St. Mary's
Published Thu, May 3 2007 7:07 PM
Technorati Tags: Health and Wellness
If there's a profession that truly impresses me, it's the nursing profession. Nurses, more I think than anyone care for our sick and dying in ways that go beyond what I think the average person has the capacity to understand.
My wife is a nurse. She's an LPN and works in a clinic near our home. She worked in long term care for quite a while. I guess I sort of understood what that meant, but at the same time, I only had a dim understanding of it.
When I was younger (much younger), I occasionally went together with a church youth group to visit people in nursing homes in Florida. I say occasionally, but it was pretty rare that I would go. I'm just not really good at relating to the elderly, the senile, or to people in need of constant care because of chronic diseases. I guess it's a bit of a character flaw and I'm not that proud of it.
I've been reminded several times over the last year or so about the depth of caring and commitment it requires to care for someone in need of long term care. Today, I was reminded again, in a pretty forceful way.
Last summer, one of my friends died rather suddenly of a heart attack. He had been in the hospital a few times for one reason or another over the years. I went to visit him once after a bypass surgery. He went in again a few years later with lung trouble. He was at home, and on oxygen therapy for a while. Just as it appeared that he was getting better and would be able to go in for further treatment, he died of a heart attack while cooking dinner for his family.
At the memorial service I learned things about this man that I never knew. He had lived a rather interesting life as a fireman, and he had several children. He enjoyed life and loved his family. I never realized just how deeply committed to his community he was though. He coached all sorts of sports, including soccer. He touched more lives that I had ever dreamed of, and suddenly he was gone.
His wife, another dear friend of ours suffered a relapse of her cancer shortly afterward. She went through chemotherapy again. It was a hard and debilitating experience. And then they discovered that the cancer was all through her body. She wasted away before our eyes, and it was horrifying to watch her suffer and to watch her family suffer with her. In her final weeks she received hospice care at home. A nurse came to help out, but her daughters took the responsibility for her round the clock care upon themselves.
On the night she died, I went over to visit, and to say goodbye to her. I knew she didn't have very long to stay here, and I was grateful for a chance to say goodbye. It was incredibly difficult to see her lying on her deathbed suffering. I took my son home with me, and my wife stayed behind. My wife watch our friend take her final breath.
Knowing she was gone was both a relief and a heartbreak. Relief because we knew she wasn't suffering anymore, and she did suffer horribly. Heartbreak because our dear, dear friend was gone. It still hurts knowing they're both gone.
Today I'm in Tennessee. My grandmother, who is 89, and up until a short time ago was a very active and vital woman had a stroke two weeks ago. I came out here as soon as I could arrange the trip, because this is probably the last chance I'll get to see her alive. She's in hospice care at St. Mary's in Knoxville. I went to visit her with my mother and my aunt today.
It's pretty tough to see her in this condition. She's in pain, so the hospice gives her regular doses of pain killers. She has a pair of nurses come in every few hours to turn her in her bed so she doesn't develop bedsores. She sleeps most of the time, and when she's not asleep, she suffers or struggles to communicate or even to recognize that you're there.
It's hard to watch, even though I haven't been here for very long. My mom and my aunt have to be having a real hard time of it too.
Through it all though, the nurses at the hospice are there to try to make her as comfortable as they can. The come in and they are oh so gentle with her when they check her vital signs, check on her comfort, or give her a bit of water.
These nurses go through this with dozens of patients day in and day out. Many of the patients in a hospice are terminal and the nurses watch them all die. They have to be rotated so they don't develop a strong attachment to any one patient or they probably couldn't bear the grief as patient after patient dies.
I watched these nurses care for my grandmother today. I've watched nurses care for others who were sick and/or dying. I am truly impressed.
Mark Levin likes to tell how our military men and women are better than he is, because they serve and he doesn't. I have to agree. Our military men and women, anyone who serves to support our freedom is a better man than I am, because they serve and I didn't.
Watching the nurses at St. Mary's reminds me again that the men and women who go into the nursing profession are awesome people. These people care for our sick and dying every day. That's a level of caring and commitment that leaves me impressed.
The next time you visit a doctor, think about it, and thank a nurse.
I know I'm grateful that my wife is a nurse, and I intend to let her know just how proud I am of her the next time I see her. It won't be that long. I go home again on Sunday.
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