I’ve been thinking about death. Death in a hospital is so strange. Death to a nurse is even stranger.
We recently discharge a patient who had spent 116 days on our unit. She was crazy and hated everyone. Refused cares, assessments, vitals, everything. Called every morning at 3am on the dot for coffee. She was famous for hoarding anything and everything we took into her room. From boxes of gloves to mouth wash bottles to spoiled food.
We couldn’t wait until she was gone.
A few nights ago we found out that she had been readmitted to a different unit in our hospital. A telemetry unit. We all laughed and couldn’t believe she was back. She had only been gone for two weeks.
Then, a couple nights ago, we heard the call overhead. Code blue. Her room. Myself and the nurse I was working with stared at each other, dumbstruck. We couldn’t believe that the old, stubborn bat that had spent 116 days with us was dying two floors down.
She passed that night. And we did what nurses do. We joked. From the outside I’m sure we all sounded macabre and sadistic, the way we talked about all her outbursts and how she would be hoarding in heaven now. We joked about death like it was a friend. I guess it kind of is.
See, to us nurses Death is a friend. We walk the halls with him, joke with him. We have an agreement. He doesn’t get in our way and we don’t get in his. We let those who have made the decision to do so go peacefully. We stand vigil with Death. He waits patiently as we make sure they aren’t in pain. Drip after drip we fill their bodies with the poison that allows them to meet Death peacefully.
Then there are the other ones. The ones where Death has gotten a little antsy. He hasn’t stuck to our agreement. And we do what we are trained to do. We fight. Violently. We fight for the life that this patient wasn’t ready to give up yet. We yell and we scream at our friend, Death. We break ribs with our compressions. We burn veins with our drugs. And if we are lucky that patient lives and we go on with our friendship, our agreement, with death.
But sometimes we aren’t. Sometimes no matter how many ribs we break or how many veins we burn, it’s not enough. Death gets his prize. And in that moment we hate him. And we hate ourselves a little too. Because we know that we are going to come back tomorrow night, shake hands with Death, and reforge our agreement. Because Death is part of the job.
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