One Little Ragamuffin: Nursing Is My Jam

This is my 13th year celebrating National Nurse's Day and it has been a wild, wonderful ride for sure.

After I graduated nursing school, I worked my first year as a nurse at Healthsouth Medical Center, with a phenomenal team of nurses.

It was there that I learned how to start an IV practically with my eyes closed, how to pack a Stage Four pressure ulcer and at least make it out of the room before I vomited, how to give patients news that no nurse wants to give, and how to be a strong nurse, no matter what. (Oh, and never to wear lace underpants with white scrubs. ;)

I also encountered a certain well-known sports medicine physician there, who is one of the rudest human beings I've ever met, and learned that not all doctors are created equal.

As much as I loved working there, staffing changes came when UAB bought out the hospital (thank you, Mr. Scrushy) and it was a better choice for me to begin working as an agency nurse at the end of 2004.

With the agency, I got some incredible experience.

I did long-term assignments in cardiology, endocrinology, at the state psychiatric hospital, and at the county hospital, to name a few.

Doing a long term contract at Bryce, the state psychiatric hospital, was great experience and helped me really learn to fend for myself as there was often no back up when things happened.

I remember one night in particular that we had a serious incident and I could not get in touch with the Bryce police to save my life so I had to manage it alone.

However, when I was leaving the next morning, the Bryce police appeared to pull me over for speeding on campus. Grrrr.

By the time I got done asking where the hell they had been a few hours before, they decided a warning was sufficient for my speeding.

After Bryce, I did a year assignment at Cooper Green, the county hospital, when they still had inpatient beds.

That experience was unlike any other.

Often, the staff was entirely unconcerned with assisting agency nurses, I was often overloaded with patients, and supplies were extremely limited to say the least.

Every shift I just had to manage.

The absolute hardest day of my nursing career is burned into my brain:

I went into work, signed up for a double.

I was assigned eight patients, I had no nursing assistant so I would be providing total care, two of them had full blown AIDS, and two of them were actively dying. And one of the patients who was actively dying weighed 368lbs and I had no one to help me with him.

During that 16 hour shift, both of the dying patients did and I had to provide post mortem care, notify their families, and take them to the morgue myself, one of my patients with AIDS kept pulling out his IV, causing blood to go everywhere, and creating a biohazardous mess for me, and another patient kept having seizures.

It was the worst damn day.

But I made it.

And, after I made it through that, I knew I could make through anything.

Another agency stop was a long term pediatrics assignment about ten years ago.

The nurse I worked with, Nicole, taught me everything about peds. Nursing friendships are a strong bond and we remained friends through the years:

As it happens, when hell broke loose a few months ago at my previous job, she needed a night shift nurse and she is now my Director of Nursing.

Such a blessing.

All that experience gave me the strength to provide end of life care for my precious grandmother in March of 2014 and I am so thankful I knew exactly what to do for her to keep her comfortable and that I was able to be with her until the very end.