Nursing: How Do You Separate, at the end of the day?
“Nursing is tough, for even the toughest of nurses. You can love what you do, but still question, “what’s it all for?”
How do you let go, how do you separate when the day is done? Two of the most prevalent questions asked of any nurse or doctor. And it’s a hard question, as the impact changes according to what we are experiencing. Some days, the impact of this work strikes you at the most unexpected moments, others it sticks with you long after the shift and try as you might, you can’t let go. Some days you walk outside, pause, inhaling that first crisp breath of fresh air on the outside, then give yourself the walk to the car, or subway ride home to reflect, decompress and when you walk in your door, boom - you’re separated. Others, you’re practically running, shift already forgotten before you’ve even exited the hospital. Then there’s the days you can’t separate from, despite the greatest efforts - the shifts that keep you awake at night.
It affects us, because we can’t always show it when we are on the job. We spend 12.5 hour shifts going from sharing the grief and unexpected loss in one patient room, to a poker face in the next room, when confronted with a demanding and arrogant patient. We spend earth shattering silences with coworkers, as we clean up the devastation of a code, and perform post mortem care - holding back the whirlwind of thought as we zip up the shroud. We spend endless moments listening to patients who constantly complain, and nothing we do is right. We spend time mediating between arguing family members, who ultimately choose to turn their focus on making our life a living hell with nitpicking at everything we do while helping their loved one. We spend hours caring for patients who become almost like family to us, and we honestly spend hours wishing the difficult patients would just transfer out - but they’re the ones that remain. We spend heartbreaking moments of attempting to resuscitate traumas, with no peaceful end, and we spend peaceful moments watching the gentle passing of a DNR patient, surrounded by love, and spiritual care.
It affects us when we feel as though we haven’t performed our job as best we know how. It affects us when we have shifts where nothing we do seems to be right. It affects us when our patients are frightened, and try as we might, we can’t ease that. It affects us when we hurt for our patients, and people on the outside can’t understand why that hurts. It affects us when we’ve just lost a patient, and there is another admit rolling in for an admission. It affects us when we experience death; we feel the agony of losing the fight to save their life, we feel the pain of loss, we feel the acceptance of a peaceful transition - and we feel the memory of them in our hearts. It affects us, because people don’t want to know or hear about the challenges, only the joys. It affects us, and we can’t always articulate why.
It affects us, and you may not see it at all - because the next day, we are resetting and doing it all again.
“Nurses crave silence at the end of the long day. Void of ventilator bings, cardiac monitoring alarms, beeping IV pumps, PT’s & families shouting, telephones ringing insistently, rolling squeaky carts, amid dozens of extraneous noises. Most of all, nobody shouting out the nurse’s name every five minutes. Who knew the sound of your own name could be so damn annoying? Ahhh, the sweet bliss of uninterrupted silence at the end of the day.”
