Last night I finished reading The Help. It left me feeling so jittery, and inspired, and thankful, all at the same time. It was 11 pm and I was tired, so I went to bed, and proceeded to lay there with my mind going 100 mph. Jamaal's breathing slowed and became rhythmic after only 20 minutes or so, and I was left alone with my thoughts. He rarely falls asleep before I do, and I am not a fan.
At just before 1 am I finally drifted off, but it was short lived. Riley woke up at 1:15, and since I was basically still awake, I got up to nurse him back to sleep. He didn't seem as though he was going to let up and fall asleep anyway. It didn't take long to get him back to sleep, but those thoughts were back to torment me again. After getting up to wash my face, and a few rounds of angry birds I finally felt my eyes become heavy and off to sleep I went.
For some reason Riley woke up again at 4:30, I'm hopeful that he is going through a growth spurt, my little man needs to get bigger. By 5 I was back in bed, and quickly asleep. I should be thankful, that for the past month, I have been getting regular sleep of 4-8 hour stretches. I can't even remember the days when he would sleep for 1-3 hours at a time. Last night I was reminded what it used to be like, but not nearly as bad as it was back then. If I could have shut off my mind, I would have gotten a lot more sleep.
It seems strange to me, but after reading the book, I became inspired to write one of my own. I know myself well enough to know that I will not follow through on this. After starting as a nurse 4 years ago, I had a brilliant idea to start a book on being a nurse. I wanted to encourage new nurses that it gets better. That there is a light at the end of the tunnel. After 9 months of working, I finally felt some confidence. I finally would make it through a week without crying while at work. I finally was able to enjoy my coworkers, my patients, their families and my personality was finally coming through. Prior to that I was so focused on my tasks that I had no energy left to enjoy it.
I wrote little snippets here and there when the ideas struck me. But my inspiration quickly dissipated and I stopped. I don't even know if I have my notes anymore.
Last night the inspiration returned. This time though, I wanted to share stories of the people I have encountered at work. I have met some wonderful people. They are the ones that make me feel honored to be a nurse. When working with them, I don't feel the burden of my job, but I feel blessed to have been a part of their life, and them a part of mine.
But I've also worked with some extremely difficult patients and their families. And of course it is these situations that float up to the top. They are the ones that leave me with a bad taste in my mouth. And I wonder if they were to read about how rude, inconsiderate, and selfish they have been, would they make a change? Would it help others if they knew just what exactly it is like to be the nurse caring for difficult patients? Maybe, "please" and "thank you" would come out just a little bit more.
I literally stood outside the door of one particularly difficult patient's room and thought to myself: "It is not worth losing your job over." I wanted so badly to yell back at her, and tell her how rude she was being to everyone that had worked with her. But I knew that just would not be appropriate. Instead, I asked to get a different patient at 3pm, and passed her off to a different nurse. 8 hours of working with her was just too much time for me.
I think I will start trying to jot down notes as they come to me. But I doubt I will ever end up with a published book. There are so many logistics related to patient privacy and confidentiality, that I don't know if I would be allowed to publish it anyway.
If you haven't read The Help yet, I suggest you do it. It was a very easy read, and if I did not have housework, work and a baby to look after, I would have finished reading it the day I bought it. I would have stayed up through the night reading if I could. I plan on writing a bit more on the book itself someday, but for now I must attend to a screaming, tired babe.
I am inspired too. I think that a book about the first year of particular careers might be interesting to write and read. I too spent many mornings crying before going to work my first year teaching. It was stressful and I didn't know what I was doing. Now I love my job, but like you said, new nurses or new teachers might need some inspiration. So it would be interesting to write a chapter about a variety of public service type careers and interview people about their experiences. I too will probably never do this, but it has always been a dream of mine to write a book. I really like this post of yours. Here's hoping I can get this to work!
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