A veteran registered nurse at a big city hospital shares some of her worst cases she has dealt with as an emergency room nurse.
My name is Gloria Michelle Trainor, and I am a nurse. I have been a registered nurse for just about 20 years at Nashville Memorial Hospital, here in Nashville, Tennessee, where I live with my husband, our five children, and our three dogs (all Pomeranians).
I work in the thick of the action: in the hospital's emergency department. I have worked as an emergency medical nurse for the past ten years; prior to that, I worked with either elderly people or children. In the emergency department, I have seen it all; nothing surprises me anymore. I have seen everything from stabbings and shootings, burns, communicable or infectuous diseases, near-drownings, asphyxia, breathing problems, heart attacks, strokes, aneurysms, gorings, impaled objects, objects stuffed into ears or noses, weather-related illnesses, chemical or environmental related problems, bites from animals or even other humans, accident victims involved in falls, automobile accidents, fights or riots, or whatnot, and drunks or senile people wandering aimlessly in the hallways, with nobody to care for them. We have even dealt with homeless people or people who don't speak English (Spanish is a very common language we often deal with; and it is imperitave we have someone on our staff who is knowledgeable in foreign languages [like our head nurse, Louisiana Sandusky, as an example; she is good with foreign languages]).
Yet despite what may come through our doors, we are obligated to treat all persons who come for medical attention, and we try to treat each person with compassion, respect, or dignity (but this oftentimes does not happen; we deal with rude, obnoxious, or inconsiderate people all the time). We have to deal with children who are sick, crying, or frightened out of their wits, wriggly infants who need constant supervision, and also elderly people who are lonely, depressed, or suffering from memory problems like dementia or Alzheimer's. There are patients we would love to abandon, but as a nurse, we can't do that, and so we must treat those who need our help, even the most trying of cases.
Some of the most trying of cases involve children. We have had to perform rescue measures on children, even babies; and when a child comes into our emergency room, unconscious, limp, and seemingly lifeless (and also not breathing), there is always a sense of immediate urgency in the air, and the stress we face in trying to save this young life is oftentimes unbearable. The stress is made worse when, despite all we have done, the child ends up dying. It is hardest when the child is an infant or a child who was abused; or a child who was senselessly hurt by someone's negligence. We have to deal with not only the crisis at hand; we also have to deal with hysterical parents or family members who want nothing more than for us to try to save that child's life, even if it means heroic measures, and even if the child's life is beyond saving.
Sometimes we DO save a child's life; but not without a price: due to a gross error on our part, or an unexpected complication, a child is damaged, and their lives (as well as the lives of their families) is forever changed. This is when we wonder if saving this particular child was worth all the trouble because the child is now suffering, and somehow we all feel guilty because we didn't let this child die.
Or we deal with a child who becomes ill unexpectedly, and we have to try like hell to save this child (like the little girl two years back, a little girl who suffered a paralyzing stroke and caught all of us off guard; thankfully, the child recovered, and she is now doing very well and is thriving beautifully). Another issue we often deal with are cases involving children with life-threatening or catastrophic diseases, or children with serious physical (or mental) disabilities, and when they get sick or injured, it is always a big deal because so much can go wrong in only a few short moments. We had a young man, a little boy, come into our emergency room, suffering from one seizure after another, and we had to use our wits and our senses to try to save him before brain (or physical) damage set in. Thankfully, we managed to save the little guy's life; but he still faces a daily battle in dealing with the repercussions of his disease, muscular dystrophy, which is progressive and ultimately fatal. The little boy in question is now eleven, and he isn't expected to live but a few more years at the most.
We strive to provide the best possible care for our patients, but things can (and they so often do) go wrong; and suddenly, the mood turns even darker. We have had nurses in the past commit suicide or suffer from long-term depression or other medical problems because of past stress they had gone through while in the nursing field; and nursing, as a whole, is a thankless job. The pay is lousy, the hours are incredibly long and taxing, and we never get holidays (or even some weekends) off, especially if we are on call. (I am one who IS on call; if the hospital calls, I have to go, no questions asked; the nursing field is often very shorthanded, and we have to work like hell to try to cover up the slack.) If you can't handle stress, abuse, suffering, sickness, people in general, or not having weekends or holidays off, then I would suggest that you steer clear away from nursing because nursing CAN wreck your health if it becomes stressful enough (as if nursing isn't ALREADY fraught with stress as it is!)!
The reason I became a nurse in the first place is because MY mother, Jean, was a nurse, and I admired her willingness to help people who were sick or injured; and I had seen her compassion towards the sick firsthand on several occasions, and it left quite an impresion on me. I wanted to do what my mother did, so I went to nursing school after I graduated from high school, and I completed my studies and got my nursing degrees; and now I have been a nurse for nearly twenty years. I love my job for the most part, but as a veteran nurse, I have seen so many faces come and go, have dealt with countless patients (I can't POSSIBLY remember all the patients I have treated!), and have seen incredible advances in the field of medicine that would make your head spin. Yet nursing is incredibly taxing, and it can wear on your mind (or even your body) if one is NOT careful! But I AM glad I have been doing this; there is nothing more rewarding (or satisfying) in saving another person's life, and there is nothing more gratifying than to have a patient you have treated say thank you for saving their life, or a patient that was near death come up to you, looking the picture of health; and whenever I see this, it always gives me a renewed sense of hope; and then I am always DAMNED glad to be doing what I have always wanted to do since I was a little girl: saving the lives of others as a nurse in a hospital setting.
good story Karen. Most of the woman in my family are nurses including my mom. One time she saved our next door neighbors life after his wife shot him. If it wasn't for my mom he would have bled to death. love and peace G
A noble profession, anyone who's been in an intensive care situation can identify with this story. Love the way you dramatise, this is an ER material! Splendid write!
Safi
A poignant story about letting go of a narcissist in your life. Have you ever been attacked FULL force by a narcissist? It's the closest thing to being stabbed over and over in the back.
