Work Ramblings...

As anyone who knows me should know, I love my job. I love being a nurse. Taking care of people that are sick is truly my calling, and from the moment I started working in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) I have never for a day doubted that I had found a professional that I never want to leave. I take care of these babies because I genuinely care about their welfare. I want to see them grow big and strong and leave our hospital to become strong, healthy children and one day adults. Sometimes my nights at work are boring, babies that are almost ready to go home do not require a ton of care. They just want to be fed and then left alone to sleep. Some nights I get new babies that are really sick or just really early and need so much from me that I find myself running around all night. Regardless of that my night brings, I always leave knowing that I have done all that I can to help that baby and to help the families deal with a situation that most often they were not expecting to be in. For those of you that have any experience with health care, you will know that not all nurses are caring. They all should be, but for whatever reason, some do not seem to have any empathy for their patients and their families. The most difficulty families and patients are the ones that typically need the most kindness, as there is usually some sort of underlying reason for the anger or distrust. I treat every single patient and familiy member with the same level of kindness and respect, and it really pains me when I see other nurses not extending that same courtesy to patients and families. There are have been many times that I have been almost brought to tears by the rudeness and insensitivity of nurses. I'm not going to pretend that it doesn't make me sick sometimes when I have to be kind to a new mother that has used cocaine throughout her pregnancy and then wonders why her baby was born so early and with so many problems. I'm not going to try to say that I can't believe the parents that are allowed to take home children after treating their own bodies with such blantant disregard during pregnancy. It makes me sick. But all I can do is try to teach those parents to care for their child and hope that some of my kindness will rub them the right way during their babies stay in our NICU. I also just make sure to try to love each of those babies as much as I can while they are in our NICU, just in case they don't get that kind of love and affection after they go home. So many NICU nurses don't get attached to the babies, and I can understand sometimes why it is difficult to form attachments, but I know that some fo the bonds I have made with my NICU babies have been so rewarding! I love caring for those babies and I think that my sensitivity to them and their families makes me a stronger nurse. I wish more nurses would realize that their actions toward families is often just as important as their interactions with patients. I don't know if anyone who is reading this will care, but I just have heard some things are work during my years as a nurse that have disgusted me, and those things came from nurses (not random people visiting). To any nurses who are reading this, please try to remember to treat all of your patients and their families the way you would want to be treated as patient and remember how you would feel if a nurse was talking to you about one of your family members.