This past week, a Maryville, Tennessee, nurse was fired for allegedly posting racist and violent messages through her Facebook account.

It was later learned that she could not have made the comments because hospital security footage showed that she was in a patient’s room at the approximate time the comments were made.

Then it was learned that the horrible posts were composed by her fiancé on her social media account.  He even went to the hospital to tell officials that it was he rather than the nurse who had written the posts.  The fiancé claimed that he sent the messages because somebody sent the nurse a rude message first.

Nevertheless, the nurse was terminated from her position and referred to the Tennessee Board of Nursing for investigation.

The concern of the hospital was that comments made on a social media site by an employer reflected poorly on the organization and does not reflect the code of conduct and values for the hospital.

Now, the nurse is concerned not only about her ability to find another job but, due to the racial content of and backlash to the messages, for her personal safety as well as that of her own 2 children.

Since the incident, she and her fiancé have parted ways and she has sought protective orders against him.  [Click here for article]

I can never stress enough how important it is to maintain your privacy and security by keeping your passwords private and share them with no one!  If you share a computer at home, do not save your passwords as others might post on your behalf.

Your privacy is the one thing that is truly yours.  Therefore, respect it and do not share passwords or allow people access to your computer, even your children.  You never know what they might write on your wall and it could become a quite troublesome problem.

You are a professional and everything you do reflects on you.  Unfortunately, this nurse paid the terrible price of losing her job and being reported to the Board.

As nurses we are caregivers and sometimes the personal relationships, we may find ourselves involved in are not the healthiest.  We believe that the other person needs us so we continue the relationship.

Please, if you are in an unhealthy relationship, get the help you need to end it.