by a manipulative supervisor who is punishing me for... something.

I still like my job.  I still believe I can do good here.  I don't mean that I can do my job well (although I can do that too), I mean that I can do GOOD.  I can help people heal.  I still get paid well for what I do (that is, when I'm allowed to do it!), and have no intention of bailing.  But damn.  I can only hope that I won't get beaten down and become so dissatisfied with my job that I become one of 'them'.




I purchased this song a few weeks ago.  I'm not sure how I missed it when it was new, but I really enjoy it.  The lyrics seem to fit how I"m feeling right now though:

Say It Ain't So by Weezer