Brie Gowen

Savor the Essence of Life

How I Fell in Love With Nursing. Again.

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First love is easy, isn’t it? With stars in your eyes and a naive nature, you swing headfirst and heart-strong into the relationship. You have dreams for the future, the butterflies for excitement to spur you forward, and even a bit of healthy hesitancy to keep you honest. But somewhere between that first date (or shift in the case of nursing) and eventual broken expectations, you end up feeling betrayed. It’s nothing like you hoped it could be. You end up disappointed, likely broken-hearted, and sadly, if your experience was especially harsh, guarded and skeptical for any silver lining that might exist up ahead. Sound familiar?

A profession you can truly love isn’t that different from a romantic relationship. It’s something that gives your life a new purpose, a reason to hope, excitement, and the ability to get better at it as you go along. It’s the chance to think of someone other than yourself, but like any relationship, the one with your career can become strained. I’ve been in the medical field for 20 years now, and I think I’ve experienced every stage of the process. I mean, if Nursing was Dante’s Inferno, I probably transversed through every circle. Y’all, I fell out of love with it, and it took purposeful determination to make my way back into my partner’s good graces. At one point, I think I hated it. Just being brutally honest here.

That first year was something, am I right? Fear, panic, but somehow an exciting adrenaline rush, a pride that I’ve discovered you can’t let slip away. I was proud to be a nurse. I was proud of my vocation, and I was proud of the hard work it took to get me there. I was proud of that R, and of that N, and for a while no one could take that from me. But then came the bad apples. Damn, if they don’t ruin the barrel.

Somewhere between holding an elderly woman’s hand and double charting for the billionth time, my heart started to harden. Do you know the difference between a good nurse and a great nurse? I was always a good nurse. I took care of my patients, and I got the job done. I was honest (for the most part), and I did no harm (that I’m aware of). I smiled at my patients’ faces, and I even meant about 80% of what I said. This will sound so harsh to the layman, but my fellow nurses will understand. It’s not easy giving all of yourself with little to nothing in return. I mean, yeah, you get the paycheck, but that even seems paltry in the face of preventing death or giving up Christmas with your family. So, it becomes a job. A thing you do, day in and day out. I can even recall telling my husband I felt stuck. Lord, help me, I did. I could think of no other “job” where I could work 24 hours, yet get paid for forty hours, while maintaining the best benefits offered in our little city.

I ask again, do you know the difference between a good nurse and a great nurse? A good nurse gets the job done, but a great nurse loves the job they get to do. I guess I had to move from one to get to the other.

All I know is, I entered the field like a young, star-crossed lover, but about a decade into it, I wanted to breakup. I had become disillusioned, and it wasn’t what I thought it could be. Maybe I entered the career thinking I could make so many differences, but I wasn’t open to what could change in me. I became a woman focused on the obstacles before me, and blinded to any blessings scattered throughout. I wasn’t heartless, mind you; I still felt contentment when a patient told me how much my care had meant to them. But those Hallmark moments couldn’t outweigh the injustices I felt. I focused on every single hardship in my field, and I took personally each offense. I allowed the Negative Nancy’s to feed the fire of bitterness inside me, and I assumed every demanding patient canceled out the kind ones. There’s certainly that need for self-care, but I think I came to a place where it was almost always about me.

“Why is this so hard,” I asked, never contemplating for very long how it must be on the other side of the bed.

“What do they expect of me,” I would question angrily, without asking myself what I might give.

I saw my field only as a difficult endeavor, and seldom as a privilege. I carried the weight of a thousand martyrs, except I had forgotten the cause for which I gave myself. I was a good nurse, who did my job, but not a great nurse who loved the opportunity to do it. And I suppose that’s many of us. It’s not that we don’t enjoy what we do; it’s just that sometimes we hate it just as much. That sounds so terrible, when I type it out like that, but if you’ve never held a position where you don’t cry while cleaning the dead body of someone you just hugged that morning, then you may not understand. If you haven’t been punched, kicked, or called the worst of all swear words by someone you’re trying to help, then you won’t get it. If you haven’t cringed over calling someone in a position above you, knowing they will scream at you merely for doing your job, then this may seem like harsh words. If you haven’t felt the anxiety of trying to do the work of two people, while not making a mistake that could cost someone else’s life and your career, then you just won’t have a clue. It’s not easy to carry the weight of so much on tired shoulders, and for many who do, they end up angry and perhaps even resentful for a profession they once loved so much.

Back to the relationship bit, it’s as if the marriage is falling apart, and you don’t want a divorce, but you can’t look at his socks balled up on the floor another day or you might snap. I guess sometimes, when you realize you don’t love them like you used to, you have to take it back to the beginning. You have to remember the first time you saw them, that first date, or first, tender kiss. The spark is still there. You just gotta know how to stoke it.

I recall sitting in a computer class taking a critical care course, and I was digging it. Us Critical Care folks, we love all that medical stuff! Sitting there, I knew I loved the knowledge. I loved the dynamics. I loved the process. I loved the people. I loved making a difference in people’s lives. I loved nursing. I did. It was time to act like it.

Back when my husband and I were just dating, I remember we had been off again, on again, at one point. I had found out some stuff, and each of us had been idiots. We loved each other, we knew that, but we were kinda just coasting along, existing as a couple. Like, maybe involved, but not committed entirely to the future of it. Well, anyway, I remember standing in the card aisle on Valentine’s and I had found the perfect, mushy card for him, when suddenly God smacked me upside the head.

It was like, God said, “Brie, if you’re going to give that to him, you need to mean it.”

And I was like, dang, you’re right. I love him. I really do. We can work through this.

And we did. Every day since our relationship got better, and even now, each day is better than the last. I guess, I had to come to a place in my nursing career that was similar. I loved it, but I had to start acting like it. I had to do more than just show up. I had to get invested. I couldn’t focus on my husband’s faults, any more than I could deny my own. And I couldn’t selfishly fixate on what nursing took out of me. I had to start giving of myself more. I had to see through clear eyes. If you focus on a stain, that’s all you see. What you should look at is the fact that the fabric is still good. It can be washed. Nursing was still good. I think my vision of it had just become tainted.

My career truly began to change when I focused on the opportunity to provide care, the privilege of meeting people at their darkest hour, and leading them back into the light. I threw off sympathy and instead embraced empathy. I put myself in my patient’s shoes. Heck, even the administrators’ shoes. I saw my occupation as the ministry it was, my chance to care for the hurting, and to help those in need. I didn’t face the relationship with what I could gain, but what I could give. I didn’t focus on what wrong was being done to me, but rather what good I could sow into it. Y’all, I fell in love all over again, and it wasn’t because the object of my affection was perfect, but because it gave me purpose, passion, and a sense of fulfillment. Was it still hard, at times? Yes! But beyond that it was good. In fact, it was great. And then I realized, I was great too.

Do You Regret Becoming a Nurse?

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“I’m stuck!”

These were the words I spoke to my husband, and it surprised even me that I had spoken them out loud. Yet there they sat, out in the open, uttered in angst, and unable to be taken back. It was true, though, and even as that saddened me, admitting my frustration was freeing.

In all honesty, at that moment, I wished I could just stay at home. With young children, that’s where I wanted to be at the moment. I envied those women who could lament over daycare being too expensive to justify working out of the home. I held a job that brought a substantial enough income that my paycheck outweighed what I might have to pay a sitter, and while that didn’t sound like a problem to most, as a burned out nurse I was just looking for any old excuse to be able to step away from the bedside. As it stood, I had built a life (and the bills it included) around my salary as a nurse. I depended on my payday to make ends meet.

I was stuck in the life I had created. I was working twelve hour shifts at the bedside because the schedule I could create worked best for my family at the time, but even that wasn’t enough to make it worthwhile for me. I was exhausted with homeschooling and staying up with a baby. Dragging myself to work in between my home responsibilities was just too much. I dreamed of being a bartender again, or even working in a PVC pipe factory like I had at the age of 22. Anything sounded better than Nursing. I regretted that I had ever left vet med school to pursue a career caring for humans.

This was where my mind was five or six years ago, and I think if we’re being honest, we’ve probably all been in this place of our career at one time or another. It’s that barren place where the good doesn’t seem to outweigh the bad much anymore. Nursing is often a thankless vocation, and one day you look up and can’t remember the last time it seemed rewarding more than exhausting. After all, the hours were long, the patients were often overly demanding, the families unrealistic in their expectations. The charting had quadrupled, the staff had been cut in half, and the responsibilities multiplied. And the fact that by responsibilities we were talking life and death, that didn’t help matters. Even if you were exhausted, you couldn’t allow that to affect your performance. Otherwise fatal consequences could ensue. That would wear thin even the most sturdy individual.

Nursing was hard, no matter how you looked at it, yet you still loved it. Deep down, in that place where the light that loved Nursing still burned, you enjoyed the field. It just seemed burnout could cause the flame to flicker. It brought frustration, often, but occasionally even regret. Why did I ever become a nurse?!

Last week I walked into the room of a chronically ill elderly woman. I knew in my heart she wasn’t going to get better, and I think she did too. I had taken care of her a handful of times, including her first day admitted, so we held a special bond. In her prior moments of fear I had offered comfort. She liked it when I sang or hummed softly while attending to her needs. She said it calmed her nerves. To see her genuine smile when I walked in the room was nice, and seeing her daughter’s joyful reaction to my presence added to the feeling. Once outside of the room, the eldest daughter and I, we walked in silence to the ice machine, acknowledging without words the fact that mom was looking worse. We came across her physician in the hall, and together we all advocated for her care. I beamed with a contented feeling of accomplishment for getting my patient what she needed. It felt good to do good, if that makes sense.

Later, when I returned to my familiar patient’s room she commented, “you know what I’ve noticed? It always seems like God puts people exactly where they need to be exactly when they need to be there.”

It was an “aha” moment for me. She wasn’t just talking about the doctor, but also me. I was right where I needed to be, and not just on that particular day with that particular patient. I was right where I needed to be caring for people in their most vulnerable and difficult times. I was using my gifting to help others, and with that came a sense of purpose and feeling of pride that far outweighed any passing emotion of regret I had felt in the past. Over the past year or so my heart had changed. It had turned back to Nursing. The passion and calling that led me to the field had returned, my joy for the job had increased, and my flame had been rekindled.

Nursing is a challenging job, but more so than that it is a responsibility for the lives of others that can easily leave you exhausted and disillusioned because of the demands that weigh heavy on your heart and mind. Without the perspective and awareness of the valued part you play in changing and improving lives, you can easily come to a place of burnout, and possibly regret. At this point I’m grateful that my candle no longer flickers, but instead burns bright. That’s not to say I don’t get tired, frustrated, and stretched far too thin, but I am able to realize with pride that I have been placed exactly where I need to be, at exactly the right time.

Why Nurses Need Encouragement

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I was thinking this morning about my different blog topics that I often cover. I haven’t written on the topic of nursing in some time, and I regret that for my nursing friends. I have felt a bit stifled by the strong opinions of others, and I had to take some time to assess where I stood in my feelings of the nursing field. I was teetering on the edge of burnout which caused me much distress because of how much I love the field. Regardless, this morning I thought of how well my nursing blogs are received. Even to this day I have nursing posts written three years ago that still go viral, and while that surprises me, it also is kind of expected. After all, I realize that nurses need a voice. Just like all the mommy blogs, nurses need to feel they’re not alone. They need to laugh, but most of all they need to be encouraged. And here’s why. 

Have you ever held a job where you’re responsible for another person’s life?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever held a position where if you made a mistake (something that’s easy to do) someone could die?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever worked in an environment where you’re yelled at for things outside of your control?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever been treated horribly in the workplace not because of your performance, per se, but simply because the circumstances of being sick are awful? What I mean is, have you endured the brunt of someone’s frustration even when it has nothing to do with you personally?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever tried to memorize a million different medications, dosages, and side effects to perform your job safely?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever worked short-staffed? You probably have. But did it create an unsafe environment where you feared mortal consequences could result?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever been talked down to by someone above your pay grade? Probably so. What about when they’re 10-20 years younger than you with a decade less experience in the field? What if this was your norm?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you face death and dying on a regular basis?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever cried in empathy for someone’s death you didn’t know? 

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you build a protective wall around your emotions as a coping mechanism to be able to continue doing your job?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever educated someone on lifesaving information that they continue to ignore, and watch them enter your workplace over and over due to their noncompliance?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you ever get yelled at for not answering someone’s call quick enough for a straw, even though you were distracted by saving a life?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever broken someone’s ribs trying to save them?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever had someone beg you to let them die? Or to kill them so they can escape the pain?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever watched the same individual try and kill themselves mulitple times? But then one day you don’t see them anymore?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever been cussed out, spit on, and punched for trying to help someone?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you go home covered in a stranger’s body fluids?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever lifted more weight at work than you know is safe because otherwise someone under your care would have been hurt?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Have you ever hurt your back at work?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you take care of addicts, criminals, or hateful individuals, but treat them all like gold?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Are you expected to leave your personal problems at home, rid yourself of preconceived notions, and accept harsh treatment with a smile?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you encounter contagious, deadly diseases in your workspace?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Does your job commonly hold unrealistic expectations by the public?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you work a shift that exceeds twelve hours, sometimes is twenty four hours, and you cannot leave under penalty of law until you’re relieved?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you have to show up at work regardless of the weather, it being a weekend, holiday, or middle of the night?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you suffer from the stress of your work responsibility, the hectic, uncertain pace, and fear of making an error that could result in a lawsuit?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you cry at the end of the workday?
That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you spend an enormous amount of time on continuing education, training on ever-changing technology, licensing requirements, and mandatory meetings with information that could have been delivered via email?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

Do you absolutely love what you do, but some days (like the bad days) hate it?

That’s why nurses need encouragement. 

If you answered yes to the majority or all of these questions you’re probably a nurse, and hopefully understanding you’re not alone in these circumstances encourages you. 

Why Working “Just” Three Days a Week as a Nurse is Utterly Exhausting 

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I was sitting at my computer screen, entering orders for a physician, and trying not to forget what he had said since I had neglected to write it down. I was charting my note, mentally taking inventory of all the tasks I had accomplished and problems I had identified and reported. My eyes felt gritty and my mentation frazzled. I glanced at the time on my computer screen and was taken aback that seven hours had flown by so quickly. Then I realized with dread that I hadn’t documented a single thing on my other patient. I was so behind!

And as my sand-filled eyes started to water in the frigid air of my surgical ICU I realized I was beat. I was exhausted. Yet I had not been working all week. It was my first day on shift in two weeks! I knew, though, that nursing wasn’t so much exhausting because of the hours worked, but rather the work that was performed.

Yes, twelve hour shifts actually turn into thirteen and sometimes fourteen hour shifts, and by golly yes, that makes for a supremely long day! But you only have to do that for three days, right? Maybe four. The rest of the week you’re free and off jet-setting the country, leaving a trail of money in your wake as you go.

Yeah, right.

More like curled up under the covers in a dark room, recovering from a mental and emotional hangover much worse than one caused by the cheapest of Tequila.

As I sat at my computer screen fighting my mental and physical fatigue I knew the reason I was utterly exhausted, and although by most career standards my day should be coming to an end, it wasn’t even my lengthy shift still looming that made me want to wave my white flag of surrender. My patient was critically ill, and as such I had not stopped.

I remember in high school I ran track. Never one for speed, I was more of an endurance runner, and as a long-distance runner I can recall the trip around the half-mile track. After so many loops you’d get to a point where you were done. You were finished, in your mind and rubbery legs, and you felt certain you could go no further. You’d strive for that line up ahead that marked the finish, head down, legs pumping, and when you got there you’d realize you still had one more lap to go. One more lap, you’d whisper encouragingly to self, and by sheer adrenaline you would continue.

That’s kinda how nursing is. You go and go and go. You fight and fight and fight. You rush and rush and rush. And just when you think you may be done, you are not. The next shoe drops, the next set of vital signs plummet, the next patient falls, the next train wreck codes. On, and on, and on.

In few other fields will you find that the moment you hit the wall does not matter. Like a soldier into battle (and as a veteran I think I can speak on this), a nurse holds life and death on the line, so when your brain becomes fried and your body becomes weary, you just keep marching to the drumbeat of beeping IV pumps, shrieking monitor alarms, and persistently cruel call lights.

Nursing is exhausting for so many reasons, but the biggest being the task at hand. You work within the confines of time, pushing the limits to complete an enormous workload with minimal support staff available, all the while carrying a small library of knowledge within your overloaded brain, realizing that an error on your part could be detrimental.

You complete one job and another comes along, and much like an assembly line worker in a factory you keep going to prevent the great machine of healthcare from going on the fritz. Yet you also know if your machine stops so does someone’s heart, and if that’s not mentally draining then I don’t know what is.

So even one full day as a nurse, especially on a tough day, can seem akin to purgatory. That’s not to say that being a nurse is similar to torture, but anyone who’s begged the time clock to bring along the next shift knows exactly what I mean. You see, when you’ve mentally thought your way through keeping someone alive as long as your fizzled out mind can handle then a ten hour break away from the bedside seems like a much needed respite.

And yes, even working “just” three days a week is utterly exhausting.

Do You Know Who’s Nursing’s Worst Enemy?

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It’s no big secret that nursing is a challenging field. As if the ever-changing knowledge required to remain competent in the profession were not enough, factor in the inherent difficulties such as unrealistic staffing ratios and false perceptions from the community at large, and it’s near impossible to perform the job as is expected. 

So while striving to perserve required credentials, maintaining skill’s competency, and keeping up with continually changing and expanding technological advances, the professional nurse must also adhere to safe practice standards, ensuring the best possible care is delivered to his/her population. 

And that’s fine. I mean, we’re used to it anyway. Where things may get kinda slippery are keeping to such a high standard when short-staffed. But the hardest part is probably trying to reach the high bar that is set by the expectations of the patient population.

Indeed, nurses are not only expected to perform their job with skillful competency, without mistake, and in a timely manner, but also with a huge grin on their face. In fact, nothing ruffles the feathers of the general public more than a nurse who can’t seem to adhere to the Florence Nightingale, Angel of Healthcare perception. What I mean is, it’s just expected that nurses should perform their duties without complaint and with a happy smile. At all times. 

So is it the unrealistic expectation of the general public that makes nursing harder than it should be? Perhaps. What about stubborn, cocky physicians who belittle their nursing counterparts? Yep. That’s certainly a dinosaur I’d love to see fully extinct! How about unfair working conditions or a nonsupportive work environment? Is that the worst enemy of nursing at large? 

While all those things are terrible, they’re not the worst. It’s not even patient satisfaction surveys. And although this might disappoint some, it’s not even the large number of professionals who misspell HIPAA. (Of note, I don’t think this is a big deal whatsoever.)

I can recall my first nursing job. It was PCU, aka, Progressive Care Unit. It was a step down from ICU, which basically meant I worked my butt off. I had patients who likely should have gone straight to the ICU, but started with me instead. Most patients were one minute away from coding, but instead of having two patients, I had 4-5. It was awful! I mean, I loved it, but as a new nurse it was incredibly stressful. 

The great thing, though, was how much I learned. While I anxiously prayed my way to work, once there I hit the ground running and set-up an awesome foundation of knowledge for the rest of my career. Yet I only stayed there a year. I became certain it was the worst job ever. 

This fire of dissatisfaction was stoked by the company I kept. I worked night shift and several of my coworkers had passed go at burnout, and had completely submerged themselves in Bitter, Angry Nurseville. And they were determined to bring everyone else there to live. 

Looking back I see a job that to this day paid me better than any I’ve ever had, to include the largest sign-on bonus, best compensation package I’ve seen, and a rocking shift differential. We were paid frequently for continuing education, and had the joy of self-scheduling. Like, I only had to work a weekend every once in a blue moon. 

But at the time, I was sure my workplace was the pits. The bad mood, poor attitude, and “eat their young” mindset of those around me did their very best to poison my new nurse persona. They were serving up bad apples, and I naively fell into that barrel. And that was the worst. 

I saw it then, and I see it now. Do you know who’s the worst enemy of Nursing? Nurses. We are our own worst enemy. Sadly, poor attitudes of burned out professionals seek to infect the incoming newbies. Know-it-all nurses who are full of judgement but low on grace are negatively impacting those around them. 

Nurses are a strong breed. They have to be to survive nursing school, but that tough exterior is strengthened by necessity when they encounter the very real challenges of being responsible for the life of another while maintaining professionalism, integrity, and stellar, skillful performance without error. 

But sometimes that tough exterior actually becomes a hardened shell, one that lacks the compassion that led them into the field to begin with. The lack of help, grooming, and guidance from one’s peers can lead to burnout faster than anything. The inability of coworkers to be cohesive and willing to team-build can break a young (meaning green) nurse quickly, and it can even wear down the rest.

As nurses, when we forget what it was like to be the “new guy” we are not doing any favors for the field. When we lack grace and mercy for our peers we are actually enemies of the state, the state of nursing professionals. When we’ve lost sight of our compassion for not only patients, but also our brothers and sisters in arms, we become the worst enemy of nursing, for no one can more quickly tear down the field than someone on the inside. 

In our own unrealistic expectations of those within the fold, we can quickly put out the fire of even the most motivated of professionals. We eat our young and slowly smother everyone else. It’s a shame. And it’s something that only we can change. 

As a nurse we are taught to see the patient through eyes of compassion, to try and walk in their shoes, to see the good in all. Why is it so hard to extend this same gesture to our fellow professionals? It shouldn’t be. 

As nurses we must strive to not only provide the best care to those we serve, but also the best and most compassionate care to those we serve amongst. No one will save us if we do not at first save ourselves. 

To pull together and overcome the many challenges that exist in the field of healthcare we must first pull together as a team of nursing professionals. Only then will we be able to reach fully the goals we have for the nursing field. Only then will our efforts be worth anything substantial. 

United we are many, but divided we will certainly fall. Although it sounds cliche, sometimes the simplest answer is the best one. 

The field of nursing isn’t easy. We all know this too well. There are enough challenges we face without having to face unnecessary ones within our own ranks.

The next time you interact with a peer ask yourself if your behavior and words are ones that help build your fellow nurse, or if they in fact cut them down. If they’re anything beyond compassionate, constructive criticism that is aimed solely with a noble purpose then they are poison to the very thing you love. They are actually killing the field you claim to hold so dearly. 

And that attitude of unknowing self-destruction is the worst enemy of Nursing by far.