one fine day

I should say that the weather in central Florida is indeed gorgeous, and as I was stuck in the northeast freezing my ass off for the last hree years, this is the first spring I've enjoyed in a good long while that doesn't involve snow melting into damp small rivers of salt and dirt, refreezing at night so in the morning, you slip on the sidewalk and fall on your ass.

I have another nine days off of work before I start this New Assignment, and I'm enjoying the stressfree environment. I picked up Suzanne Gordon's book "Nursing Against the Odds" while in a bookstore today, opened it up to a scenario in which a nurse couldn't get any of the multiple docs she'd asked to look at a crashing patient, let alone order anything. The nurse knew was going to code and would never survive the code, and was trying to prevent this from happening, as the outcome wasn't ever going to be good.

I skimmed that paragraph, horrified, and shut the book. It hit way, way too close to home. Note that I wasn't horrified because I've never heard of such things like that happening to a nurse/patient. I was horrified because I've been that nurse and I've known that patient, and those doctors. That could be, and often has been, me, on an average day at work. I wondered, as I hastily put the book away, if lay people who read the book will think Gordon is overemphasizing or hyperbolizing this kind of scenario, but most nurses could vouch for that happening in their career not once, but multiple times.

When I don't have to work, therefore, I am very happy, even if all I have to do is menial tasks and cooking. Even if I'm sick with a cold (which I am now, apparently) I think, "Oh thank God I don't have to work 12 hour shifts sick as a dog!"

I've decided I can only subject myself to that kind of moral trauma for a maximum of five years (believe it or not, I've almost been a nurse for two years!) and then I have to either get out completely, or go back to school and get an advance practice degree, where the stress is diffferent, but the autonomy hopefully greater.

As for now, I treat my days off as if they're never going to come again, because sometimes that's how it feels when you're working.