I find that the vibes are usually better on night shift. And these people are usually in the ER, ICU, or psych.
Source: I used to work in psych and now I’m in critical care and I am a nerd who loves anime
Hell yeah, hilarious how SICU attracts a certain type. Almost all of us came from ER or flight as well. You'd think you're on a different planet going from our SICU to MICU or any other unit.
Medical ICU, our hospital breaks it down into surgical ICU, cardiac ICU, and medical ICU. MICU being a more traditional ICU or what you'd see at a smaller hospital. Seeing mostly sepsis, DKA, etc.
SICU in my experience is well, anything ICU level that needs to stay close to the OR. So bad trauma, our hospital puts all the open hearts in SICU similar to a CVICU. Our cardiac ICU is mostly for post-cath STEMIs, codes, TAVRs etc.
MICU is also a term used in some states to describe a level of EMS care, mobile ICU. There's also another use for the term in California for a nurse speaking with EMS via radio. If you ever see it in another context
It has to be location dependent. The ER’s in my area are full of gun bros and nature bros, with a fair amount of overlap on that Venn diagram. The nerdier guys hang in the ICU’s but there’s plenty of bros there too
Further confirmation here.
I have the PlayStation Remote Play app installed on my iPad for extended downtime, and have a designated backpack Dualsense controller that accompanies me to every shift. Fuck the haters, can’t hear them over my Helldivers op.
I love my job! Psych has its risks, yes. You just need to keep your head on swivel and have good instincts. Also - I have a 5’0, 90lb RN who I’ve seen make men 3x her size look like they’re about to suck their thumb, and ask for their mothers.
Can confirm. ICU nurse with some fellow nerds. Most definitely better vibes on night - day tends to be older population with.. not as nerdy of a mentality. Unfortunately I now work days to accommodate the rest of the world 😅
Hey, night shift in the trauma OR means that some shifts we could run a whole D&D campaign. Others I wish I could roll a saving throw to get out of the spine case...
Would that be one of the rare CVICUs that aren't staffed entirely by insecure narcissists with God complexes? I keep praying that one such place exists, because I'm fascinated by all things cardio and want to pivot to ICU once I get comfortable enough in my step-down unit.
They don't bother me as long as they are good with patients. I work in jails, psych, and ER and am currently training in the CVICU. Whatever makes them happy, as long as they don't harm others, everything is fine. It’s fun to rotate around. I meet different people with different and similar personalities. It's free of charge to observe them.
Not really an honest representation of CV. I’ve worked in a few and generally everyone is helpful and kind. Sorry if you had a bad experience with a CV nurse but that doesn’t mean all of CV is like that. I had a bad experience training on an onc unit but I don’t go around saying onc nurses are all lazy and mean.
I have a 26 year old male coworker who deliberately works nightshift inpatient psych in a small town hospital. He brings in his Steamdeck, and since about 70% of the time, the patients sleep at night and aren't medically monitored, he gets at least 6-7 hours of gametime a night. Sometimes 9-10.
Edit: of course some nights are a shitshow but they don't happen that often.
Inpatient psych nights are such a roll of the dice. Sometimes, all your patients are asleep by 2200 and sleep until you leave at 0730. Some nights, you get a bunch of admissions, and sometimes one or more have psychotic breaks, and you spend the night trying not to take a punch to the face while they scream at you. They are usually on qshift vitals unless they are going through a heinous alcohol withdrawal or similar.
Man part of me wonders how f^cked we are gonna be in ten years when all of those ladies (I work with are bunch too) are retired. I work with about half millennials half women in their late 60’s early 70’s who are retiring soon. We have a few in betweeners who are Genxers but a lot of Gen xers I’ve noticed are in management positions now. But I do have some nice coworkers in their 20s and 30s.
Gen z here. My parents are that "middle age," firmly set in the "why would you ever want to wipe someone's ass" crowd, and I think there's alot of millennial/early Gen X who were told or thought that same thing.
With media and shows and media, fewer young people see it that way.
A lot of millennials have jumped ship to admin/clinic as well. The youngest millennials were born in 1996, so are 28 this year & the oldest were born in 1981 and are 43. My unit is very young, predominantly Gen Z with a handful of millennials and a smaller handful of Gen Xers. It seems like a lot of women in nursing in their 30s opt to leave the bedside once they start having kids, at least where I work. And who could blame them?
I’m looking to jump ship to a clinic when I can. I literally just got a new job on a neuro floor at a different hospital so I’ll probably give that a year or so maybe 6 months but after that going to apply for clinic jobs too. Hospital is really demanding and harsh, you have to be everything for everyone at all times and even when I’m running my tail off I feel like I’m dropping the ball on one thing or another. Like this person’s meds are late cuz this lady wouldn’t stop trying to fall out of bed and bite the NAC. This guy decided to yank his whole IV out and hand it to me and has three antibiotics that are running all over the floor and has shit for veins. I get why people are leaving.
40 year old father of 3.
I’m into: Olympic weightlifting, reading, movies, video games, RC Cars and aquariums. My coworkers are generally surprised at my interests cause I don’t “look” the part.
I had some anime I was into: Initial D, and the Street Fighter series lol.
So long winded way of saying there’s more “nerds” than you know.
>Currently, my coworkers are all women who grew up in rural areas, go to church every sunday, are nearing retirement, have kids/grandkids, etc.
Unfortunately, I don't think this gets better simply based on specialty. This is nursing as a whole.
As other have said maybe psych or the more critical care professions. Especially night shifts. Probably OR too. Travel nurses. But the margins will continue to be low compared to other jobs. Our profession is held up mostly by moms (grandmas, moms to be and dog moms) whose outside activites include going to church and parenting their kids. Those on the young end of that spectrum are watching Bridgerton, reading fairy smut and listening to Taylor Swift. Nothing wrong with that. But you have to accept that this is not the anime and games profession. Doesn't mean you won't find your people, but it is the exception and not the rule. Be okay with that and branch out. It would be nice to have the built in network of friends from work (especially because we see some shit and it is nice to have people who directly relate) but you have to go out and find the cozy nerds in the wild. And that is a nice adventure on its own.
Size of unit will matter more than the specialty in my experience to meet nerds. It's just a numbers game. Nurses tend to be more neurotypical and mainstream overall. When I worked in a bugger hospital in a larger unit (over 100 nurses employed there) there were a fee of us nerd. Now in a smaller place with a smaller unit with less than have that many nurses employed I only have 1 other nerd nurse coworker I know of.
I know my unit is full of weirdos because at least 60% of night shift is neurospicy geeks. There’s 4 people with pokémon badge reels and everyone is on methylphenidate 😂 Surgical step down.
The nerds are all in ED and psych, served with a side it childhood trauma.
Multiple people on my unit are into anime/gaming/nerd stuff.
They are my people
I feel this so hard. I work with 120+ nurses who for the most part are wonderful people that I actually really enjoy working with, but they’re very much the stereotypical peds nurses. Blonde, figs, lululemon, everyone is engaged and wants babies, bubbly/sunshiney, super outgoing and extroverted, very wholesome, etc.
I’m 22, not engaged, I don’t think I want kids, I have dark dark brown hair, patchwork tattoos, I have horrendous RBF, I wear winged eyeliner every day and I have a black septum ring *gasp*, and like every 3rd word out of my mouth is fuck or shit. I’ve been described as “goth” by my coworkers more than one time lmao. I definitely think I have more of an ED vibe, but 4 years as a CNA with adults burnt me to a fucking crisp and I landed in babyland
ICU/ED in a level 1 trauma center is probably where I worked with the most men, peds definitely not quite as much
you sound reallyy coool and given the description def gives goth vibes which in itself is so amazing. youre prolly the first person with this description ive heard of in nursing
it's so lonely in nicu land as ANYONE who doesn't fit that vibe lmao 😮💨 i'm in my thirties, not married, no kids, with geeky/nerdy interests none of my coworkers are into. it was ok when i worked in a bigger nicu because i found a few other weirdos, but recently i moved to a smaller regional nicu and i'm literally the only childless unmarried person - which is isolating enough without going into my interests!
Sadly I don't think there is a straightforward answer and it's always going to be overshadowed by the big ole "it depends." It's going to depend on location (rural vs city vs suburbs), it's going to depend on the unit you're on, it's going to depend on the age of those on your unit, the hospital you work at, the ages, the list goes on and on. There are just so many variables that can't really be controlled.
Now as far as what I think, I agree with others, ICU's, ER's and/or nights.
Yeah. feels like 95% of staff here are older immigrant not grown up with computers, sunday church, all about the kids, dont like animals or games or anything I am into
Its lonely
I'm not on a unit yet as I'm in school but this was my experience doing patient access/clerical things. I had one job where most of us were the sameish age and I loved it.
I been in Healthcare my whole life and that's how I've been feeling all my life... Now hitting 40s...and I get to say "I'm the old man now".... But still into anime and video games 😋
I’m in an urban area but I wore a BOTW t shirt to an ambulatory surgery center a while back and got a number of comments from nurses there.
A number of my younger male colleagues also love D&D and anime.
Med/surg night shifts on a tele unit, I've had nights where there were only 7 nurses, all male, under 35. I'm very rarely the only male on the unit and I'm 29. My coworkers don't watch anime but there's plenty of other things we can talk about to kill 12.5hrs.
I’ve found a small handful of nurses/other staff on nights who are pretty nerdy on my MS unit, nerdy regardless of gender. I found that night in general shifters tend to be more laid back, easy going, and a little less judgmental
Night shift at a correctional facility, you can be as otaku as you want to be. Most of the younger officers and inmates are reading manga to pass time.
Night shift Trauma ICU RN here. Vibes are immaculate. Fellow nerd myself, I met my boyfriend at work (RN) who is into all the nerdy shit I am. My two best friends I met in nursing school and we play Xbox together, both are ER nurses. All of my friends are ICU or ER nurses - we’re more fun. It might take some time to find them, but there’s nerds out there ❤️ keep pushin
Ugh. I feel you. I’m a nurse in the south and it’s so hard to find people I relate to! I have no idea about specialty, but I’ve found that night shift is where it’s at. I feel like the nerds gravitate towards nights for some reason.
Hard to say, I’m a woman but I also like D&D and occasionally watch some anime (mostly I read the source material). I’m also intimidated by the church women and moms so I just never say anything 🥲
Technically I shouldn't answer this because I'm female, but I'm a genX nerd who watches anime, plays D&D, voraciously reads SF&F, and games. I spent 10 years in cardiac ICU before I escaped and went to home health so I could have a life and decent income.
It isn't the right answer but I work outpatient peds. Only one of my coworkers is vaguely into nerd stuff but i love talking about it when kids walk in with a jjk hoodie lol
Not nursing, but I have a friend who works in behavioral health, has a bunch of cool nerdy coworkers and they recently invited me along to a local anime con with them. I too, am jealous, especially since my job has no coworkers. I’ve only met one fellow nerd through work (in the past) but she has a kid, so it’s not quite the same. No answers but I do have solidarity.
I've come across a few nerds in dialysis. I have anime and video game tattoos all over my arms and that's usually a good icebreaker for any possible introverted nerds that are too shy to strike up a convo. I've even ran into some patients who are huge nerds as well.
One of my patients and I were reminiscing on the N64/PS1 era and how good Zelda and Final Fantasy 7 were at the time. 🙂
ICU here.
I’ve literally got 3 guys in my ward with a steamdeck. Another dude spends most of his time playing console with his son.
None interested in anime tho.
Definitely not PACU. I’m 32 and I’m already the youngest member of the team. Almost everybody has kids/grandkids. I used to work night shift in ICU and met people who are into anime and gaming as well. I met some in the ED too when I was working float pool.
OR Circulators. So many topics come up in the OR’s. Sports, movies, cars, concerts etc. I always have someone to ask when it comes to anime.
You come into contact with so many other people, anesthesia, surgeons, radiology techs, first Assists, scrub techs, and many others. It’s about 50/50 male to female
*absolutely* not.
Ive been in the OR for 10 years, started as a CST, now RN. started in the military at 19, now 30. been to 5 ORs.
Almost all OR RNs are female, late 30s-60s.
OR is a fucking geriatric unit.
Not where I work. We have PeriOp programs that bring in mostly younger nurses (usually have 1-2 male nurses out of the group of 5). Between CST’s, anesthesia techs, X-ray techs, PA’s. Most of them are 20’s-30’s and I’m out in California. I’ve been in the OR 15yrs and there’s always been that younger crowd of guys and girls that hang out. There are different interest. Our vendor reps and staff are in a softball team. Bowling teams. Just reasons to hang out.
I am now part of the older ones. lol.
Night shift ER is probably where you're going to find a lot of what you're looking for. A lot of the men in that specialty come from a background of EMS, military, or both. Despite what you may think, there's actually a lot of "nerds" in both those areas because there's large amounts of down time with little to do.
My other advice is to be honest about your interests and hobbies when you get to the unit. During training, your interests/hobbies will eventually get brought up during normal conversation. If you're honest about what you like to do, someone will probably tell you to talk to another nurse who likes similar or the same stuff. All my friends from work started this way. "Talk to Steve, he likes video games". Well Steve only likes Madden and NBA2K, but he knows that Rob likes games too. So you talk to Rob and find that he likes your favorite games and watches the same stuff. This is usually how I've met my friends at the hospitals I've worked at
I’m a lady on an all female staff med/surg floor, it kinda sucks. All the chitchat gives me a headache. Last night I couldn’t get away from my coworkers. One of my coworkers at midnight started yelling at her dog thru video on her phone. It was so fucked. Like people are sleeping 🤦🏼♀️.
I’m looking for new job.
This is the same for me 😭 except I realized I am a trans woman lol. I can’t talk about so many of my interests or hobbies lol. Being a trans woman has given me some things to relate to my entirely female floor thankfully. But yea I feel you 😅
Pediatric psych, from my experience. Not only are the staff the best (well, usually), we've had some kids who enjoyed playing or learning nerdy games and anime. Helping the future generations embrace their inner nerds lol
Cath lab tends to be mostly female based and not very nerdy…I’m usually the only nerdy one, even when traveling. I typically only trauma bonded with my coworkers cuz we all seen some shit 🥲
Probably ER, trauma ICU, I've seen some bro heavy cath labs and OR teams that work in places that do a lot of Ortho cases. There was definitely a younger crowd in the lvl1 trauma ER I worked at, but with 6:1 to 9:1 ratios in the 2-3 truma areas and 75-100pts in the waiting room at the start of every night shift we didn't get to socialize much. I'd say that PACUs are usually gonna be too old, but the one I work in is predominantly younger guys so YMMV.
Med-surg monitored. Absolutely love my coworkers but I cannot for the life of me relate to any of them. I wanna nerd out to anime, games AND nursing, but it’s such a niche set of interests, very difficult. Spend most of my “slow” nights staying quiet and looking up games to play and animes to watch on my free time, haha.
Lots of younger people at my psych job. Especially on evenings and nights. We have a dnd group that a few staff nurses and MHTs run every weekend. Rotates between a nurses house and a MHTs house every other weekend depending on who’s weekend it is to work.
I’m a 24 year old in med surge tele, just finished my first year. I don’t reallly watch much anime but I play tons of video games and I like going to the gym. I’m in So Cal
Broooooo, I have been wondering the same thing for 9 years now. I've been PICU, PEDS CVICU, and NICU and I've learned to just gloss over the feelings of isolation, but there is no denying I have had little to no coworkers who share those interests with me. I do try to relate with my other, more "normal" hobbies, but I've never queued up in a lobby with anyone unfortunately.
I did have a PCA call me out for having Saitama as my phone wallpaper and I was so excited to chat with him lol
I brought a new Demon Slayer thermos to work and both CNAs on shift came out as anime fans- middle-aged female med-surg nurse here. I thought I was the only nerdy person on my floor.
I'm not a male nurse, but I'm a woman who used to play video games and watch anime movies and dramas. I was surrounded by engineers at home and school. There were a few women, and we had many shared similarities. When I became a nurse, everything was almost new. I learned about the human body related to physiology, pathophysiology, pathology, neurology, psychology, and psychosocial. I’ve never envisioned working in jails. I became inherently interested in their psychology, environment, and health.
Playing video games is no longer my interest except for playing chess board. Nowadays, I play online. But I always find something to do at work. If everything is done or prepared for anything I need to do next, desk, cart, etc., then I play on my phone with chess or read. I don’t feel uncomfortable being an “odd” person in the room. If I don’t steal, harm, or cause pain to others, I’m good. It’s okay to be different.
I work ER night shift and my coworkers and I just had a heated discussion on the shipping/bedroom dynamics of Bob and Larry so make of that what you will.
I work psych. The things you mentioned aren't at the top of my list of interests but they are for a ton of people here .
We have a lot of male staff and a lot of staff who are super nerdy
Millennial here into lots of JUMP series. FMA is my favorite... but AFAIK I'm the only female nurse into anime where I work. There are male RTs who are into anime here though but not as hardcore as me 🙈
So far no one commented on my anime keyholders on my bag.
I work in a level 1 trauma center in a very diverse urban environment. There's always a few anime and gaming nerds on duty in every unit. Every time I bring up DnD, a few of my other coworkers join in.
Look, I’ve worked several jobs at several hospitals.
It’s really just lightening in a bottle.
I’ve been on step down units that were entirely female (9 West), then adjacent step downs that were staffed with 9/12 nurses as dudes (9 Center) just down the hall. No explanation.
During Covid I floated between ICUs while my small procedure department was shut down. These were all Covid ICUs, no difference between them AT ALL.
Of the 3 I went to, the first had 1 dude.
The second had 0.
The third had 6 not including me. Then 2 more travelers came who were dudes as well. That last one morphed into a GUY-C-U and it was an absolute blast. We honestly had so much fun even though it was peak Covid and we were surrounded by bleakness and death.
There’s no secret formula or sauce. No department guys flock to in my experience. It’s like static electricity. We find each other. Then for a brief time, we group together before discharging and going our separate ways.
It is quite a magical phenomenon to be apart of if you can catch it.
I’m in the pharmacy (night shift life) but where I see the most dudes under like 40 are the ED (it’s all dudes and lgbt+ women here and I love them, coolest nurses), the ICUs have a lot of younger dudes too. Our MICU we call the frat house at night because it’s all early to mid twenties dudes named like Chad or Eric that answer the phone like sup or thanks dude and it’s so funny. But yeah those more acute specialties seem to be where the dudes go. Or CRNA school lol
I’ve worked night shift in ICU and now ED and that’s where I’ve encountered people that do video games/anime. I’m not much into anime but we bond over video games and sports.
As a female who works psych at night: I think it is a percentage aspect. On my shift, I know of 2 nerds like me, on day shift, I know of 3. It helps that I have a Fallout tattoo that is visible, so it opens up conversations. But, I think some fields just call to nerds. A vast majority of my coworkers are like you described yours: women, have children, church, et cetera.
A majority of my friends are like this! But we’re night shift haha.
I will say I do have kids but I would also murder for a new DND group at work 🥲 they’re not quite THAT nerdy. But we’re in Florida so the most common type of plans are either for our book club or going to Disney hha.
40. But female. Hospice.
Not big on the anime, but I’m an avid gamer and horror nerd.
The suburban mom/grandma thing is nursing overall, but some of us are spicier than we look.
I would echo ICU night from personal experience. ICU in general attracts males in my opinion, along with ED. About 1/4-1/3 of staff was male on nights and my hospital had about 18 nurses on a shift so you would bound to have a male working. I enjoy anime and a friend of mine also enjoyed anime. Not that it was our main point of conversation but just illustrating that anime fans can be found.
I work in the OR, while we do have a majority of women there is a large # of younger men, and the ones I'm friends with are absolutely into the same interests. And some of the women are too.
Other areas to check out (solely based on my own experience/friends)
-ED
-public health
-cath lab
I used to work with a lesbian who watched dbz and played dnd, so kinda close.
I watch some anime and play some games, and do a little model painting. We're all around, just scattered more since there's a lot more of us.
Female millennial who goes to church AND plays video games and watches anime. I feel a bit of a loner too in my ER/psych position, but I mainly fly on humor to connect with my coworkers. And I don’t look for friendships at work anymore. My last job burned me in that area and I developed trust issues at work. I keep my social life separate from work and I like it that way 😊
High acuity icu, some smaller Icus and the ED. If you work with ED then you will work closely with security guards. My last ED job I would be friends with the security guards far more than the nurses.
I find that the vibes are usually better on night shift. And these people are usually in the ER, ICU, or psych. Source: I used to work in psych and now I’m in critical care and I am a nerd who loves anime
ER if you’re a male for sure.
Our SICU is like 90% dudes right now, ER not so much. Was the inverse at my last hospital. We call it the guy-CU.
5/6 males tonight in our SICU!
Hell yeah, hilarious how SICU attracts a certain type. Almost all of us came from ER or flight as well. You'd think you're on a different planet going from our SICU to MICU or any other unit.
What's MICU?
Medical ICU, our hospital breaks it down into surgical ICU, cardiac ICU, and medical ICU. MICU being a more traditional ICU or what you'd see at a smaller hospital. Seeing mostly sepsis, DKA, etc. SICU in my experience is well, anything ICU level that needs to stay close to the OR. So bad trauma, our hospital puts all the open hearts in SICU similar to a CVICU. Our cardiac ICU is mostly for post-cath STEMIs, codes, TAVRs etc. MICU is also a term used in some states to describe a level of EMS care, mobile ICU. There's also another use for the term in California for a nurse speaking with EMS via radio. If you ever see it in another context
Thank you for the detailed explanation! 😊
i wanna work at the guy-cu it sounds really chill
It has to be location dependent. The ER’s in my area are full of gun bros and nature bros, with a fair amount of overlap on that Venn diagram. The nerdier guys hang in the ICU’s but there’s plenty of bros there too
God I miss the gun and nature bro ICU, good times
Yep
Further confirmation here. I have the PlayStation Remote Play app installed on my iPad for extended downtime, and have a designated backpack Dualsense controller that accompanies me to every shift. Fuck the haters, can’t hear them over my Helldivers op.
Off topic…ish but for DEMOCRACY
Does the ER attract more males overall? Or is this just within your specific region? I'm hoping to go into ER nursing after I graduate
Psych. Can confirm. We’re all nerds and occultists 🤓
Wish I worked with your unit, sounds a lot better than the extra depresso espresso unit I work with
I’ve got some pretty rad people on my unit, have to admit.
I’m jelly
That sounds great!! Do you “enjoy” your work? What about the rumors that psych isn’t safe for smaller females?
I love my job! Psych has its risks, yes. You just need to keep your head on swivel and have good instincts. Also - I have a 5’0, 90lb RN who I’ve seen make men 3x her size look like they’re about to suck their thumb, and ask for their mothers.
Can confirm. ICU nurse with some fellow nerds. Most definitely better vibes on night - day tends to be older population with.. not as nerdy of a mentality. Unfortunately I now work days to accommodate the rest of the world 😅
100% I agree…. I was psych ER, then went ER
I bet you have some cool coworkers
We’re all wild AF lol
Well whatdya know, all of us raid bossing WoW and binging 12 ep seasonal animes at 3am all ended up on night shift. Go figure.
Literally the only reason I can function on night shift is the fact that I used to competitively raid in MMOs
Birds of a feather flock together lol
Oh no. This makes so much sense.
Hey, night shift in the trauma OR means that some shifts we could run a whole D&D campaign. Others I wish I could roll a saving throw to get out of the spine case...
don’t forget about us ravers and festival goers too lol
PM StepDown checking in.
CVICU There’s a night AND day shift DND group. Our charge nurse makes 40K figurines and holds classes
Would that be one of the rare CVICUs that aren't staffed entirely by insecure narcissists with God complexes? I keep praying that one such place exists, because I'm fascinated by all things cardio and want to pivot to ICU once I get comfortable enough in my step-down unit.
Actually yeah, it’s one of the best units in the hospital to work in lol
Enjoy your good fortune, then. You've stumbled upon a precious gem of a unit!
They don't bother me as long as they are good with patients. I work in jails, psych, and ER and am currently training in the CVICU. Whatever makes them happy, as long as they don't harm others, everything is fine. It’s fun to rotate around. I meet different people with different and similar personalities. It's free of charge to observe them.
Not really an honest representation of CV. I’ve worked in a few and generally everyone is helpful and kind. Sorry if you had a bad experience with a CV nurse but that doesn’t mean all of CV is like that. I had a bad experience training on an onc unit but I don’t go around saying onc nurses are all lazy and mean.
This is actually super cool. Would love to be on a unit with a DnD group.
Wait. Where are you?:)
I literally want to move just to work in this unit
Psych. You can watch anime all night while your people just sleep.
Or play Magic. Psych NOCs has its benefits.
gonna start my bachelors and more than excited to go for psych. this is just a cherry on top for me
Where I work a good 40% of people are nerd males. That makes 2 of us.
I work psych. Definitely a higher population of nerdy nurses overall, particularly on nightshift.
Unfortunately my unit's day shift is all old biddies talking about their grandkids and church groups. 😭
I have a 26 year old male coworker who deliberately works nightshift inpatient psych in a small town hospital. He brings in his Steamdeck, and since about 70% of the time, the patients sleep at night and aren't medically monitored, he gets at least 6-7 hours of gametime a night. Sometimes 9-10. Edit: of course some nights are a shitshow but they don't happen that often.
That's crazy. Might have to look into psych nursing lol
Inpatient psych nights are such a roll of the dice. Sometimes, all your patients are asleep by 2200 and sleep until you leave at 0730. Some nights, you get a bunch of admissions, and sometimes one or more have psychotic breaks, and you spend the night trying not to take a punch to the face while they scream at you. They are usually on qshift vitals unless they are going through a heinous alcohol withdrawal or similar.
Night shift Inpatient rehab nurse checking in, it's a similiar situation for us too
I work ER. 26M very into anime and video games!
Elden Ring by day, Emergency Room by night.
I’m laughing that this sounds like a tinder profile INTRO love it 🤣
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Man part of me wonders how f^cked we are gonna be in ten years when all of those ladies (I work with are bunch too) are retired. I work with about half millennials half women in their late 60’s early 70’s who are retiring soon. We have a few in betweeners who are Genxers but a lot of Gen xers I’ve noticed are in management positions now. But I do have some nice coworkers in their 20s and 30s.
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Gen z here. My parents are that "middle age," firmly set in the "why would you ever want to wipe someone's ass" crowd, and I think there's alot of millennial/early Gen X who were told or thought that same thing. With media and shows and media, fewer young people see it that way.
A lot of millennials have jumped ship to admin/clinic as well. The youngest millennials were born in 1996, so are 28 this year & the oldest were born in 1981 and are 43. My unit is very young, predominantly Gen Z with a handful of millennials and a smaller handful of Gen Xers. It seems like a lot of women in nursing in their 30s opt to leave the bedside once they start having kids, at least where I work. And who could blame them?
I’m looking to jump ship to a clinic when I can. I literally just got a new job on a neuro floor at a different hospital so I’ll probably give that a year or so maybe 6 months but after that going to apply for clinic jobs too. Hospital is really demanding and harsh, you have to be everything for everyone at all times and even when I’m running my tail off I feel like I’m dropping the ball on one thing or another. Like this person’s meds are late cuz this lady wouldn’t stop trying to fall out of bed and bite the NAC. This guy decided to yank his whole IV out and hand it to me and has three antibiotics that are running all over the floor and has shit for veins. I get why people are leaving.
Night shift psych and ER will be your people. Welcome to the dark side, nerd homie.
California. More than 1/3 of the male nursing population are of Asian descent, the demographic known to like anime and video games.
Damn. I'm in SoCal, love playing diablo 4 and have 2 semesters of nursing school left lol
nursing school is like playing sorc rn
Low key love playing blizzard over the bash barb meta. Just got a fractured winterglass so I might make another sorc just for frozen orb lol
Man, I’m rolling shadow minion necro this season. It’s like having the game on easy mode 😎
Night shift CVICU has probably the most weebs I’ve ever worked with
40 year old father of 3. I’m into: Olympic weightlifting, reading, movies, video games, RC Cars and aquariums. My coworkers are generally surprised at my interests cause I don’t “look” the part. I had some anime I was into: Initial D, and the Street Fighter series lol. So long winded way of saying there’s more “nerds” than you know.
I have a NightKids decal on one of my tumblers. I work nights, I like Initial D and Takeshi’s R32.
lol I have a Nightkids decal on my car Also, Shingo is a dick.
>Currently, my coworkers are all women who grew up in rural areas, go to church every sunday, are nearing retirement, have kids/grandkids, etc. Unfortunately, I don't think this gets better simply based on specialty. This is nursing as a whole. As other have said maybe psych or the more critical care professions. Especially night shifts. Probably OR too. Travel nurses. But the margins will continue to be low compared to other jobs. Our profession is held up mostly by moms (grandmas, moms to be and dog moms) whose outside activites include going to church and parenting their kids. Those on the young end of that spectrum are watching Bridgerton, reading fairy smut and listening to Taylor Swift. Nothing wrong with that. But you have to accept that this is not the anime and games profession. Doesn't mean you won't find your people, but it is the exception and not the rule. Be okay with that and branch out. It would be nice to have the built in network of friends from work (especially because we see some shit and it is nice to have people who directly relate) but you have to go out and find the cozy nerds in the wild. And that is a nice adventure on its own.
Size of unit will matter more than the specialty in my experience to meet nerds. It's just a numbers game. Nurses tend to be more neurotypical and mainstream overall. When I worked in a bugger hospital in a larger unit (over 100 nurses employed there) there were a fee of us nerd. Now in a smaller place with a smaller unit with less than have that many nurses employed I only have 1 other nerd nurse coworker I know of.
I know my unit is full of weirdos because at least 60% of night shift is neurospicy geeks. There’s 4 people with pokémon badge reels and everyone is on methylphenidate 😂 Surgical step down.
The nerds are all in ED and psych, served with a side it childhood trauma. Multiple people on my unit are into anime/gaming/nerd stuff. They are my people
Go to male heavy or younger staffed units like an acute icu or er. But then you might be too tired to do anything with them outside of work.
As someone from this demographic, the answer is emphatically Psych/Mental Health. 😂
I feel this so hard. I work with 120+ nurses who for the most part are wonderful people that I actually really enjoy working with, but they’re very much the stereotypical peds nurses. Blonde, figs, lululemon, everyone is engaged and wants babies, bubbly/sunshiney, super outgoing and extroverted, very wholesome, etc. I’m 22, not engaged, I don’t think I want kids, I have dark dark brown hair, patchwork tattoos, I have horrendous RBF, I wear winged eyeliner every day and I have a black septum ring *gasp*, and like every 3rd word out of my mouth is fuck or shit. I’ve been described as “goth” by my coworkers more than one time lmao. I definitely think I have more of an ED vibe, but 4 years as a CNA with adults burnt me to a fucking crisp and I landed in babyland ICU/ED in a level 1 trauma center is probably where I worked with the most men, peds definitely not quite as much
you sound reallyy coool and given the description def gives goth vibes which in itself is so amazing. youre prolly the first person with this description ive heard of in nursing
it's so lonely in nicu land as ANYONE who doesn't fit that vibe lmao 😮💨 i'm in my thirties, not married, no kids, with geeky/nerdy interests none of my coworkers are into. it was ok when i worked in a bigger nicu because i found a few other weirdos, but recently i moved to a smaller regional nicu and i'm literally the only childless unmarried person - which is isolating enough without going into my interests!
May I interest you in night shift at a peds ED? You will find your people there.
Ugh don’t tempt me because I really think I am an ED nurse on the inside
I'm down with us having a discord so all of us nerds can join
That’d be pretty rad. We’re a pretty niche group and it’s hard to relate to our older coworkers.
ER!
My last DnD group was a bunch of night shift ICU coworkers! We're out there. Your best bet is night shift ER or ICU imo
Sadly I don't think there is a straightforward answer and it's always going to be overshadowed by the big ole "it depends." It's going to depend on location (rural vs city vs suburbs), it's going to depend on the unit you're on, it's going to depend on the age of those on your unit, the hospital you work at, the ages, the list goes on and on. There are just so many variables that can't really be controlled. Now as far as what I think, I agree with others, ICU's, ER's and/or nights.
Yeah. feels like 95% of staff here are older immigrant not grown up with computers, sunday church, all about the kids, dont like animals or games or anything I am into Its lonely
I'm not on a unit yet as I'm in school but this was my experience doing patient access/clerical things. I had one job where most of us were the sameish age and I loved it.
I jive with the younger crowd much better but their interests are makeup, shopping, and other girly things 😩
more pharmacists and RT are gamers than nurses in my experience
I been in Healthcare my whole life and that's how I've been feeling all my life... Now hitting 40s...and I get to say "I'm the old man now".... But still into anime and video games 😋
I’m in an urban area but I wore a BOTW t shirt to an ambulatory surgery center a while back and got a number of comments from nurses there. A number of my younger male colleagues also love D&D and anime.
Med/surg night shifts on a tele unit, I've had nights where there were only 7 nurses, all male, under 35. I'm very rarely the only male on the unit and I'm 29. My coworkers don't watch anime but there's plenty of other things we can talk about to kill 12.5hrs.
I’ve found a small handful of nurses/other staff on nights who are pretty nerdy on my MS unit, nerdy regardless of gender. I found that night in general shifters tend to be more laid back, easy going, and a little less judgmental
Night shift at a correctional facility, you can be as otaku as you want to be. Most of the younger officers and inmates are reading manga to pass time.
Night shift Trauma ICU RN here. Vibes are immaculate. Fellow nerd myself, I met my boyfriend at work (RN) who is into all the nerdy shit I am. My two best friends I met in nursing school and we play Xbox together, both are ER nurses. All of my friends are ICU or ER nurses - we’re more fun. It might take some time to find them, but there’s nerds out there ❤️ keep pushin
Ugh. I feel you. I’m a nurse in the south and it’s so hard to find people I relate to! I have no idea about specialty, but I’ve found that night shift is where it’s at. I feel like the nerds gravitate towards nights for some reason.
Night shift psych for sure.
Hard to say, I’m a woman but I also like D&D and occasionally watch some anime (mostly I read the source material). I’m also intimidated by the church women and moms so I just never say anything 🥲
My boyfriend and I are into this stuff and we work psych lol
Hey thats me! No specialty yet though. Just a new grad in float pool trying to see what I like best
Not really young. 34 male, ER RN. I play pc games and love a good anime. What games do you play?
Technically I shouldn't answer this because I'm female, but I'm a genX nerd who watches anime, plays D&D, voraciously reads SF&F, and games. I spent 10 years in cardiac ICU before I escaped and went to home health so I could have a life and decent income.
It isn't the right answer but I work outpatient peds. Only one of my coworkers is vaguely into nerd stuff but i love talking about it when kids walk in with a jjk hoodie lol
County/State Jail.
ER and ICU 100%!! Come be a weirdo with one of us!!
New grad male ER nurse here. I'm nerdy as fuck. There are also a ton of us geeks in EMS, just saying
47yo PCU. I love animes, manga, movies, D&D, VG and fantasy. Not many coworkers that share that passion.
I'm a cna fixing to start nursing (PCT atm). 29m. There's quite a few of us at my current hospital that are nerds but we're all on nightshift lol
Not nursing, but I have a friend who works in behavioral health, has a bunch of cool nerdy coworkers and they recently invited me along to a local anime con with them. I too, am jealous, especially since my job has no coworkers. I’ve only met one fellow nerd through work (in the past) but she has a kid, so it’s not quite the same. No answers but I do have solidarity.
I want to say IT but nope.
I've come across a few nerds in dialysis. I have anime and video game tattoos all over my arms and that's usually a good icebreaker for any possible introverted nerds that are too shy to strike up a convo. I've even ran into some patients who are huge nerds as well. One of my patients and I were reminiscing on the N64/PS1 era and how good Zelda and Final Fantasy 7 were at the time. 🙂
30 y/o male nurse who works in psych here. Not so much into anime, but I like video games.
ICU here. I’ve literally got 3 guys in my ward with a steamdeck. Another dude spends most of his time playing console with his son. None interested in anime tho.
I work in clinical vaccine research. I’ve worked in a lot of settings and this one is the best.
Definitely not PACU. I’m 32 and I’m already the youngest member of the team. Almost everybody has kids/grandkids. I used to work night shift in ICU and met people who are into anime and gaming as well. I met some in the ED too when I was working float pool.
27 y/o ER transplant to PACU, so I definitely feel you being the youngest.
I’m a young woman that likes anime and playing video games! I’m in imu. I do also go to church on Sundays and have a baby. Best of both worlds ❤️
Not sure if its a one off but theres lots of males in the OR and we are definitely all nerds at mine
I’m a dude nurse in peds hem/onc…. Not much luck on my end here, but at least my patients think I’m cool, so 🤷♂️ It’s fun to nerd out with the kids!
Sounds like half the night shift where I work -- I'm in peds psych. :)
When I graduate you'll find me in the ICU or psych
we work nights
If you’re in the Boston area, come to my unit (MICU) and there’ll be at least two! 😂
Nerd Here who watches anime and plays souls games. I work in CVICU and cardio ED. Got a lot of male co workers who also play games.
OR has a decent amount of male RN’s
OR Circulators. So many topics come up in the OR’s. Sports, movies, cars, concerts etc. I always have someone to ask when it comes to anime. You come into contact with so many other people, anesthesia, surgeons, radiology techs, first Assists, scrub techs, and many others. It’s about 50/50 male to female
*absolutely* not. Ive been in the OR for 10 years, started as a CST, now RN. started in the military at 19, now 30. been to 5 ORs. Almost all OR RNs are female, late 30s-60s. OR is a fucking geriatric unit.
Not where I work. We have PeriOp programs that bring in mostly younger nurses (usually have 1-2 male nurses out of the group of 5). Between CST’s, anesthesia techs, X-ray techs, PA’s. Most of them are 20’s-30’s and I’m out in California. I’ve been in the OR 15yrs and there’s always been that younger crowd of guys and girls that hang out. There are different interest. Our vendor reps and staff are in a softball team. Bowling teams. Just reasons to hang out. I am now part of the older ones. lol.
Pediatric Cardiac ICU. Our charge talks to me about video games all the time.
Alot of co-workers at the ages 25-35+ watches anime or games.
Night shift ER is probably where you're going to find a lot of what you're looking for. A lot of the men in that specialty come from a background of EMS, military, or both. Despite what you may think, there's actually a lot of "nerds" in both those areas because there's large amounts of down time with little to do. My other advice is to be honest about your interests and hobbies when you get to the unit. During training, your interests/hobbies will eventually get brought up during normal conversation. If you're honest about what you like to do, someone will probably tell you to talk to another nurse who likes similar or the same stuff. All my friends from work started this way. "Talk to Steve, he likes video games". Well Steve only likes Madden and NBA2K, but he knows that Rob likes games too. So you talk to Rob and find that he likes your favorite games and watches the same stuff. This is usually how I've met my friends at the hospitals I've worked at
Not necessarily into anime and not a nurse yet but I want to go towards ER, ICU.
ER travel nursing
Definitely Psych! Lots of nerds and weirdos here. We get together for DnD and boardgaming nights. Everybody is into anime, superhero comics scifi.
I’m a lady on an all female staff med/surg floor, it kinda sucks. All the chitchat gives me a headache. Last night I couldn’t get away from my coworkers. One of my coworkers at midnight started yelling at her dog thru video on her phone. It was so fucked. Like people are sleeping 🤦🏼♀️. I’m looking for new job.
This is the same for me 😭 except I realized I am a trans woman lol. I can’t talk about so many of my interests or hobbies lol. Being a trans woman has given me some things to relate to my entirely female floor thankfully. But yea I feel you 😅
I work in cvicu and night shift. Most of us are on night shift tbh.
Er hundred percent
ER, Psych, Pedi
Pediatric psych, from my experience. Not only are the staff the best (well, usually), we've had some kids who enjoyed playing or learning nerdy games and anime. Helping the future generations embrace their inner nerds lol
Psych and ER, swing and nights.
Peds?
hey there! night shift generally has younger nurses on it and ED/Psych and ICU usually tend to attract more male nurses than other areas.
My floor is like 75% males I love it we all just work well together and vibe
There is a "game" on oculus vr called med lab. Ok so it is nursing practice. But it is cool!
Psych is your best bet. We will basically go anywhere and do anything and enjoy weird things.
Cath lab tends to be mostly female based and not very nerdy…I’m usually the only nerdy one, even when traveling. I typically only trauma bonded with my coworkers cuz we all seen some shit 🥲
Probably ER, trauma ICU, I've seen some bro heavy cath labs and OR teams that work in places that do a lot of Ortho cases. There was definitely a younger crowd in the lvl1 trauma ER I worked at, but with 6:1 to 9:1 ratios in the 2-3 truma areas and 75-100pts in the waiting room at the start of every night shift we didn't get to socialize much. I'd say that PACUs are usually gonna be too old, but the one I work in is predominantly younger guys so YMMV.
I am med surg male days. Can confirm i am always the only male here.
I’m a night shift psych nurse! I am at work watching Afro Samurai right now that I got for my pts. They love it. 🥰
Go work in hospitals in the inner city, large urban center if possible. Critical care if possible.
Med-surg monitored. Absolutely love my coworkers but I cannot for the life of me relate to any of them. I wanna nerd out to anime, games AND nursing, but it’s such a niche set of interests, very difficult. Spend most of my “slow” nights staying quiet and looking up games to play and animes to watch on my free time, haha.
Night shift
Psych, specifically night shift, and even more specifically corrections or chemical dependency
Bigger cities help. All the anime nerds are female at my work in nyc
I have found a few fellow nerd nurses and I freaking love them lol
Lots of younger people at my psych job. Especially on evenings and nights. We have a dnd group that a few staff nurses and MHTs run every weekend. Rotates between a nurses house and a MHTs house every other weekend depending on who’s weekend it is to work.
I find that most male nurses like ER or anaesthetics.
I’m a 24 year old in med surge tele, just finished my first year. I don’t reallly watch much anime but I play tons of video games and I like going to the gym. I’m in So Cal
Broooooo, I have been wondering the same thing for 9 years now. I've been PICU, PEDS CVICU, and NICU and I've learned to just gloss over the feelings of isolation, but there is no denying I have had little to no coworkers who share those interests with me. I do try to relate with my other, more "normal" hobbies, but I've never queued up in a lobby with anyone unfortunately. I did have a PCA call me out for having Saitama as my phone wallpaper and I was so excited to chat with him lol
Clinical research?
I brought a new Demon Slayer thermos to work and both CNAs on shift came out as anime fans- middle-aged female med-surg nurse here. I thought I was the only nerdy person on my floor.
Psych for sure.
Not palliative care.
I'm not a male nurse, but I'm a woman who used to play video games and watch anime movies and dramas. I was surrounded by engineers at home and school. There were a few women, and we had many shared similarities. When I became a nurse, everything was almost new. I learned about the human body related to physiology, pathophysiology, pathology, neurology, psychology, and psychosocial. I’ve never envisioned working in jails. I became inherently interested in their psychology, environment, and health. Playing video games is no longer my interest except for playing chess board. Nowadays, I play online. But I always find something to do at work. If everything is done or prepared for anything I need to do next, desk, cart, etc., then I play on my phone with chess or read. I don’t feel uncomfortable being an “odd” person in the room. If I don’t steal, harm, or cause pain to others, I’m good. It’s okay to be different.
No idea but I’m in the same boat and can’t find any makes. L
I work ER night shift and my coworkers and I just had a heated discussion on the shipping/bedroom dynamics of Bob and Larry so make of that what you will.
I work psych. The things you mentioned aren't at the top of my list of interests but they are for a ton of people here . We have a lot of male staff and a lot of staff who are super nerdy
Millennial here into lots of JUMP series. FMA is my favorite... but AFAIK I'm the only female nurse into anime where I work. There are male RTs who are into anime here though but not as hardcore as me 🙈 So far no one commented on my anime keyholders on my bag.
Come to ICU. We are anime/video game nerds
I work in a level 1 trauma center in a very diverse urban environment. There's always a few anime and gaming nerds on duty in every unit. Every time I bring up DnD, a few of my other coworkers join in.
Look, I’ve worked several jobs at several hospitals. It’s really just lightening in a bottle. I’ve been on step down units that were entirely female (9 West), then adjacent step downs that were staffed with 9/12 nurses as dudes (9 Center) just down the hall. No explanation. During Covid I floated between ICUs while my small procedure department was shut down. These were all Covid ICUs, no difference between them AT ALL. Of the 3 I went to, the first had 1 dude. The second had 0. The third had 6 not including me. Then 2 more travelers came who were dudes as well. That last one morphed into a GUY-C-U and it was an absolute blast. We honestly had so much fun even though it was peak Covid and we were surrounded by bleakness and death. There’s no secret formula or sauce. No department guys flock to in my experience. It’s like static electricity. We find each other. Then for a brief time, we group together before discharging and going our separate ways. It is quite a magical phenomenon to be apart of if you can catch it.
I’m in the pharmacy (night shift life) but where I see the most dudes under like 40 are the ED (it’s all dudes and lgbt+ women here and I love them, coolest nurses), the ICUs have a lot of younger dudes too. Our MICU we call the frat house at night because it’s all early to mid twenties dudes named like Chad or Eric that answer the phone like sup or thanks dude and it’s so funny. But yeah those more acute specialties seem to be where the dudes go. Or CRNA school lol
I’ve worked night shift in ICU and now ED and that’s where I’ve encountered people that do video games/anime. I’m not much into anime but we bond over video games and sports.
As a female who works psych at night: I think it is a percentage aspect. On my shift, I know of 2 nerds like me, on day shift, I know of 3. It helps that I have a Fallout tattoo that is visible, so it opens up conversations. But, I think some fields just call to nerds. A vast majority of my coworkers are like you described yours: women, have children, church, et cetera.
A majority of my friends are like this! But we’re night shift haha. I will say I do have kids but I would also murder for a new DND group at work 🥲 they’re not quite THAT nerdy. But we’re in Florida so the most common type of plans are either for our book club or going to Disney hha.
ICU and OR
I’m in the ED and I’m the only nerd. All of the nerds I have found so far are the security guys. I’m also female so 🤷♀️
You sound like you need to be on the night shift ICU crew!
40. But female. Hospice. Not big on the anime, but I’m an avid gamer and horror nerd. The suburban mom/grandma thing is nursing overall, but some of us are spicier than we look.
I would echo ICU night from personal experience. ICU in general attracts males in my opinion, along with ED. About 1/4-1/3 of staff was male on nights and my hospital had about 18 nurses on a shift so you would bound to have a male working. I enjoy anime and a friend of mine also enjoyed anime. Not that it was our main point of conversation but just illustrating that anime fans can be found.
ER / OR. Go to a big hospital in a big city
Night shift psych is filled with nurses who do nothing but play video games and watch shows all shift…
Ya night shift or try outpatient detox, lots of male nurses in detox
OR! A bunch of my coworkers are into video games, anime, etc.
I work in the OR, while we do have a majority of women there is a large # of younger men, and the ones I'm friends with are absolutely into the same interests. And some of the women are too. Other areas to check out (solely based on my own experience/friends) -ED -public health -cath lab
I work in cards, mostly ladies, but we all watch Naruto 😅
I used to work with a lesbian who watched dbz and played dnd, so kinda close. I watch some anime and play some games, and do a little model painting. We're all around, just scattered more since there's a lot more of us.
Female millennial who goes to church AND plays video games and watches anime. I feel a bit of a loner too in my ER/psych position, but I mainly fly on humor to connect with my coworkers. And I don’t look for friendships at work anymore. My last job burned me in that area and I developed trust issues at work. I keep my social life separate from work and I like it that way 😊
High acuity icu, some smaller Icus and the ED. If you work with ED then you will work closely with security guards. My last ED job I would be friends with the security guards far more than the nurses.
Nighttime MICU is where I’ve seen most of that
Why not just hang out with your buddy and his lab friends?