Saturday, April 11, 2009

Thoughts on the Road

So I was driving home tonight and talking to God. I had really somewhat forgotten how hard it was to wait for something. When I was in high school and had to wait for what was going to happen next with my urological issues.....that was hard. When I didn't have the surgery I was supposed to have in December 2000, I had to wait till the following MAY 2001 to have the next procedure done.....then August 2001, and then my final urological surgery in September 2001. All that waiting in between was hard.

Now that I have applied to several jobs, it has been hard to wait for a positive response. Things have been changing in me, and either I am losing my steam or God is changing my heart and molding it more to be towards His will. I am not all about getting into L&D as much as I used to. I am very happy that I am getting doula certification, and I think that would fulfill my desire to work with pregnant, laboring, and postpartum women. I really do. I realize that I don't have to be an L&D RN to work in that field.

Lately I have been interested in PICU, peds oncology, and NICU. I don't know if it sounds weird, but I want to work with people who are hurting (physically and emotionally), and I am possibly interested in providing palliative care. I enjoyed working with the patient who was on the ventilator on the days I was in intensive care units.

When I was driving home tonight, I had somewhat of a light bulb going off in my head, and I remembered one of my most memorable experiences working on the Disney College Program. To summarize, there was a guest who had lost her daughter. It sounded like she had been in the hospital, possibly an ICU-type of setting. The women said Jiminy Cricket reminded her of her daughter. Jiminy Cricket was extremely touched by this, and though the woman said that meeting Jiminy made her whole vacation......honestly, the woman's presence and touching words made Jiminy's day.

I want to help more people like that.

I am just a little worried that working in a setting like that would de-sensitize me towards loss & death. I don't want to become like that. I am very much in touch with my emotions and am not afraid to cry. I want to help my patients and their families through tough times, pain, and sorrow. If I work in PICU, peds oncology, or NICU, I don't want to become emotion-less. Crying is very therapeutic for me. Tough life experiences are something I am familiar with. Healing happens when emotions are felt and expressed. I think that God could give me the strength to help these kinds of patients.
I think that God wants to use the pain and healing I have experienced to help others who are hurting, whether physically or emotionally.

I also want to help children who have been abused (physically or sexually). I hear this is something one will unfortunately see when working in peds nursing. I read on Allnurses.com (related to children who are abused) how nurses can show them love and kindness in an otherwise sad situation (very much paraphrased obviously, but I hope you can get an idea of what I mean). I really liked that, and that is what I would hold to if someone asked me why I would want to work with these children. My mission would be to treat them with kindness and love, to be a light in darkness. It is an awful crime to abuse a child - it can be our job to show them that they are loved.
I think some of these recent interests stem from my interest/background in psych.

1 comment:

  1. Go where ever your heart leads you and follow it. It will get you what your looking for.

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