All Those Hands Held – Reflections on a Career in Nursing

This is a post I have been meaning to write for a while, but I’m not sure I knew exactly what I wanted to say, until now. If you subscribe to my Changing Pages newsletter, you will have read some of my musings already.  On the 27th March, after almost 26 years of working as a nurse, I returned my uniforms, I cleaned my desk, and I set my out of office, forever. I then walked out of the hospital for the final time.  In between all of that, I received many lovely gifts and cards, I said lots of goodbyes and I enjoyed a ‘surprise’ afternoon tea organised by my team.  I may even have shed a tear or two.

Three and a half weeks on, and with a bit of distance between myself and all the emotions I went through in my final weeks, I can start to reflect on what a privilege, and on occasion, a challenge,  those 26 years of nursing have been.

A Career in Nursing

For most of my childhood and into A levels, I thought I wanted to be a teacher.  I went to university with that in mind, temporarily toying with becoming a social worker along the way. Nursing certainly wasn’t part of the plan. However, like many graduates at the time, I left university with a degree, but not a job.  A year or so later after one temporary job as a care assistant in a nursing home and one lovely nursing sister taking me under wing,  I was training to be a nurse.

I wasn’t a natural nurse. I was always squeamish, in fact I still am.  I hated blood and most bodily fluids, didn’t much enjoy anything surgical or too invasive and fainted at the births of babies and regularly during placements in intensive care and theatres.  However, what I did love from very early on, was oncology or cancer nursing and palliative care.  I had some wonderful placements, where I met nurses who were so compassionate and so kind and such wonderful communicators I knew I wanted to emulate them.  I loved the way these specialties gave the opportunity to care for people who were extremely vulnerable and facing really difficult times.  I knew this was exactly the kind of nurse I wanted to be.

Apart from the usual variety of jobs junior nurses have in the early days, the majority of my career has been in the field of palliative care.  I’ve worked in the community, in a hospice and lately in a hospital caring for those with life limiting diseases coming towards the end of their lives.

I am so thankful, that for the majority of my career, it was the speciality of palliative care in which I was able to work.  A speciality that brought on occasion tears, and of course sadnesses, but fundamentally so much joy.  The privilege of caring for a patient and their family when they are most vulnerable is a privilege I trust I never took lightly.

A Fond Farewell

There are of course things I won’t miss about nursing, primarily PPE and Uniforms! Wearing a mask +/- visor or goggles has become a way of life for so many now, not just those working in healthcare.  Despite best efforts, caring for sick people and attempting to have difficult and meaningful conversations from behind a mask is never easy or ideal.

For some nurses, there is much pride in wearing navy blue.  It means you have reached the heady heights of nursing sister or equivalent. Of course I did feel that, but I also disliked being stripped of individuality, not being able to paint my nails or wear jewellery!  Thick polyester and tights on a hot day, whatever the colour and whatever status it signifies, is miserable!  For now I am revelling in opening my wardrobe and choosing to wear something I enjoy and makes me feel happy.

If I’m honest, the things I will miss are more significant than those I won’t.   It’s the people.  It’s always the people. Palliative Care is made up of the most altruistic, kind, supportive, funny types of people.  There is a humour unique to those who work in areas where sadness has the potential to prevail.  Only those who work in palliative care will understand why sometimes you have to laugh, not at death, but certainly with death and those ridiculous situations which can surround it.

Any good team will have a sense of camaraderie.  I cannot speak for any other job or career, but in health care, this sense of camaraderie and pulling together is massive.  Sharing the highs and lows of a difficult situation when feeling drained of everything has been especially important throughout the pandemic.

Caring for people has been such a huge part of my life, whether at the hospital bedside, or in the home.  The impact of this and the way it can make you feel about your self cannot be downplayed.  Patients are on the whole, wonderful, and for me have certainly have made the job of nursing so incredibly fulfilling for so long.  Observing others bravery, fortitude and even humour  in the face of sometimes immense suffering is what kept me going on so many difficult days. I suspect I may have  a caring sized hole I will at some point need to fill.

 Being Thankful

I have so much to be thankful for.  I am thankful to Sister Diana who cajoled and encouraged me to apply to train as a nurse all those years ago.  I am thankful to all those selfless members of health care teams I have had the joy of working with.  I am thankful for the friendships built and sustained through my work.

I am so thankful I was able to finish this chapter working with such a kind, caring and funny group of people during what has been the most difficult year most of us have known.  Perhaps though, more than anything, I am thankful to all those patients whose lives and deaths I have been part of.  For all those hands held, I will be forever grateful.  It is very special.

The Future:

For me, as for many, the last year has taken its toll.  However, it has also given me the time to reflect long and hard on what is important to me. The pandemic has been a tacit reminder of how precious life is and also, how quickly life can change. Writing has always been hugely important to me.  For many years. I have had a long held, half formed hope that one day, I would be able to make it into something more than a hobby.  It is something I had talked about in a fairly abstract way with my husband for a long time, becoming more serious in recent months.  When December struck and I was immersed in a hospital where Covid was taking hold once again, I knew it was time to make a change.  Not because I no longer valued my role in palliative care, or indeed in the pandemic, but because I had finally found the courage to make a change, and to try and make the dream a reality.  There is a wonderful world of other work out there and I am already having lots of fun discovering it.