Working In Care - An Important Message To Remember

The past week or two a few things have come to my attention that don't sit well with me. The first was a picture on Instagram insisting that in order to work in health you had to normalise death...what!?
The second was a post from a student nurse that has gone viral this week..she explained how choosing to be a nurse was the worst decision of her life. (Siobhan Fenton, 2016). She goes on to say that she broke down crying in front of her young daughter and how bus drivers are on more money, for an awful lot less training.
This may be true..BUT..a bus driver does not go to work each day, knowing that they are making a fundamental difference to someones life. If money is your only motivation for working in health, then you may as well go and be a bus driver.
I am not a student nurse yet, but I have worked in care for 4+ years, and people that know me have seen the effect that it has had on me at one point or another..I honestly wouldn't recommend anyone undertaking a nursing degree without first gaining some experience in care.

But this is the important thing to remember..
If you go home from your job in a care home, community, hospital, hospice, doctors etc and you cry..it is because you CARE! Do not ever think that you are weak for having a good heart! Do not ever think that seeing someone die needs to become normal to you..do not desensitise yourself to that. You are human. It is in your nature to love and to feel empathy. Your children will see that their mommy and daddy have an important job, they look after people who cannot look after themselves. They hold peoples hands as they take their last breath and they hold peoples whole worlds when they welcome a new life. What you do today is important. The compassion that you show and the work that you carry out, day in, day out is appreciated.

As Mahatma Gandhi once said “You must be the change you want to see in the world.” Don't ever forget that. You are special, you are needed and you are magnificent.










Reference:

Siobhan Fenton. (2016). Student nurse reveals 'soul destroying' realities of career in open letter. [online] The Independent. Available at: <http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/student-nurse-reveals-soul-destroying-realities-of-her-career-in-open-letter-a7344516.html?cmpid=facebook-post>.