Control Freaks: A Prelude to a Doocing.

I hate them.

I hate them with a passion that I usually reserve for child-molesters, men who commit crimes against women or people who ass-rape goats in Uganda. People who feel the need to have everyone by the short hairs piss me off to the point where there is smoke coming out of my ears.

We have one of those at work, in the form of our office manager.

Our office manager has NO background in medicine whatsoever, yet, she has made herself the self-appointed "nursing supervisor". While this woman is great at managing funds, bookkeeping and black and white protocol, she has NO sense of gray. What I mean by that is, nursing is not a profession where the same thing applies day to day. She makes protocols that we have to break all the time. Then, her vengence turns upon us in the form of being ranted at or written up.

Last week, three girls in the office (one of whom is useless, one of whom is a "yes girl" and the other, a neurotic clean freak) decided it would be just charming to waste an entire day cleaning and re-organizing the nurses station. This of course pleases the control freak OM to no end, as she seems to believe that a clean office is an orderly office. I don't understand people like this. Sure, organized is great, but labeling EVERYTHING in the entire nurses station is a ridiculous waste of time. I mean, these girls even put a label that says "stapler" ON the stapler.

What. The. Fuck.

Our files were pulled apart. Pictures of my children and husband were removed from the nurses station.

"It looks tacky," they said.

"Um, no. It looks like we are human beings with families," I counter.

When I got into work this morning, after spending yesterday in our other office, I walked into disaster. Even Mr. Clean would have said "what the fuck happened here, bitches?" That's how organized it was. Organized to a fault, because we were unable to find anything. My partner and I stood there staring at this mess of stackers, paperclip drawers, thumbtack holders, color coded charts and pen holders.

It doesn't sound bad to you probably, but, it was.

However, the worst thing that I saw was something I could not sit idly by for. We have a machine called an autoclave. Autoclaves are sterilizers for instruments. They hit temperatures in excess of 200 plus degrees. We used to have it sitting catty-corner, in the corner of the nurses station, where only the nurses could come in contact with it.

These rocket scientists I work with, headed by their fearless leader, Controlfreakasaurus, opted to put that device at the very edge of the counter, where patients pass constantly. Now, this autoclave? When it is done with a course of sterilization, it POPS open! POW! It sounds like a gunshot. After 9 years of being around them, they STILL make me jump. But, more importantly, when they pop open, they vent out the steam that sterilized the instruments. This steam, if you are within 6 inches of the autoclave, will scald you. You WILL get a third degree burn. No questions asked.

So, by having the autoclave on the corner of the counter, the steam will blow out directly into the path of the hallway, where our patients walk past to get into the exam rooms. It's dangerous. It's impractical and most importantly, it is setting us up for a horrendous lawsuit.

I brought this up to the OM/CF last week, when she was first discussing rearranging the nurses station. I thought she was a reasonable human being and would understand this.

Apparently not.

So, my partner and I lift the autoclave and move it BACK to where it originally was.

You know, for safety's sake. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, right?

A few hours later, I am in an exam room, setting a patient up for surgery.

"CP!!!!!"

Rut Ro, Raggy. The OM/Controlfreak is looking for me.

She comes to the door of the room and says, "I don't care WHAT you have to do right now, but that autoclave gets moved BACK TO WHERE IT WAS this instant."

"OM, may I explain to you why we moved it?"

"NO! YOU MAY MOVE IT BACK!!"

"Okay, but OM, can you just listen for a seco..."

"I DON'T CARE WHAT YOU HAVE TO SAY. YOU JUST MAKE SURE THAT IT GETS MOVED BACK NOW!"

I rip off my gloves. I go down the hall. I stand there in the middle of the hall, caught between my desire to do the right thing and my desire to keep my job. My sense of duty always prevails. I couldn't move it back. On principle, it would be the wrong thing to do. While I would secretly LOVE IT if someone did get burned so I can say, "TOLD YOU SO, YOU FREAKIN' CONTROLLING TWAT!", I wouldn't be able to live with myself if someone got hurt because of it.

While I am standing in the hallway, letting the devil and angel on each of my shoulders battle it out, the doctor comes up to me.

"Did you get that patient set up yet," he asks.

"No. I got pulled out of the room to move the autoclave."

"Go set up the patient," he says.

Now, last I heard? I am a nurse. The doc says jump, you say "how high"? He is the one that signs my paychecks. So, I go back down the hall, back to the room I was in before She-Devil went all Charles Manson on my ass. I hear her say (from down the hall) "I want her to move that autoclave!"

Doc retorts with, "just let the girls get the patients done."

To which she replies: "NO. I WANT HER TO MOVE IT NOW!"

Hoooooooooo boy! I am sitting in that room wiping the DROOL offa my chin! Awesome! Now he is gonna tear her a new asshole! Whoop whoop! Here we go! He's gonna come to my defense and tell her that her wants, needs and flippant little desires are NOT the priority and that, as a nurse, I should be able to make the decision about whether something impacts a patients safety or not! Sweet! Here we go! Give it to her, Doc!!!

I peek out of the room just in time to see him slink off, tail firmly between his legs...castrated.

Damn.

She stomps into her office. Looking to make peace with the megabeast, I walk in behind her.

"Can I talk to you for a second," I ask.

"THIS ISN'T A GOOD TIME, CP!" (yes, she was screaming.)

"But, I just want you to hear my reasonin..."

"I SAID THIS ISN'T A GOOD TIME. NOW YOU GET BACK OUT THERE AND DO YOUR JOB AND LEAVE ME ALONE TO DO MINE! ALL I KNOW IS THAT THING GETS MOVED TODAY OR YOU GET WRITTEN UP!!!"

"You," I snarl back, "are seriously going to tell me you are going to write me up for trying to make something SAFER, just because it doesn't agree with your point of view? Are you serious???"

"MOVE IT, TODAY." (Yes, banchee-bitch is still screaming.)

I was about to turn and leave, when I realized I tasted blood in my own mouth. It was the distinctly metallic taste of biting ones own tongue. I didn't care for it much, so I spat it out at her verbally.

"You know what? The priorities in this place are really friggin' SCREWED!"

Mmmm. That felt good. Not quite as good as sex, but definately as good as a quickie masturbation session with a vibrator whose batteries were running a tad bit too low. What I really wanted to do was tell her to eat my ass with a spoon, yet, I feel that would be too good of a yummy treat for her. No. I will not reward her actions with allowing her to eat the royal ass of the Princess, not even if the spoon was silver.

I walk out. I call my husband. I piss and bitch. I feel better.

Lie. No I don't. But at least I vented.

The day goes by. She leaves the office. Not another word is said. I don't move the autoclave and neither does my partner. We agreed not to. Said we absolutely will stand on our morals and values as nurses and just say no. Nancy Reagan would be proud of a bitch.

She returns much later on in the day. I go about my business.

There is a very uncomfortable stink of dread in the air.

Or, it was her perfume. Not sure.

4:30 rolls around. It is time for me to leave and pick up my son. NOW she opts to have a conversation. Hm. Coincidence?

Think not.

So, partner and I walk into her office and this time, I say very little. I let the partner do all the talking this time. She has my back on this and is doing a pretty good job of handling her. OM barks at my partner to move the autoclave back. Partner says, "we won't."

"Fine," she says, as she pushes past us. "Then I will go do it myself."

"OM," I say, "it is not a matter of who physically moves it. It's about WHY it should be moved in the first place."

"IT WILL BE MOVED BECAUSE I SAY SO!"

"And if someone gets burned," I query.

"We had it like this yesterday. NO one got burned, CP. There were no problems."

"But that's only ONE day," my partner counters. "What if someone gets burned in the future?"

"We'll just have to deal with it then," is her intelligent reply.

She then proceeds to move the autoclave which is 50 pounds heavier than she is with us just standing there watching her. Neither of us moved toward it because, bottomline, our integrity as nurses was being challenged. If the doctor had told me to put it there and leave it there, I probably would have. He's my boss and I listen to him, regardless. If he feels it is safe, then fine, I'm all for it. It's his office, after all. If he is okay with getting his ass handed to him in court, so be it. But, I am NOT listening to a woman who has a certificate in office managment on how to be a nurse. Sorry. Not happening.

My job is in jeopardy right now. I realize that and I am ready to take on the responsibility of my actions. I will never compromise a patient to save my own ass. Not ever. This is what separates me from the medical assistants that I work with. I have a license to think about. I have meticulous training that will always make me intervene when I see a situation that I think could cause harm or injury to my patients. I would correct a doctor if I saw him about to do the wrong thing without hesitation. I am not the type to stand idly by with my fingers up my gooch and be all like...Um, OOPS!

That's not me. That ain't who Esther raised.

(Are you thinking this post is getting too long? Ask me if I give a rats testicle. Leave now or continue on. I am not writing to entertain you, damn it! Whaddya think? I'm a clown? I'm here to amuse you? Fuggedaboudit! I'm venting. Now, shut the fuck up and let me finish.)

Ahem.

Anyway, a friend of mine at work, (who I won't even give a pseudonym to on the off chance I should get dooced. I will not take her down with my ship), said something incredibly accurate poignant. She said, and I plagerize and embellish and paraphrase:

"The reason that OM has to exert so much control over everyone and everything in the office is because she has no control at home. She has a loveless marriage. She has a son who is out of control and a derelict. She has a grandaughter she is never allowed to see because the baby's mother hates her. She has a medical condition that she cannot control and that infuriates her. Hell, she is even angry she can't control the due date of her daughters baby! She has no control in every other facet of her life. So, she takes it out on us."

Did you ever want to make out with someone, simply based on the fact that they just fucking GET IT????

I LOVE her. She is simply the smartest bitch in the office. She just...gets it.

However, unlike me, she isn't a "speaker upper". I can understand that with her a bit more. She needs her job. She's a single momma of a beautiful baby boy and she, unlike the OM, understands priority.

Me? I have no sense of priority when it comes to my integrity.

I just refuse to be controlled.

If God wanted me controlled, he would have equipped me with a remote.

On a lighter note, I will be 40 in one more week.

August 30th.

Write it down. I accept cash, check, charge or THIS.

Please email me for the shipping address.

Thanks in advance. Have a great day.