Your Job, My Job

Cellar Door said something in one of her comments that reminded me about the adult nurse / mental health nurse divide.

I have friends on the mental health branch of the course (mostly from when we all started together in first year) before the 'iron curtain' fell and the 'them and us' mentality was installed.

It's almost natural to think that your job is the best job. Round up a bunch of nurses and, unless you've just caught them coming off the 'shift from hell', most will tell you that they quite like their job. I mean if you hate your job the why the heck are you still working there?

Why do we seem to think that other people, who are also nurses (for talking's sake), have an easier / harder job than ours? You are good at your speciality (even if you 'fell' in to it) and they are good at theirs. Lets put it this way I can't talk down your agitated suicidal patient and you probably can't read the arterial blood gas results and alter the ventilator settings accordingly (OK, I did that once under supervision but I totally get the science).

All our jobs are complicated and technical, but if it came down to it I couldn't do yours and maybe you couldn't do mine (well not without a bit of study or something).