Considering working overnights so I can go to school during the day. It balances better for me tbh. What’s it like and is it easier? I have autoimmune issues and I get fatigue/weakness during flares so im wondering if this will be easier on my body. I worked overnight for hotels before I love the schedule.

I’m sure this question has been asked hundreds of times, but I’m not sifting through hundreds of posts to find the answers. 😂

I work weekends at a new facility, and I’m currently going through the “I’m new, so apparently everything that goes wrong is my fault” stage.
One of the employees (I’m not entirely sure what her title is because she works in therapy but isn’t licensed?) was caught calling me “retarded” and “a dumb bitch” over a situation that genuinely was not my fault.

For context, a resident who is nearly completely independent went to therapy without pants on. This resident gets herself up, gets herself dressed, and rarely needs assistance with anything. She usually isn’t even up that early. Instead of simply asking where the resident’s room and closet were so she could help resolve the situation, this employee threw a fit. Honestly, it felt like she was looking for a reason to start something.

There’s also a nurse on another hall who seems to have a problem with me. She’s called me lazy, despite the fact that I DON’T EVEN WORK ON HER HALL. She’s the one who sits behind the nurses station and watches TikTok . Or clocks in and GOES HOME for an hour. She has no firsthand knowledge of how I do my job, yet she’s targeted me on multiple occasions. I’ve been firm in response without being outright confrontational.
The problem is that the way I’m being talked about and spoken to is absolutely ridiculous. I understand being new means I have things to learn, and I’m perfectly willing to accept constructive criticism. What I’m not willing to accept is being insulted, talked down about, or treated like a punching bag because I’m the new girl. There’s a clear difference.

Leaving this facility this early isn’t an option for me, so I’m trying to figure out how to navigate this professionally without letting people walk all over me.
For those of you who have worked in LTC, SNF, or other healthcare facilities for a while: How do you handle the catty coworkers and workplace bullying without making yourself a target or getting caught up in unnecessary drama?

Do you address it directly? Document everything and go to management? Kill them with kindness? Set firm boundaries and keep it moving?
I know I can’t control how other people act, but I would appreciate some advice on how to protect myself, earn respect, and get through this stage without losing my mind. Because I am NOT used to this petty of drama especially in a workplace.

At my job for NOC shift, we’re not allowed to wake the patients early to check or reposition them. We’re supposed to let them sleep. So we only change and reposition them once besides passing out ice water. I see other CNAs start changing residents at 5AM and finish all of them by 6:30AM so they can return the cart to the laundry lady who gets mad if we return it after that time. Well yesterday I got an assignment that I was unfamiliar with (because they keep jumping me around while other CNAs get a fixed assignment). And in my assignment, I basically had to go from one wing to another wing because it was just basically random rooms that other CNAs do not want.

For my assignment, I had 16 residents and 13 of them needed to be changed and repositioned. 5 of them are on g-tubes so I had to get the nurse to turn them off. Well I asked the nurse at 3AM after my break if she could please turn them off so I can start changing them and she tells me it’s too early. I told her my assignment is very heavy and I’m unfamiliar with these rooms and she’s like yeah but morning shift doesn’t change them right away so they’re just going to be sitting in their soaked briefs if you start changing them too soon. Well my thought process was since it literally take me at least 15 minutes to change someone because I have to wait for the water to get hot (we use towel and water), gather all my supplies (we don’t have a linen cart so we have to get it one at a time from the supplies)…not to mention my rooms are all over the place so I have to factor in the time to get there. Well the nurse starts turning off the gtube at 3:30AM and it turns out pretty much all of the patients couldn’t even assist in rolling so it’s very hard to change them. One of them was a 200lb+ man and he couldn’t even move his body because he was in pain. I’m a 150lb woman and I basically had to do my best to roll him myself. And you may ask, why did I not ask for any help?? Like we don’t do that here at all. When I was training with my preceptors they all tell me, try not to ask for help and try to just do it yourself because there’s not a lot of people during NOC anyways. Also I had like 2 patients (thankfully females) who kept throwing punches at me as I was changing them. Their grips were so hard they wouldn’t let me brief them up. Another man was soaked everywhere so I had to do a full bed change/gown change and that took a while for me as well. When I finished, it all took me a little after 6:30AM and of course the laundry lady got mad at me because she wants it returned latest 6:30AM.

I dont know if it’s just me but when I was training with my preceptors we didn’t have to change that many people?? Like they only had 6-7 incontinent patients. I’m the newest one here but they did this with a girl that I became close to who had to quit and she was getting like 10+ incontinent patients and would often finish late as well.

Am I just really slow or is it not normal to be assigned 10+ incontinent patients with a lot of total dependents?

I’m almost done with my clinicals, and honestly it’s made me rethink if I even want to be an CNA. I’ve been a medical assistant and gave that up to take care of my grandma. I’ve always considered being a nurse and I believe that being a CNA would be the next best step for me. I’m not sure if it’s the facility I’m at, the school I went to, or the current CNA/Nurses that I deal with…. But I’m honestly starting to rethink it all. I haven’t felt this humiliated, depressed, or defeated in my life. I’m hoping that once I’m done and I’m able to move to better place things will get better, but part of me doesn’t even want to do it anymore.

CNA in long-term care. I’m having a lot of trouble pushing the linen carts / meal carts / wheelchairs around all day, and my back is killing me. Do you guys have the same issue? Which carts or equipment are the worst for you?