I’m getting some X-rays on a suspected dislocated ankle.

Nurse: “Do you have anything metal implanted in your body, any pins or surgical plates, copper birth control, anything like that?”

Me: “No.”

Nurse: “Is there any chance you might be pregnant?”

Me: “None whatsoever.”

Nurse: “You know, one time I had someone tell me there was zero percent chance she was pregnant — she insisted on it — and it turns out she was about three months along. She swore we were making it up, but we delivered her baby about six months later.”

Me: “I wonder why she was so adamant that she couldn’t be pregnant. Was she older? Just thought the time she could get pregnant was behind her?”

Nurse: “No, she was about your age, married, and came in complaining of nausea and classic pregnancy symptoms. I was new but my first thought was, ‘Oh, she’s pregnant,’ and then I thought I shouldn’t say that in case she wasn’t. I always get annoyed when people assume I’m pregnant any time my stomach does something odd, and I didn’t want to do that to her. But now I’m always wary of people who insist they aren’t pregnant and their symptoms line up.”

Me: “Well, if it makes you feel better, I’m married to another woman, and the last surgery I had removed my uterus, so there’s definitely a zero-percent chance of me being pregnant.”

Nurse: *Laughing* “And I don’t think dislocated ankles are a pregnancy symptom.”

Me: “Man, that would be a sucky way to find out you’re pregnant. Congrats on the news! Sorry about your ankle…”

My boyfriend is recovering after emergency surgery. As he had a spinal block, he needs more time to recover from the anesthetic. He has just regained full function a couple of hours after the operation is finished when a (male) nurse comes into the room. It’s about 11:00 at this time. Normally, someone would only need thirty minutes or so if they used a general anesthetic, which my boyfriend opted out of.

Nurse: “You guys need to leave.”

I’m here as support and to take down all instructions as my boyfriend is understandably a bit out of it.

Me: “Why?”

Nurse: “We are about to get very busy. You need to leave so we have this bed free.”

We are in the A and E department (emergency room). There are a few private rooms at the end of the corridor with the waiting room at the other end as it’s a small hospital. I literally stick my head out the door, look right, and look left. There is not a sound or another soul except us three.

I turn to look at the nurse, who stares at me and says:

Nurse: “What are you waiting for?”

It was the most unprofessional discharge I have experienced. What kind of emergency was going to occur on a Thursday morning that would require the entire A and E?

My boyfriend had a little accident at work today and needed some stitches. While we were waiting in the emergency room, a car stopped right at the entrance. We assumed they had someone disabled in the car and just wanted to load them out real quick and then find parking. 

It turned out to be a woman alone. She got out and walked inside.

A nurse filling out paperwork with us shouted at her:

Nurse: “You cannot park there! That is for ambulances bringing in emergencies!”

Woman: “I will just be a minute. I just have a few questions.”

While she said that, she kept walking.

Nurse: “Be that as it may, this is for ambulances only. Seriously, you need to move your car away!”

The woman just waved her hands like swatting away an annoying fly and started to walk faster,

Then, the nurse suddenly talked in a very hushed voice so that only we could hear her but the woman could not.

Nurse: “We have our own tow car that can be here in two or three minutes. Move away now, or your car is gone by the time you return.”

If a car is blocking an emergency entrance or exit this can cost lives, so they are not messing around, even when most of the time they only tow people parking in the disabled spaces for no reason.

Then, she winked at us.

Nurse: “You both heard me warning her, right?”

Me: “Yes, loud and clear; you warned her that she would get towed.”

The nurse called security on her radio, and within two minutes, they were there hooking the woman’s car up.

We were still waiting when I suddenly heard a screech.

Woman: “YOU B****! WHERE IS MY CAR?! I HAVE PLACES TO BE!”

Nurse: “Security is on their way; they will explain to you where it is.”

Woman: “They’d better bring my car, or I will call the police for theft!”

The nurse looked up and could see that security was already almost behind the woman.

Nurse: “I was calling after you telling you that you cannot park there. This is for emergency vehicles. But you ignored me even when I shouted after you that you will be towed and that this will be an expensive mistake.”

The woman lost it and tried lunging at the nurse, but the nurse just stepped back and security grabbed her, so she hit the security guard instead. They tackled her and called the police.

To make a long story short, the police came, and we told them the nurse shouted after the woman that this was for emergency vehicles only and that she would be towed several times, but the woman did not listen.

The woman got arrested for assault and a whole bunch of other stuff. The nurse later brought us to the examining room and told us the assault was probably her biggest mistake. She only wanted to teach the woman a lesson by making her pay for the towing, but since they had to call the cops, she will also get a ticket for blocking the entrance to an emergency room, and the fine for that is a lot higher than just the towing. Plus all the charges.

My boyfriend got his stitches and is just fine now.

CONTENT WARNING: Infertility, Suicidal Ideation

My husband and I have been trying for a child for about ten years now. This has resulted in one miscarriage and nothing else. We try to get medical help, but then the global health crisis hits and my husband needs two surgeries, which causes a delay. However, I am still below my forties, so the doctor assures me there’s plenty of time.

After the surgeries and the health crisis, I finally get an appointment with a fertility clinic. We go over the basics: allergies (I have two cats) and work (next to work, I volunteer at a sports club, working with kids twice a week). Nothing seems off in my daily life, so the tests begin. 

Meanwhile, the specialist goes through the options with us. Adoption is impossible because of my age. The process for qualification and the waiting list is so long that by the time I get approved, I will be considered “too old”. Fostering is the same. At the end of the list, IVF is the only option left, so all we need to do is wait for the results, and then we get going. 

The results come in and… my values are not good. The specialist tells me I have the same chance of natural conceiving as with IVF, and the values point at a very early menopause.

The conclusion: I am considered infertile. 

I break down crying, and in my sorrow, I call out:

Me: “Why am I still here, then? What do I have left to live for?”

Her response: 

Specialist: “Then why don’t you get a pet? Or do some volunteer work; that is very fulfilling.”

Never before have I had such an urge to yell at someone or cuss them out. I managed to keep it inside and left quickly. Thanks for remembering my file, lady!

I’m a nurse at a large hospital. The floor I worked on was selected to be the [contagious illness] unit during the first and second waves of the global health crisis.

More nurses than not were catching [illness], so when I got an inkling of being sick, I called out for a day and got tested. If I tested positive, then I would get two weeks off without penalty, but I tested negative, so I returned to work the next day. I got called into the office where my manager gave me a verbal warning because I had one too many sick days.

Me: “You realize we are in a [health crisis], right?”

Manager: “Yes, I know that, but we still have to stick to the original policy.”

When we clocked in, there was an electronic message that popped up on the time clock that read, “During the [health crisis], we need to self-monitor ourselves, and by clocking in, you are declaring that you are fit to work.” There was no adjustment to the policy even though we were an [illness] unit during a health crisis, so I would either have to lie about feeling sick when I clocked in or call out and get in trouble.

Here is where malicious compliance comes in. I had always picked up a lot of extra time in a sister department, not because I needed the extra money but because the hospital was always short-staffed. My manager didn’t like the fact that I picked up extra time in the other department. She wanted me to pick up extra time in our department.

Manager: “As punishment, you can not pick up extra time in [sister unit] for ninety days, the length of your disciplinary period. You should be responsible enough to pick up extra time in your own department.”

As I didn’t need the extra money, I didn’t pick up ANY extra time anywhere in that period. I got called almost every day to ask if I could come in because my department was short-staffed. One of the reasons they were short-staffed was that our sister unit was even more short-staffed and the nurses on my unit were getting pulled to go work there. If only more nurses picked up extra time on the other unit. Hmm…

At the end of the ninety days, I was told I could pick up extra time in the sister department again. At that point, I handed in my two weeks’ notice and told my manager that I had accepted a position at another hospital.

Manager: “Because of your years of service, you need to give four weeks’ notice.”

Me: “No, that’s just a courtesy. So I’ll extend the same courtesy I got when I needed to call out sick.”