Disclaimer: I love my job. When God was making me, He said "Hmm, she looks like she should be a nurse. So a nurse she shall be." I couldn't imagine myself doing anything else in the world. And this post will probably be a deep one...I'm not sure what I'll write, but I just know I need to write. So here goes.
Okay, glad I got that off my chest. Now here comes the venting. Hold tight...encouragement needed in just a moment. Work has been chaotic lately. And by chaotic, I mean exhausting, intense, and pretty much miserable. This past weekend was my weekend on (3 nights in a row...hence why I've been MIA from the blogosphere) and I had to fill-in as charge nurse Friday night. From here on out, Friday night shall be called the night from hell. Pardon my French, but that's about the only thing that gets my point across.
Being a nurse is so rewarding. And so draining. You pour your heart into your work more than any other profession, in my opinion. Some may disagree, and that's okay...I just know how much of myself I invest in my job on a nightly basis. Every now and then, I'll really stop and think about what I do. And it scares the you-know-what out of me...the fact that I have a person's life in my hands every night. My every move, every medication, every action is literally a matter of life or death. Talk about some pressure.
Luckily, it's become second nature to me. I've always been the nurturing, mothering type, and it comes out more than any time when I'm at work. I get picked on because I call all of my patients "honey," "sweetheart," and the likes...I just feel like they need a little extra lovin'.
This past weekend rocked my confidence in my said-second nature nursing abilities. Picture this: me in charge, 31 patients, 8 nurses, 3 nursing assistants. I knew when I took this job that this floor was crazy, the patients were sick, and it would always be a toss-up on the kind of night we'd have ahead of us. We walked onto the shift with 7 empty rooms (which means 7 new patients through the night) and a patient actively seizing--so I just knew that night was bound to be a bad one. Nursing is so superstitious. You can walk onto the floor and feel the vibe of how the night is going to be, you never say "Wow, this night has been pretty quiet"...and you never, ever mention the C-word. Hint: it rhymes with road.
Well, God was surely testing me that night...seeing how much I could handle before I threw my hands up in surrender to Him. I didn't make it very far, I can tell you that.
We had two patients C-word that night. It makes my heart stop to hear the operator page "Code Blue" over the intercom, much less when she follows that phrase with the floor I work on. And it happened twice in one night.
For those of you who are thinking, "What the heck is a Code Blue?"...cardiac or respiratory arrest. I.e. a patient either stopped breathing or the heart stopped beating for any number of causes. Cue panic to the floor...nurses running every where, doctors flooding the room, IVs being started, medications being pushed, chest compressions being done, orders being shouted, adrenaline pumping, shocks to the heart being delivered...you get the picture. Grey's Anatomy on steroids, because we all know TV shows aren't accurate.
A bad night is when you have a code. A terrible night is when you have two. And picture me, in charge, little 9-month-old nurse, wide-eyed and terrified. But we made it through, and both of the patients went straight to the ICU, but left our floor alive. Successful and crazy night. I left work Friday and just wanted to cry, but all I could do was laugh...I had hit the wall of exhaustion where you can't do anything but laugh about it. You all have been there, I know.
Drained. Mentally and physically...but even more so emotionally. It's hard to put up a wall between your emotions and your work, because for me, they go hand in hand. Of course, in the middle of me doing chest compressions, I'm not thinking about crying over this patient...the adrenaline shuts off anything that makes you a human at that point. But people don't realize what it does to you emotionally...once the high of a Code wears off, it hits you that a patient just died on your watch. On your bed. Under your hands pumping his heart to start beating again. We were lucky--we got both of them back, but some nights, we don't get so lucky. And it really gets to you.
I'm the kind of person that pours my whole heart into the things I'm passionate about. It's a blessing and a curse all wrapped up into one. This blessing/curse made me just want to turn my badge in Saturday morning, but that's when God grabbed a hold of me and poured His peace into my heart. I really believe it takes a special person to be a nurse, and God reminded me of that Saturday morning...deep in prayer, tears flowing freely, I was reminded that even in the worst of times, these people need me. Need my touch, need my words, need my smile. Yeah, it may take everything out of me on some nights, but just as soon as I'm completely depleted, a family member hugs me and tells me how thankful they are that I'm their father's nurse that night, or a patient squeezes my hand when he can't physically tell me thank you, or a patient tells me I'm her favorite nurse because I sit and talk with her. It's the little things that fill me back up and remind me of why I chose this profession.
And when I think about it, I don't think I really chose this profession. It chose me. God put me in it. And even on the nights when I just want to throw my hands up and go cry in the bathroom (which I've totally done, numerous times), it's who I am. It's not just what I do. It's a part of me. And I'm so thankful for that.
