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Life in an Emergency Room

I'm not sure why I ever became an ER nurse. I was a hypochondriac as a kid and was absolutely sure I had some kind of (insert random body part) cancer. I also cry when anyone gets a devastating diagnosis or loses a loved one. Every.single.time. That doesn't really scream NURSE, huh? Nevertheless, I was fascinated by medical shows and in combination with my love for children, I found my calling as a nurse in a pediatric ER. Need an IV in a newborn? I got this. Blue baby not breathing? Calm and collected and in the zone. Kid poops or pees on me? No biggie. I loved my job.

But when our family moved, there were no pediatric ER's near us. So I got a job in a wonderful ER that sees adults and children, but mostly adults. And can I tell you what was completely new to me??? PSYCH PATIENTS. And I don't mean those with anxiety and/or depression. I'm talking poo slinging, manic raging, dead people seeing, voices hearing, needing to be restrained kind of WHOA! It was a whole new world for me. And one I was not comfortable with (I'm still not). This is how it generally goes (sorry for the vulgarity but this is life in an ER):

Me (smiling big and happy): "Hi my name is Holly and I'm going to be your nurse today."
Patient: "Well you can go suck *%#%* and I hate everyone with blue eyes and by the way the government put a wire tap in my tooth and I'm taping everything you say you stupid *^%#***."
Me (as I back out of the room): "Welllll, that escalated quickly."

I'm not good at this people. God didn't prepare me for this. I just want rainbows and unicorns and I've been thrown into a pit of nurse flesh eating piranha. I think to myself "the charge nurse hates me. I've committed some awful atrocity and she's paying me back for this assignment." I try to convince another nurse to trade assignments with me. "You have a background in psych", I say. "You would be sooo much better than me." She just laughs at me and sits at the other end of the ER. I'm later told "you were the least likely to upset them." Ugh, I KNEW I needed to work on my game face. I'm too soft. Maybe if I growled more at my coworkers.....

The truth of the matter is, these patients desperately need help and  I wish the psych system wasn't so broken. It's so sad. I also wish I could just go in to these patients and be like "look, let's just be buddies today. You be nice and I'll be nice. Pinky promise, ok?" It's never that easy though. NEVER.

And for all the psych nurses out there,  GOD BLESS YOU. No really. I think God will bless you with a special spot in Heaven that doesn't involve spit masks, Ativan, or police officers.  I admire everything about you, but mostly how you get yelled, cursed, spit at, and physically assaulted on a daily basis and wake up and do it all over again. That's pretty admirable. I generally try to avoid those things.

Working in an "adult" ER has opened my eyes to a lot of things. It's also taught me that I really enjoy working with the elderly. Its interesting to me how you come into the world needing to be taken care of, and how a lot of people don't realize that you often leave the world needing to be taken care of as well.. Sometimes it's hard in a busy ER, but I always try to find time to sit down at eye level and ask my elderly patient about themselves. It's amazing the things you will find out if you just take the time. There's something so special to me about connecting with an older person and hearing their life stories. It truly is a blessing somedays. I still feel called to be in pediatrics, but I'm glad I've been able to experience different populations to help me grow in my nursing profession and in my own character.

The ER is not for the faint of heart, and somedays I'm not sure how I got there. But I love the adrenaline rush, I love the craziness, I love the people I work with, and I love helping others. I guess that's reason enough. ❤️


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