I'm buckled...thoughts of being a RN

"To do what nobody else will do, a way that nobody else can do, in spite of all we go through; is to be a nurse."

Well, to be buckled means "to prepare oneself or apply oneself."  Hence, I am buckling to write a post.  I have so much I want to write about but this blog is supposed to be about Sean and I's adventures and not my rants and thoughts.  However, Sean living with me has to be an adventure, cause I tell you what, I am...well past roommates, what am I?  Lol, I guess I shall call myself an adventure.  So life continues to continue whether I want it to continue or not.  During the "adventures of our love" we have to do something that is most adventurous-work. 

I'm sure all of you know I am a nurse.  In the last week I have been punched in the gut, clawed, pinched, and bled on....yes, someone bled on me because they pulled out their IV.  I suppose that is better than other weeks when I get to take home vomit and feces.  Seriously, being a nurse is tough stuff.  Tuesday, I cried and cried at the end of my shift.  At work.  Some days are just so extremely exhausting that I shut down and there is not a reset button.  Unfortunately, because of law, I am unable to post any details of my "bad days" which makes working as a nurse even harder.  Does anyone else struggle with their professions?  Well, today I am posting a little bit about what it is like to be a nurse through tidbits of quotes I have extracted.

"Bound by paperwork, short on hands, sleep, and energy... nurses are rarely short on caring."  ~Sharon Hudacek

So nursing is a lot of things, but it is hard. 

Here is a joke I like.

Question: What 's the difference between a nurse and a nun?
Answer:  A nun only serves one God.


The awful truth.  Some patients think they are gods and should be served like one.  The food must be five stars, the doctor must see them first, no pain is acceptable and to them, you are a peasant.  It doesn't matter that you haven't sat down for ten hours, they want their diet Coke now.  And it better be cold and on the rocks.  It is so ridiculous.  Patients like these are hard too please and are so demanding.  Everything is wrong, and everything is unacceptable.  12 hours with this patient feels like eternity. 

Mother Tersea said this,  "People are unrealistic; illogical, and self-centered. Love them anyway."

I wish she would have left instructions on how.


Often times patients say, "what are you nurses good for anyway?"  If only they knew.  I'll tell you what, we are worth a lot more than we make.  The responsibilities we have, the training we go through, and the things we do are far more extensive then could ever be explained without being shown.  Ask a new nurse, they'll give you insight.

"When you are a nurse you know that every day you will touch a life or a life will touch yours."

However, there are also good days when being a nurse is wonderful.  On one such day, I had a patient who was so entirely sweet and giggly.  Yes, she would laugh and giggle about everything.  The pains and aches were part of the roller coaster of her disease.  Each bump made her laugh, and each drop made her smile.  Not because she was dying, but because of the life she lived.  Past ninety years old, this woman still said please and thank-you.  She always had a smile on her face, even when her pain was at its worst.  After 24 hours spent with this patient she invited me to her surprise birthday party.  It was a surprise because it would be a "surprise" if she was still alive.  She hugged me and kissed me on the cheek before I left on my week vacation.  I knew she still had days of treatments left, and I knew she may not make it another day.  She looked me in the eyes and said, "Anne, I love you."  You know that watery stuff that fills the eyes during certain moments?  Well, my eyes were full of that watery stuff.  Tears rolled down my cheeks as I drove away from the hospital that day.  I was not crying because I was sad.  I cried because I was grateful to be her nurse.

Which leads me too another quote..

She also said, "It's not how much we do, but how much love we put into doing."


This is something I am really trying to learn. 


Sean is my greatest example of a good nurse.  If there was another definition of caring, it would be Sean Cristian Willardson.  After working ten hours himself, he will come home, make dinner, start a warm bath, make the bed and have it all done before I return from work.  He is never asked to do it, but he does it anyway.  When I am sick, he will treat me like an ICU patient, catering to my every last whim and loving me all the while.  He never complains.  He loves doing it.  


This is a pic taken in 2008 of Sean stretching my legs after I had returned from a nursing clinical. 
Sean still stretches my legs today.





So ending my post I'd like to share a quote from one of the greatest nurses of all times, Florence Nightingale.

"Nursing is an art: and if it is to be made an art, it requires an exclusive devotion as hard a preparation, as any painter's or sculptor's work; for what is the having to do with dead canvas or dead marble, compared with having to do with the living body, the temple of God's spirit? It is one of the Fine Arts: I had almost said, the finest of Fine Arts." ~Florence Nightingale