Nurses week!

This past Tuesday was Nurse's Day, so this week at the hospital I work is called Nurses' week. It is nice to finally feel appreciated for the work that is done. This year's gift was a copy of Chicken Soup for the Nurse's Soul, which contains some great stories. Even if you are not a nurse, you will still enjoy the stories and have a better understanding of what nurses go through in one shift or over a couple of days. Today was the last day and finished it with a pot luck lunch, which is pointless for nurses, only because we never can all sit down at once and eat obviously someone has to be available for the patients and we rarely have longer than 15 minutes for lunch, and today was no different. On a busy Friday, we will probably have 3 discharges. Today, we had 6! But it is so good to see people get better and able to function at home safely. Unfortunately, there are times when we get an admission too quickly from surgery that is not rehab appropriate and things do not get better and they return to an ICU or unit where they can be monitored more closely and sadly do not return. Today was one of those days where we received bad news about a patient that we had. I hated to hear that he passed away yesterday. It just really burdened my heart, because this guy was so positive and never complained about his condition. He was also very young actually younger than my mom, and before coming to the hospital months ago, you would have thought this man has everything. In nursing school, I remember the instructors saying don't get attached but with some patients you just can't help getting attached, and I hope that never changes!