We have just survived hurricane Sandy. Compared to our neighbors in New Jersey our experience was the inconvenience of being without power for 48 hours and some minor cosmetic damage to the front of the house. We are lucky to live in a community where we have close friends with power so at least we could get a hot shower and local coffee shops where we could plug in and stay connected. But still it disrupted the week. From a work point of view not much got done, although I did get a 1000 page novel read that I had been meaning to do all year!! Sleep was not great as it was sooo cold, even with the dog in bed as a foot warmer! And there was a general feeling of not being in control, of wishing, hoping the power would come on NOW!, and even a rumbling panic of what if the power does not come back for days and days.
When patients become a patient they must feel like this. A loss of control, someone else is in charge of their destiny for the course of their treatment. A patient is at the mercy of the medical team and their decisions of what/when care will be administered. At pediatric clinicals yesterday this was highlighted for me. A parent had been visited by her medical team at 6.30am (usual time for rounds! really... busy days of clinic surgery mean an early start). The team decided her child was well enough to go home. Well, by 11am the discharge process had not even begun as the doc had not written the order. Mom was going nuts, as she had other kids at home to care for and was being told if she just walked out ( I could see she was tempted) she would be leaving against medical advice, therefore risking the wrath of the medical team and social work (more aggro than she was willing to take on). I could see the medical teams point, on a priority list this was low on the totem pole, especially on a week where staffing members were down due to inability to get to the hospital (I have lost count of the number of fallen trees on power lines around here). But also I had great sympathy/empathy for this parent, we are here to serve her family, not just her child and I am not sure we were doing a great job of keeping her in the loop of communication and hustling the discharge process along better.
When a nurse joins a team she/he may feel like the power went out in the hurricane too. So many unknowns, what is the culture of the team/organization. Will people like me? Will I be competent? Will there be someone who will show me what to do (for weeks or months if needed)? Will there be that safe person I can ask all my stupid questions to? Then there is the lack of control over work schedule and assignments, coming to work early, staying late to do paperwork, dealing with the difficult patient, family member, staff member!! Dealing with the truth that we do not always make it all better and some patients get worse and die, and dealing with our own emotional grief and physical exhaustion throughout that.
Wow, I just reread that last paragraph and wondered if this is truth why would anyone want to be a nurse! However, many have had an incredibly rewarding life in this profession, myself included. But it is OK to admit the rough stuff, to get it out of the closet of perfectionism. Over the years you build resilience as a nurse, I am not sure if resilience can be taught but it certainly comes with experience.
On the 48th hour exactly without power the lights came back on in my house, very very happy. It was an rough week even though all we really experienced was some minor discomfort but it gave me a greater perspective to not dwell on the small things, I mean really, does it really matter if I cannot log onto Facebook?!! And to dwell and prioritize the important stuff, family, great friends and work that I love and despite all the thorny points cannot imagine myself doing anything else but staying in Health Care.
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