Right, given that you answered genuinely and constructively I’m answering you.

This stuff being the first thing that comes to your mind when you start talking about this coworker I think tells us more about you than it does about the coworker.

yes, it tells you I mean she is unfit to do this job.

I see a nurse who to me is incapable of doing this job because, as said, she won’t pick up any tray or serve food and beverages, and I don’t want to work with a person like this because it means I have to be the one serving her patients as well as mine and as said this unit is chronically understaffed. It’s very frustrating being the one moving patients and delivering food trays and beverages while she sits in front of a computer. This is not what I signed up for.

I don’t know how future me nearing retirement is going to be, but it’s clear I have to quit bedside or study something else, precisely not to become this coworker because as you said, nursing is hard as f*ck on the body.

You write “She deserves some credit, some respect, and some empathy – you’re going to be there too, someday.” You speak like somebody who has the luxury of not having to deal with the consequences of a coworker who gives you the physically harder tasks while she, as said, sits. You understands it’s a bit difficult for me to agree with you, right? Options for her? retire or move to a desk position, both perfectly legitimate options, but don’t pretend to qualify for a job she physically cannot do anymore. Hell, even I cannot sometimes.

OTOH this is not as much her fault as management’s and society’s at large: If we had 3 RN instead of 2, we possibly wouldn’t have this problem, reason why the best I can do might be keep looking for another position, quit this one ASAP and think about studying to get away from nursing. No wonder nobody wants to be a nurse with this job conditions: just today 6 ICU RNs working quit, if you believe one of my coworkers. This ship is sinking.

Happy downvoting I guess.