Diary of a Hem-Onc Nurse! Happy Nurses Week

It’s Nurses Week! So, I’m going to switch gears and write about a part of my life that I try hard to compartmentalize when away from the hospital. Most nurses just read that statement and laughed. It’s one of the most rewarding but most difficult professions. Maybe I’m a tad biased.

I decided I wanted to be a nurse as a Senior in high school. I had a rough year, medically. I tore my right hip flexor and ended up on crutches. Not long after, I had a hemiplegic migraine and ended up temporarily paralyzed on my right side. Basically a migraine fuzzied up my nerves, causing the paralysis. Crazy, but all true. I spent a few weeks in the hospital and saw just how vital nurses truly are.

The decision to do Pediatric Oncology was not a difficult one. The career change from Emergency nursing to Pediatric Oncology emerged after losing one of my best childhood friends to brain cancer. Well…to treatment, really. There was no option for me after that. The ER was my first home; I am a better nurse for spending my first eighteen months there with some of the greatest, most talented people you’ll ever meet. But after facing cancer head on, I knew where God was calling me.

Hence, this year marks the start of my sixth year on Aflac. Some days I still feel like a newbie and others make it feel like a lifetime. I’ve seen many faces and families on that floor. One thing I’ve learned for certain… Pediatric Cancer doesn’t discriminate, and it shows no mercy. It can affect any family at any time. I think most of us secretly wish choosing that field will make us immune to facing it with our own children. But that’s not the case. One coworker/friend recently beat breast cancer and another lost her daughter after a twenty year battle with cancer/effects from treatment.

Like most nurses, we work long shifts. We see some of the best moments, but also endure some of the worst. We serve as pastors, waitresses, stand in family members, teachers, plumbers, and advocates. Nursing takes a lot out of you. People are so quick to make comments like: “It must be nice to work three days a week.” “Cool, you get paid a lot of money to give shots and put on band aids.” (We don’t really make that much.) “Aren’t doctors the ones who do everything anyways?” Let me go ahead and address a few of these while the iron’s hot.

Yes, I work(ed) three days a week. But I leave covered in blood, sweat and tears. I’ve got one patient going to surgery while one has a nose bleed that’s lasted for hours. The third is crying out in pain. I sometimes don’t eat lunch; I often don’t pee for a solid eight hours. That “12 hour shift” turns into 14 when my patient codes and goes to ICU at shift change. I will not take away from physicians because we love our Fellows and Attendings. But I can’t count how many times I’ve had to tell a resident what to do and demand a next step of action. Not because they are incompetent, but because they haven’t laid eyes on my patient once during my shift. I’ve been in the room every hour. Three days a week may not seem like much to the outside eye. But sometimes I’m so sore I can’t pick my son up after working the night before.

My days off I TRY to be fully present and turn my brain off from work. But the thoughts of sweet faces who love me and let me love them back fill my mind. I look at my little boy and wonder how, but thank the Good Lord that we’ve been so lucky. My brain never stops hoping and praying that the mom or dad I spent the weekend with, doesn’t have to (yet) feel the grief every parent fears.

Working on Aflac has changed me in so many ways, many of which I didn’t expect. I thought I knew death well from the ER. But death took on a whole new meaning. “Fighting for your life” did the same. These are kids and families I spend weeks, months, and sometimes years getting to know.

At the end of my first year, Id said final goodbyes to a sweet teenage boy with dreams of the NBA. We’d shared jokes and basketball moves. We’d held onto each other as he walked down the hall with his new leg after having an amputation. I later cried all the way home after leaving a shift, knowing it’d be the last time I’d see him until I go to the gates of heaven.

A mom (who watched me play barbies with her daughter the week before) walked with me to take her sweet girl’s body to the morgue. She wept as she thanked me for everything I’d done. I couldn’t even mutter “you’re welcome.” How could I say that when she’d have to leave the hospital without the same child she’d walked in with? That moment taught me very valuable lessons about nursing; some lessons harder than others.

As an Pediatric Oncology nurse, Ive shed a lot of tears: for the patients Ive said goodbye to, and the nights I hold my child close out of gratefulness. Ive been (and will continue to be) pushed… morally, physically, ethically, and spiritually. Ive learned there’s an ebb and flow of highs and lows. Nursing has taught me the best place to be is on your knees. I constantly pray for humbleness, forgiveness, confidence, and peace. There have been moments I questioned taking on this profession and all it entails. I’ve debated if I can take another day. I’ve spent a solid month being so angry at God, I couldn’t make myself pray outloud if I wanted to.

Nursing has straight schooled me on the true meaning of team work. I value my coworkers more now than I ever have. They are my family away from home and really the only other people who understand. Ive convinced myself I, my husband, and/or child has cancer or some crazy disease you’ve never seen. When really, I’m a paranoid lunatic; or, maybe I’m just a Hem-Onc nurse. I’ve discovered peroxide gets anything out of clothes. I’ve learned to tuck my tail between my legs and admit when I’ve made a mistake.

Being a nurse is not for the weak or faint-hearted. I’ve learned I’m a hell of a lot stronger than I gave myself credit for. Above all, I’ve learned to truly appreciate the moments that keep me coming back; the “successes,” the patients and families who will forever hold a piece of my heart.

I’ve shared the struggles of nursing. But if it were just about those, no one would be a nurse. You see, it’s the hand of the mom who kissed her child one last time that reminds me we are more than just band aids and shots. It’s getting to cheer from afar, a teenage boy walk across the stage to receive his high school diploma this year. He walked into surgery five years ago and came out quadriplegic and unable to speak. He beat cancer and he’s beat the effects of treatment. It’s getting to see a seventeen year old girl have the chance to live out her dream of modeling in New York as she rocked a bald head better than most. It’s getting to watch fearless kids run wild on days they actually feel good. Its first birthdays and Thanksgivings in the hospital. It’s playing Santa Claus on Christmas Eve to kids who think they will be skipped because they aren’t at home. It’s throwing a Prom in the hospital for a deserving high school Senior, because she didn’t get to go home in time for her own. It’s getting praise reports from a close friend from college who’s daughter is beating all odds and serving as a true Warrior Princess. Its having eye makeup applied by a four year old because it’s the first thing that’s helped her feel beautiful since losing her hair. It’s the patient bracelets that adorn my arms and stethoscope. It’s the sisters and brothers who become nurses because they saw first hand, how intimately nurses were intertwined not only in their sibling’s care, but their own as well.

Yes, this is hard. Yes, it’s draining and frustrating at times. But dang if it’s not worth it! Every good day FAR outweighs the bad. And we will forever carry in our hearts the ones who are called home too soon. They are why we fight. They are why we return. Because we wish they had the same good moments we’re lucky enough to experience with others.

Nurses don’t expect a thank you or a huge celebration. We don’t even expect anyone to try to understand. We just want healing, love, and answered prayers. We want others to choose healthy choices for themselves and their family. We want people to appreciate life. Every. Single. Day; we know (all too well) how quickly things can change. We just want to have enough balance to keep doing what we love and are called to do. If it weren’t for missing the good moments, we want there to be no reason for nurses to exist.

Oddly enough, sometimes it’s hard to hear: “I don’t understand how you do it.” To me, the response to that is simple. I don’t understand how you don’t.

Here’s to every nurse and every patient and family I’ve had the pleasure of taking care of. You give me purpose.