I think of him when I graduate.Īt twenty-five years old, I’m a traveling nurse. I cling to his words as I continue my struggle through nursing school. “I don’t know what I’m going to do without him - I don’t even know who I’ll be without him.”īrian’s death hits me hard. “We’ve been married for forty-five years,” his wife tells me. He can no longer walk, can’t even stand up or roll over in bed. In the two months he’s with us, I watch his physical abilities decline. But the conviction in Brian’s words and the confident way he says them leaves an indelible impression on me. They’re supportive because they’re my family. They’ve essentially given me the same advice - to hang in there, be resilient. I come from a family of nurses and doctors. Remember, nothing that’s worthwhile in life comes easy.” “Going to school during the day, working nights - I know it’s hard. One night, as I’m talking with Brian, I share my struggles with him.
We gravitate toward him because of his demeanor, how he handles himself as he tries to fight the disease. He’s a super-nice guy, former navy, and really, really accomplished. I have pancreatic cancer.”īrian is a professor at one of the colleges. “I was holding a lot of fluid in my stomach, and I wanted to see what’s what. “I came into the hospital tonight because I’m not feeling well,” Brian explains as the nurse and I get him settled. There’s no way I can do this for a career, I think as a nurse delivers a new patient to one of the open rooms on our floor. They have to be rational, steady, fully in control of their emotions. When someone dies, it really affects me, and it really affects the other nurses too because, deep down, like me, they’re nurturers.
It comes in waves, and lately we’ve had a lot. They have more heart than they let on.Īnd then there’s death. A lot of the nurses here share that trait. I’m highly sensitive to what other people are thinking and feeling. I admire their composure, because I’m an empath. The nurses here run around at a hundred miles a minute, all the while projecting to everyone that they are cool, calm, and collected. The hospital job is important because it’s a front-row seat to the reality of nursing. I’m struggling with the dual responsibilities of attending class during the day and working as a nursing assistant at night. My interest in becoming a professional caregiver sparked, I toyed with the idea of becoming a doctor - until I shadowed one and found out how little time doctors spend with patients.Īnd I want the human interactions, so I chose nursing.īut nursing school, I’m finding, is hard. Growing up, I watched my mother take good care of my extended family, especially my grandmother. Angela is a traveling nurse and currently lives in California. After graduating from nursing school, she did an externship at a cardiovascular ICU. Angela Parawan was born in New York City and grew up in Virginia Beach.
0 kommentar(er)
