Everyone has one memory, one absolutely glorious memory that cheers them up regardless of whatever situation they're in. Mine is so precious to me that I rarely think back on it, because I don't want it to become "just another memory". It's a wonderful story to tell.
And I'm not going to tell you it.
Read what I wrote in my opening paragraph. This is a memory so personal to me that I have told one other person. Just one. Someone whom I trust so much I'd share it with. Who? You ask. I'll leave that for you all to guess, but let me tell you - it wasn't Kerri, Jeremy or Paul. One day, perhaps, I will share that memory with you, but its not today. Instead, let me tell you about my first ever shift as a student nurse.
It was on a stroke rehab ward, which is basically where people who have had a stroke and recovered sufficently to begin thinking about going home get discharged to. It's an interesting place, and the perfect spot to send a First year student who thought he knew it all, and let me tell you, it happens to every student. They spend three months or so learning basic stuff and think they're ready to take on the World.
The First placement is always an eye opener.
It's a place where you quickly discover how little you actually know. Sure, you know how to do a manual blood pressure and what a normal temperature is, but that's only the tip of the ice berg. My first day, I met a patient with a wrapped up leg. Why? I had no idea at the time, but a Staff Nurse pulled me and the other student into her room and told me to assist him in changing the dressing.
why two of us?
Because he wanted to open our eyes. As he unwrapped the bandage I was holding, I noticed a strong smell coming from the wound. It was so strange and impossible to describe, but it's a smell I'll never forget. It was rotting flesh. The woman had had a stroke, but also had an open wound on her leg which had become infected with gangrene. How the hell do you treat gangrene? I hadn't a clue!
And here I was, holding this leg up while the Nurse unwrapped it and then rewrapped it. It was, without a doubt, a truly disgusting and one I will not describe because it will make me gip. Even thinking back to that day does. It was just so awful, and this poor woman was on a very high dose of morphine because of it. She never recovered from it sadly, but I owe her a debt.
She showed me that I could do the job. That night, I did a bit of research on Gangrene. How it forms, how its treated etc. I also owe a debt to that Staff Nurse. He deflated my ego and showed me how much I needed to know.
On average, a third of a nursing class drop out after their first placement. A third. They realise they can't handle the stress or there's something about the job they just can't deal with at all so they leave. It's not their fault. They just find out that Nursing is not for them.
But that day, I found out I could.
Live Long and Prosper
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