Thank you to all the nurses that took care of my preemie baby that just turned two!
It took me over an hour to get home from work the other day. There was an accident on the freeway, and as the clock in my dashboard ticked closer to 8:00 p.m., I knew that I would not make it home in time to put my kids to bed. I had left for work before they had woken up, and I had tried really hard to get home in time to bathe them and tuck them into bed. But a combination of a stressful shift and a fender-bender on I-10 left me stuck alone in my car, helplessly parked on the highway halfway home. I was starving, and I really needed to go to the bathroom. Hormonal, exhausted, and so frustrated I was not going to get to tell my kids goodnight for the third night in a row, I started crying. It was just one of those days.
When I finally walked into my house, my kids were in bed and I was too tired to eat. I aimlessly scrolled through my phone to see nurse after nurse posting Facebook pictures of themselves with their stethoscopes. Curious, I tried to figure out what had initiated such a reaction. After very little investigating, I realized that all the uproar was about something said on a television show by a group of women... and I couldn't really care less.
Here is what I thought about the comments made regarding nurses:
- My first reaction was that everything said about nurses on this television show was just dumb. I don't even think it could be considered ignorant, I just thought it was stupid.
I wanted to tell someone that I was the one that sat next to my laboring patient all day. And when I say "sat," I mean I helped her breathe through each contraction while rubbing her back and wiping her forehead. I held her while she got her epidural, and didn't flinch when her water broke and soaked through my scrubs and all over my legs. And at the end of my shift when my patient begged me to stay "a few more minutes" so I could be there for her delivery, I said I would stay a few more minutes, even though I knew a few minutes would probably turn into an hour. So I found it a little irritating that there are still people out there who could think anything around my neck belongs to a physician. I also thought it was a little funny that I had actually come home without my stethoscope, because a physician had borrowed mine and hadn't given it back to me before I left work. I also felt kind of sorry for the women who spoke so negatively about a profession that is so powerful, a profession that is rarely recognized for the good work that we do, a profession that gives everything to the people that we serve.AWHONN nurses In Washington, D.C. advocating for NAS legislation for our moms and babies!
What most people out there don't understand about nurses is that everything we do, everything we say, every action at and outside of work is examined. Our characters are constantly scrutinized. We aren't able to take off our scrubs and stop being a nurse. And more often than not, we come home exhausted, with some body part injured from work, but tomorrow we will put our scrubs back on and happily serve our patients and our profession.
So to the handful of women who wanted to voice comments about nurses that ended up not being as funny as they may have thought... don't worry, you don't have to worry about
this nurse
banning your show. After all, I'm the nurse that works 13 hour shifts at two different jobs, the nurse that volunteers once a week teaching prenatal classes to underserved women, the nurse that is still in school (for my Doctorate in NURSING Practice) so I can do better for my patients and my nursing profession. So you don't have to worry about this nurse banning your show... I couldn't tell you the last time I was actually able to watch daytime television. My view hasn't really changed... I still think nursing is one of the greatest professions on earth, I absolutely love my patients and my coworkers, and if any one of you were ever in need of a nurse, I know you would bear witness to all of the good work that we do.
Until my next delivery ♥
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