#traumatized nurse

[nurseorvampire]

Having a full on crisis. I’ve been out of bedside nursing for a year after leaving due to PTSD related to COVID. My job ends in March. I have no idea what to do after this. I don’t really want to go back to bedside, but it’s all I know.

[nurseorvampire]

I quit nursing. At least for now. Let’s see how a year of trauma therapy goes. COVID broke me.

[nurseorvampire]

The PTSD means it’s hard to sleep because thats when all the dead patients come back to haunt me.

[nurseorvampire]

I left the ICU because I had developed PTSD from watching covid patients waste away while they slowly suffocated, from losing a 35 year old cousin, from my own experience with having covid. I pushed myself into having a panic attack in a patients room. I have spent the last year in therapy trying to heal. I’ve been doing so much better. I found out today, Christmas, that my 86 year old grandfather has covid. He’s okay for now and he got on antivirals, but I am terrified of what tomorrow will bring. I’ve only really seen the worst cases so my mind keeps going to the worst cases. To the intubated, paralysed, proned patients. To the patient with so much subcutaneous emphysema that he looked like the Michelin Man. To the code who we thought was worsening covid all night until he was intubated during the code and more blood than I ever imagined burst from his haemorrhaging lungs. I’m scared for him. I’m scared for me. I’m scared for my dad and my sisters and my uncles. I’m scared.

[nurseorvampire]

I’m going to make an attempt at a fictionalized account of my time working critical care during COVID. So much trauma to process. Hopefully it’s therapeutic