This question was originally posted on Quora.com and was answered by Kathy Hurst Davis, Labor and Delivery nurse for over 30 years. This has been answered and those answers are correct. I will try to expound a little with my own experiences. I look terribly unhealthy. I am overweight and I have had cancer…multiple times. You might ask, “But why? You are a nurse!” Here is why. For 30 years I worked in hospitals and most of my shifts were in labor and delivery. My shifts were 12 hour shifts. This in itself is a lie. In order to work a 12 hour shift, you are expected to be there 15 minutes before your shift and stay 15 minutes after your shift. This allows for report from shift to shift. I lived an hour away. This made a 14.5 hour shift. I also worked nights and slept days. It was so common to arrive at work and have shifts where I didn’t get the 30 minute lunch break we were supposed to get much less the two 15 minute breaks . Yes, dear ones…30 minutes out of a 14 hour shift for ONE meal. There were many shifts where I had to run into the break room and wolf down a sandwich in about 5 minutes and get back to my patients. Any food that could be grabbed and eaten in a nurse’s break room is fair game? Why? Because no one had time to eat a damned salad for crying out loud. Eating a sandwich was a science…9 bites. Fast. Throw down some chips if they were there. Peel an orange? Ain’t nobody got time for that. Banana, 4–5 bites…Then get back out there because the patient that you had been working with for 8 or 9 hours of your shift is ready to have her baby, NOW. Labor laws be damned. NOW. Then you finish that, run to the bathroom and come back to finish up. Did I mention that you have needed to go to the bathroom for at least 4 hours? And there you have why many nurses have urinary tract issues or hemorrhoids. HOURS… Finally, the next shift arrives and you are able to pass the baton, if you aren’t behind on charting because, well, you were taking care of the patient? Then I left. Got off at 7:15, drove an hour to get home. Showered the evidence of the day or just fell into bed. I would usually get to sleep around 9am. I then was awake by the time my son got out of school. 3:15. Awake, and in the parking lot. So, there was a good day…5 - 5.5 hours of sleep. Bring him home, figure out something for dinner, eat, get dressed for work and leave the house by 5:15 to do it all over again. Then I get a day off. I get home at 8:15 and do all the business type things that need to be done during normal hours and don’t go to bed at all. Then I sleep that night…don’t take much of a nap the next afternoon because I am so messed up, and head back to work another 12 hour shift. 3 one week, 4 the next. Up and down the days in between. All days off are spent trying to fill up with memories with my son to make up for the lack of attention during the working days. And of course, you get called in half the time you are off. The most hours I ever worked were 168 hours in 2 weeks. My son was away with family and I stayed at the hospital around the clock, sleeping in the call room. This covered many vacations and gave me some overtime pay which is always welcome to a single mother. We are constantly working trades so that we can attend important functions with our families. Forget consistently being home for the holidays. Someone has to be there with the patients so we all have to take turns. Sometimes, due to staffing you had to work 2 or 3 Christmas’s in a row. And guaranteed, if you start a new job, it will be at least a year before you get Christmas off and most likely, you will have to work Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. In the 30 years I did patient care, I only got both off when I was on medical leave after surgery. We have the crappiest lifestyles and are exposed to sick people on a regular basis. That is why so many of us are tired, fat, grumpy, have bad skin and want to beat the shit out of people who are judging us. Source
