LeaRNing

I'm officially a nurse. Not because I have an RN or because I have a job in an ER, but because I had my first healthcare associated meltdown.

I started my job in early December. We spent three weeks on a computer doing modules. Modules about things like respiratory emergencies and dangerous rashes and electrolyte imbalances. Then we were issued a preceptor and began working in the ER.

My first day was in trauma.

I did more stuff on my first day in trauma than I did in all of nursing school. Foley catheters, NG tubes, C-spine stabilization, chest compressions... all on actual human beings. Since that first day I've had patients in handcuffs, patients who've died totally unexpectedly, patients who've survived against all reason, patients who've called me an ugly bitch, and patients who've told me they'd remember me for the rest of their lives. I was the first person a soon-to-be-mom just back from ultrasound told she was having twins, and I was the last person a septic heroin addict told he wanted to go home. I've heard people actually say, "Wear gloves because there is sputum all over that curtain," and "The fetus is intact."

My days as an ER nurse are full of intense ups and downs, and my skills – nursing, social, and communication – seem 10 years premature for this position. That was the root of my meltdown. I was overwhelmed by my lack of knowledge, by insecurity about my abilities, by my helplessness at granting a dying man's last wish, by the extremes of life that pass by me on a daily basis. The closest I've come to this breadth of humanity is riding the bus in Los Angeles; now it is my job to look at their penises and put electrodes on their boobs. And I don't even speak Spanish.

I'm not sure where they're going to fall yet, but I definitely have strong feelings about this job. I want to be good at it, to learn all there is to learn – about the medicine stuff and the social stuff – but I also need about 15 more layers of skin and about 6 more sets of batteries put in my body. I'm not sure what my limits are in total, but I know I reached a level of them the other day.

My preceptor, a veteran who's been at this for more than a decade and can lead a code without batting an eye, sensed my meltdown. She said, "We're good, right? You're okay?" and when she did, that little bit of momma that makes you feel safe to explode reached out and patted me on the back and my face wrinkled up and I hid under my jacket. She led me to the med room and talked me off the ledge, and while we were in there, another nurse came in, saw I had lost it, and gave me a high five. "You're not officially a nurse until you lose it," she said. 

I've done a lot of jobs in my life, and all of them have had their challenging moments. But nothing that I have ever done is like nursing. Nothing has ever pushed me to be the best I can be in so many ways as nursing does. And nothing has ever made me feel like such a failure either.