It's a question I ask myself everyday since I decided I want to be a nurse: Can I make it as a nurse?
I'm not worried about cleaning up someones poop, dealing with the jerk from hell, seeing blood, or being short staffed and having to work for extremely long hours. I'm not worried about any of that. I know I can easily handle that.
What I'm worried about is the death part.
Two years ago I watched a guy die of a heart attack while I was snowboarding. Vince and I were riding the lift up and I noticed 2 men and a woman skiing down, laughing and talking to each other. I noticed one man ran over the womans skiis and I thought to myself, "That would piss me off if my friend did that!" After I thought for a second, I realized I wouldn't really care, and I could hear the girl laugh it off. Next thing I see, the man's his skis pop off his feet and he lands face flat in the snow. Vince and the people on the chair behind us exclaimed, "Oh man, he's out cold!"
I immediately knew something wasn't right though, I just had a feeling and I started crying within like 15 seconds. It ended up that he wasn't all right; he had a heart attack and died.
When the man, Jeff, was laying there, his others friends noticed what had happened and were calling out his name, from about 15 feet further down the mountain. His friend kept calling out, "Jeff, buddy, are you all right? Come on Jeff, say something." Hearing the fear it his voice was AWFUL. I've been in a situation like that, where you truly don't know if someone is ok and the worst thoughts are running through your mind.
Jeff's friends kept trying to talk to him and had climbed back up the mountain to him. We all kept asking Jeff's friend if he was responsive, and by the panic in his voice, we knew he wasn't.
After riding the lift to the top of the mountain and then riding back down again, passing Jeff as someone gave him CPR and waiting for Ski Patrol, I was heart broken. I went to the deck on the lodge to sit, and at that point the medics had brought Jeff down and the ambulance was there and a helicopter was on it's way. I sat at a picnic table and secretly cried while everyone was wanting to look at him over the ledge and see what had happened.
This was the 2nd run of the day, and I was already done.
Can I deal with that on a daily basis? Will I want to cry for every person that dies, knowing they may have had a family that loves them and more of a life to live? Will I grow callous to it and not care after a while? Will I just have to carry all that pain and sadness with me for the rest of my life? Maybe going into work and expecting it will make it different.
I want to work in the PICU, Oncology, or the ER, the places where people will die EVERY DAY. I will have to go into work knowing that someone will most likely die.
Will the fact that some people do survive be enough to keep me going back?
I obviously don't know that answer to any of those questions, but I do want to find out.
I know I want to be able to help people and I will have hope that they'll survive.
I'm reading a WONDERFUL ladies blog, as she deals with Stage IV ovarian cancer. She is beautiful, spunky, and actually LIVING HER LIFE FULLY unlike a lot of people, knowing that she only has 6-12 months to live. When I read that I just cried, trying to picture if someone told me I only had 6 months to a year to live, that's nothing. That would fly by so quickly. She seems upbeat about it though {as upbeat as you can be}, and is even going to Africa to volunteer next week!
She is so inspiring and when I'm laying in bed way longer than I should be, I'll think about her and ask myself if this is what I'd want to be doing if this were my last day. Usually, the answer is no.
Recently some people have been asking me how I'm so happy and upbeat, and it things like her blog that keep me happy. How can I be mad that's it's snowing outside when she knows she's going to die? How can I be sad that I can't afford the bookshelf or the flat screen I really want when there are SO MANY PEOPLE who are going to die?
I feel like being sad or mad isn't an option any more. I've spent way to many days being sad and unproductive, and it's not like it got me anywhere except more sad.
Maybe that's what will help me get through the hard days as a nurse?
I've been thinking a lot about your comment on my recent blog post and after reading this post of yours I really don't have any words of wisdom.....at least none that I can truly explain with rationale. All I can say is that it does get easier. Death does get easier. And it's not really about exposure per say, it's more about reflecting on your own views of death.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was in school I did a palliative nursing rotation that showed me that death is actually an incredibly peaceful, spiritual journey that as a nurse you can help light that journey for the family and also provide incredible care to your patient to keep them comfortable & pain free. Then I went to emergency and realized that we really only deal with tragic deaths there and the best we can do to help light the way for families there is to show our truest, kindest empathy. Also, realizing that after all valiant efforts, everything was truly done for them. We DID fight for their life. We WERE on their side. But nature won over.....and as tragic and heartbreaking as that is, it is reality. There is some sort of strange peace about that.
Now, that doesn't mean that things won't get to you. Because they will. I have written post after post after post about those situations. But that's what makes us human with beating hearts. You are on your way to becoming a nurse because you care. If you didn't care, I'd say pick a different career.
The other thing is that everyone has triggers. Mine happens to be kids. In fact, most people have a real hard time with kids. You don't ever want to become callous. Now, take that situation with the skiier you wrote about and think of it from a medical stand point. If he were to come into my trauma bay (or yours) he'd likely have a heart rythm we couldn't treat because being so far away from a defibrillator or CPR. Which would mean he'd come to me in emerg and we'd try to defibrillate and throw IV's in him with meds.....but honestly it would likely be to no avail. So I'd agree we'd stop treatment and I'd sit back and think about it. Is it tragic? Yes. But you know you did everything for him you could. You tend to find solace in that. I"m only speaking from experience.
Any way, this is really long winded and I apologize for that....but please know it does get easier with time. At least it does with adult. But there are still those times, with those specific patients who hit you in the gutt when you least expect it Kids still stabs at the heart. And truthfully, I hope that never changes because those who don't care and are not affected by death & tragedy should move on from nursing.
THANK YOU. Thank you so much, you don't understand how much that helps me. That's a really good point about the man who died.
ReplyDeleteI also like that you said death can be peaceful. Not every death is horrible and tragic, and that's a good thing for me to remember.
The kids will be the hardest part for me to. No matter how they die, it will always be tragic in my mind, even if it was peaceful.
Thank you so much for writing. I am SO thankful that you write your blog, I know it's going to help me out so much {and already has!}.
I've been thinking a lot about your comment on my recent blog post and after reading this post of yours I really don't have any words of wisdom.....at least none that I can truly explain with rationale. All I can say is that it does get easier. Death does get easier. And it's not really about exposure per say, it's more about reflecting on your own views of death.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was in school I did a palliative nursing rotation that showed me that death is actually an incredibly peaceful, spiritual journey that as a nurse you can help light that journey for the family and also provide incredible care to your patient to keep them comfortable & pain free. Then I went to emergency and realized that we really only deal with tragic deaths there and the best we can do to help light the way for families there is to show our truest, kindest empathy. Also, realizing that after all valiant efforts, everything was truly done for them. We DID fight for their life. We WERE on their side. But nature won over.....and as tragic and heartbreaking as that is, it is reality. There is some sort of strange peace about that.
Now, that doesn't mean that things won't get to you. Because they will. I have written post after post after post about those situations. But that's what makes us human with beating hearts. You are on your way to becoming a nurse because you care. If you didn't care, I'd say pick a different career.
The other thing is that everyone has triggers. Mine happens to be kids. In fact, most people have a real hard time with kids. You don't ever want to become callous. Now, take that situation with the skiier you wrote about and think of it from a medical stand point. If he were to come into my trauma bay (or yours) he'd likely have a heart rythm we couldn't treat because being so far away from a defibrillator or CPR. Which would mean he'd come to me in emerg and we'd try to defibrillate and throw IV's in him with meds.....but honestly it would likely be to no avail. So I'd agree we'd stop treatment and I'd sit back and think about it. Is it tragic? Yes. But you know you did everything for him you could. You tend to find solace in that. I"m only speaking from experience.
Any way, this is really long winded and I apologize for that....but please know it does get easier with time. At least it does with adult. But there are still those times, with those specific patients who hit you in the gutt when you least expect it Kids still stabs at the heart. And truthfully, I hope that never changes because those who don't care and are not affected by death & tragedy should move on from nursing.