OB/GYN tales: The Mean Girls of the Hospital

Welcome back to the ob/gyn tales series (read the last one here!), today’s story is going to be a short one, and probably the last one of this series.

It was my last night shift before the end of my obstetrics rotation, thank goodness, I cannot wait to get out of here.

Over the two weeks that I’ve been here, I have encountered more mean nurses then I have my entire nine months at the hospital. I’ve always thought that by smiling at everyone and trying to be nice to everyone I talk to that I could avoid their nastiness, which can get pretty nasty sometimes. And it’s always worked! But the ob/gyn department at my hospital is notorious for having really mean nurses (and doctors), so I guess things work differently here.

But the nurses on night shift today were so mean I literally couldn’t! One called for us to go to the delivery room and I ran outside to ask which patient was about to give birth. She didn’t even look at me, not even side-eye me. She just looked straight ahead with the most spiteful RBF, waited for probably longer than necessary, and uttered the most impatient “Room706-1, what do you want?”

Okay sister, who pissed in your cheerios this morning?

It wasn’t long before my night shift started that the chipmunk-like mother started going into labor. This delivery was like any others, except the father was very enthusiastic about cheering the mother on- and I’m not sure how I feel about that.

To be honest, the most interesting thing about assisting in birth are all the interesting and unpredictable fathers you meet.

“YOU CAN DO THISSS! C’MON YOU GOT THIS YOU CAN DO IT! GO GO GOOOO” The father cheered a little too excitedly throughout the entire course of labor.

“YOU’RE DOING SO GREAT, YOU‘RE IMPROVING SO MUCH! YOU’RE THE BEST!!” The cheering went on for a good 15 minutes, and at this point I didn’t know whether I wanted to laugh or to bury myself into the ground. Maybe both.

I wonder if that was how the mother felt too.

“IT’S COMING OUUUUUUT”

Okay daddy, are you cheering for a baseball team or what?

The assisting nurse practitioner didn’t even bother trying to hide her distaste for us and the father.

Honestly I’d really like to know- mothers who have given birth- does this kind of enthusiastic cheering make you feel better in any way? Does it distract you from the pain? Or perhaps help you focus better? I don’t know. Because I was thinking if I were the mother, I’d probably want to slap him with my purse and tell him to shut up. But again, I’ve never given birth before.

Please let me know your experiences, I’m really super curious!

And in honor of this night shift, here is a photo of the pretty sunset from tonight. I was telling my friend how it was kinda romantic, watching the sunset. I clearly forgot where I was, ha-ha.