Last week marked the halfway point of my current travel assignment. It also marked the first week I made personal connections at work with a family. As a traveler there is usually not a lot of continuity of care in my patient assignments, which to me is quite frustrating as I'm a big believer in continuity of care. However, last week I did manage to keep my patient assignments 3 days in a row. With the one family we faced several difficulties such as language barrier and I felt like I was "the bad nurse".
"The bad nurse" is characterized by the nurse that has to tell the families "no" or keep them out of the room for hours at a time, or constantly remind your patient that "no, you cannot have a sip of water because you are NPO" over and over again as tears stream down their face and they beg for just a small sip. I hate being that nurse, but we all must take our turns. After a day of being NPO, traveling to MRI for several hours, and then proceeding to do several other procedures at the bedside preventing the family from seeing their child for about 5 hours I thought that I had rightfully gained the "bad nurse" status. This family in fact did not see me that way. As much as we struggled in our language barriers they saw the care I was attempting to provide to their child. Towards the end of my shift I transferred them to the floor. The mother did not understand why I was no longer going to be their nurse, and then had her child translate for me "That she would always hold me in her heart" AND "if she has a girl she will be named after me" (the mom was 4 months pregnant). Now, I've been close to a lot of families in my day, and I've gone to some extraordinary measures in my day for those families...but none of them ever named their baby after me! I probably did not handle the situation that well as I asked them not to name her after me, I did not deserve that honor. In hindsight I should have just said thank you and realized what an honor and how sweet that was. In the moment it was just weird, creepy, and awkward.
It took 6 weeks to have this personal experience that I so enjoyed as a staff nurse. It also takes 6 weeks to begin to feel comfortable with your surroundings and new routines. I can get around town w/o a gps. I know some great places to eat. I've made friends with the locals. The downfall is that I only have 6 weeks left, and now I need to start thinking about my next assignment. I really like the area out here, and would like to stay, I'm just not sure what to do about my job. This morning I was asked about renewing/extending my contract here. I am worried about the possibility of a strike, however it'd be so easy to just stay here where I know most of my coworkers and how things on this unit run. If I move into the city I'd have to start from scratch again and possibly go back to paper charting (EW!). So many things to think about these next few weeks!
Stay tuned for an upcoming post about my first camping experience that I am about to embark on tomorrow with an old college friend!
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