What I’ve Learned in the first 3 months of being a

1 There is no pressure like being in the code of a 23 year old you were talking to 20 minutes ago while their mother stands in the door way begging you to save them.
2 There is no silence like the one at the nurse’s station while everyone is gloved up and waiting for the arrival of the fire department that just called to report they’re on the way with someone in full cardiac arrest.
3 It’s easier to tell your friends about the funny stories and the funny patients. You keep the sad ones to yourself.
4 It’s hard to get someone to care about following up with a primary care physician to get further care and medication refills when they don’t know where their next meal is coming from.
5 Psych patients make thanking God for waking you up in your right mind a completely different thing.
6 Other peoples struggles can make yours seem so small.
7 The screams of the family who just lost their loved one will ring in your ears for hours…sometimes days.
8 Nursing is NOT passing meds and listening to heart beats, its giving your all during a code and still pulling something out of yourself to hold a grieving family member and understanding your emptiness does not compare to theirs.
9 I’ve learned to stop praying for things to go right but instead to pray for the strength to handle anything that may come way.
10 Some patients will make it hard to care about them, others will make it hard to let them go.
11 I haven’t learned this yet but I’m practicing leaving all of these things at the exit door of the emergency room. So that I can exist outside of work.
12 I love nursing and there’s nothing I’d rather do.