When I completed high school in 1965, three career options awaited me: secretary, nurse, teacher. I had the skills for the first, having spent the summer I turned twelve taking typing and shorthand at a business school, but I lacked interest in the job. My fear of blood and needles eliminated nursing from my future. Thus, I became a teacher—a profession that fulfilled me for more than four decades.
Yet, nurses remained an integral part of my life. Whether assisting the doctor during my annual visit, or being there for me through multiple surgeries: a complicated tonsillectomy, an even more complicated hysterectomy, and five jaw procedures. Nurses, however, did more than medically care for me and emotionally comfort me. They became my mentors who prepared me for my later job of nursing my parents in their final years.
Nurses taught me the value of listening to the patient and treating that person as a human being, not a disease. When Ma lost herself in dementia, I applied those lessons to my interactions with her, always remembering that somewhere in her altered—and not always pleasant—personality, my mother still existed. When changing my dad’s diapers, I listened to his concerns about this role reversal and talked to him as an adult.
Through nurses, I learned the importance of explaining to the patient what was about to happen. “Dad, the tightness in your arm that you’re about to feel comes from my taking your blood pressure, not any major physical event.” “Dad, the pain in your finger will be short-lived; I am just testing your blood sugar.” Knowing what was happening lessened my dad’s fear and made my job as a faux nurse a bit easier.
Like real nurses, I kept charts of when each medicine was to be dispensed and when blood work needed to be taken. I had a calendar filled with important dates of different medical appointments. I thank nurses for inspiring me to keep my caregiving life as organized as I did.
I have never taken a nurse for granted, and I have never belittled the nursing profession. Those individuals, women and men, have my gratitude, both for how they have treated me and for showing me how to treat my loved ones.
Ronna L. Edelstein
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania