I am one week away from finishing (I hope) my respiratory therapy degree.
Today I had a CT scan at my local hospital. Since I had just come from physical therapy, I was wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt and needed to brush my hair (but I probably would have been wearing the same outfit even if I hadn’t just come from PT). My CT tech noticed that my shirt says respiratory therapy on it and asked where I work and explained that her husband is an RT at one of the larger local hospitals. I explained that I’m almost done with school and that I would like to work for the same hospital we were in. She got all excited and left to get the respiratory manager who then brought me to his office for a chat. :smack: I look like a total slob. I think I managed to make a good impression despite my appearance though.
I think that I should start dressing better until I find a job, just in case something odd like this happens again.
But if you’d “dressed better”, your shirt probably wouldn’t have said anything on it, and then you might not have gotten the opportunity for that chat at all!
Back when I was married, my wife’s car broke down on her way back from dropping our son off at school. The thing was, she was wearing a nightgown with a tattered robe and some house slippers. She felt fine doing this because she never had any intention of getting out of the damn car.
So she basically had to ride with the tow truck guy to the auto repair shop, and then once she got to the shop, she had to sit there in her crappy robe and house slippers until I came and picked her up.
I practically bit a hole in my lip to keep from laughing so hard.
Personally, I would not leave PT without hitting the bathroom to at least check my hair. I’d probably take different bottoms to change into if I wasn’t going straight home, but that’s my hang-up as I refuse to wear sweats in public.
I think it comes down to what you’re comfortable with. I’ve run into friends and coworkers at the grocery store and Target and such, so I prefer to be put together in some way.
But, you were dressed practically for what you were doing, comfort is called for with both PT and the CT, so I can’t imagine it would have raised an eyebrow under that unplanned circumstance!
When I was in high school, a girl said you could only wear sweatpants if you’re sick, on your period, or really really cold. That stuck with me for some reason, but I am too hot for sweats 90% of the time anyway. I do have a problem with timing things correctly, and so I show up places with wet hair occasionally. Especially if I’ve come from a lap swim where I would not have brought a blow dryer in any case. That’s usually at an odd time too, so I feel like I get these sorts of “Why is this lady’s hair wet at 6pm?” kind of looks.
Clean, logo-free, synthetic navy sweatpants are often close enough to jeans that most people won’t notice them. It especially helps if you are muscular enough that the sweatpants fit somewhat closely and don’t billow.
My mom was dressed that way one day, and there was a minor accident on the way to school. She got out and directed traffic wearing the same outfit. My sister was mortified.
When I was in PT (at least at the beginning), I lived in Adidas running pants and whatever clothes were easiest to get on.
Besides, half the people radiology sees are practically falling apart. Ever see someone with an angry kidney stone. You didn’t look at all out of place.
Sure, you should get dressed if you were going for an interview, but you can’t walk around in a suit and tie 24 hours a day just because you might bump into someone that might have a connection and like chrisk said, if you were, you wouldn’t have made the connection to begin with (unless you’re the type of person to start that conversation on your own).
My company is somewhat well known in a certain industry in our area. I’ve made plenty of random connections just because I happened to be walking around in my work t-shirt on an off day. If I was ‘dressed up’ (like the people I’m making the connections with) or wearing non-work clothes, they wouldn’t have happened.
