Sad times

This week was a rather sad week. No, nobody died, but still. There are other situations that can constitute feelings of sadness; for me this was the week. On Tuesday I was with pediatrics; had a wonderful patient that was admitted for a seemingly routine procedure. The procedure required for her to have a cast for a little while, which was all explained to her and her family before anything even began. Well afterwards, the whole time I was assisting in taking her back to her room, she was screaming and crying. She was yelling at the nurse to take the cast off, at the passing-by nurse to take the cast off, and yelling at me to take the cast off. Quite sad; the things little kids say when they are in pain. Luckily, after some intervention she did just fine.

What blew me away about this child was how SMART she was! She was singing all types of songs, counting, spelling and singing the ABC's...in German. Yep. Put to shame by a small child. Lots to learn from them, that's for sure. Personally, I think they're incredible. Some of them are going through so much at such young ages and have good heads on their shoulders.

This brings me to today. Some people are going through a lot of things but have lived for a little longer. I was on a different floor today. Basically, it's like an extended care part of the hospital; the patient's insurance has run out and they have nowhere else to go. Some of them can't even go to nursing homes. It's sad. Anyway, the one patient that I had had...a lot of problems. I won't disclose, but her situation is just really really sad. The nurse and I were performing all this care and she was just...sitting and taking it all in. Yes, she was pleasant, smiled and talked to me in a friendly voice, but during parts of the day you could just tell she's taken a beating.

Having been in chronic pain before, it's really easy to put the pain away and put on a happy face. However, it only goes so far in my opinion. One can smile all they want, but the key is to look a little deeper. Sometimes it's hard. Today was a day in which it was easy. I tried to be as nice as I could, and I'm sure my patient appreciated it. Every day I learn about people, even if I don't talk to them directly. Trust me, you learn tricks every day, especially subtle ones. The goal of nursing school is to never stop learning. If you walk in with the mindset of "what am I going to learn today", you will be amazed at what you will discover. Especially when you can see sadness through a smile.