#icu nurse

[plaguern]

Two weeks ago, I walked into a unit that was utilized as the main COVID ICU of my hospital. Myself and many other nurses spent all of 2020 and the majority 2021 in this space. At the time, it was only lit with artificial lights, was run down with old equipment, and felt more like a cave than an ICU.

The smell of fresh paint and the brightness of the unit were in stark contrast of the heaviness I felt in my chest. This particular area of the hospital had been all but abandoned after the surges were over, and now it was being repurposed to once again house critically ill patients.

Ignoring my internal conscience’s screams of, “Don’t take another step”, I walked a bit further into the unit. I should have listened to myself; I shouldn’t have taken that last step. Something caught my gaze and I froze, effectively thrown back into a place and time I would rather keep deep in my memories. Ventilator settings written in dry-erase marker on a glass ICU door.

The scent of the fresh paint and the bright, natural light merged together with the memories of the most difficult and painful experience I have ever experienced as an ICU nurse. The faces of every patient, each Code Blue, every family FaceTime that occurred before we intubated-with the intention of saying goodbye, because they knew they would more than likely not make it-flashed before my eyes in full technicolor.

I snapped back to reality and felt angry, an anger that was so overwhelming, breathing became difficult and hot tears fell freely. I was angry about the loss of precious life, the unsuccessful resuscitations, and the misinformation that spread like wildfire, that only lead to more death. Most of all-I was angry at the ventilator settings written on glass doors for eliciting such a vehement response out of me. I was caught off-guard and completely unprepared to face the trauma that imprinted itself upon me; so I turned and left the unit for (what I thought would be) the last time. I had no intention of ever going back.

I spent that entire night thinking about what I had seen that day and my reaction to it. I finally came to an agreement with myself. I would go back in there and erase the ventilator settings, but I needed to make it a calm and healing experience. My favorite chaplain was all-too agreeable to helping me through this. The next day, I entered the unit I had promised myself I would never step foot in again.

Since it had been quite a while since they were written, the ventilator settings would not wipe off the glass easily. It was almost as if they were taunting me and making me work to erase them. Once the first glass was wiped clean, I felt a wave of grief wash over me. I was no longer angry, I was saddened. Saddened by loss. Loss of so many lives, loss of friends that left our amazing profession, and loss of our way as a society. Guided by my emotions-I erased all the writing off of each door to each room. It was cathartic to erase every trace of grief and despair that I could see. I then threw away the paper towels that held the remnants of another time, and walked out of that space feeling lighter than I thought I would.

#Nurse #icu nurse #fuck covid #ptsdawareness #trauma

[kenniegeex2]

And I’ll dream each night of some version of you. That I might not have had but did not lose.

#noah kahan #stick season #personal #selfie #nursing #icu #icu nurse #exhausted

[jhud-mrs]

#teamhudsonheartsofhope #myhopefulheart #heart transplant #mitral valve #heart surgery #wife #adversity #hope #sick husband #advanced heart failure #chronic illness #heart story #perseverance #wife caregiver #heart failure #suffering caregiver #icu nurse #hearttransplant

[bitterandmad]

I love my job as a nurse. I really do. But sometimes it's so fucking hard to deal with the things I see. I know I keep saying that I can deal with this easily because I grew up in chaos and trauma, I'm used to it, I need it to feel at home. But sometimes at the end of the day I realise.. It's not pretty. Sometimes it's awful. It's awful to have to do daily cares on dying patients that try to swat your hands away and writhe in pain but you have to keep going to prevent infections or sores. It's awful to watch the monitor all shift long hoping the dip in their oxygen sats or heart rate is self limiting and not a sign of their passing. It's awful to watch a patient take their last laboured breaths and then stop forever. It's awful to watch families cry and hold their loved ones hand telling them to hold on, or that it's okay to let go. It's awful to see confused patients turn over and over, restless, disoriented, and in pain. It's awful to watch them bleed and scream and die. But it's part of the job, and at the end of the day we have to be okay, we have to go back to work and keep doing it over and over again. All that just to be told "but you're just a nurse, how bad can it be?"

#Rant #I'm sorry I needed to get rid of this #Cw #Death #Mention of death #Trauma #Mention of trauma #Ptsd #Cptsd #Nurse #Nursing #Icu #Icu nurse #actuallymentallyill #Actuallytraumatised

[bluevelvetea]

1 a.m. during night shift at the ICU is when you're deep into reading a book, one of your coworkers is asleep and the other one just found a part of her patient's genital piercing in her shoe after it had been missing for two days.

#Yeah... It's going great rn #I've been silent here for weeks just to come back with this #Only five more hours to go #Nursing #ICU nurse #I'm reading Sherlock Holmes btw and I love it #Personal

[kenmaregal]

#nurse #icu nurse #icurn

[thenursediaries]

The Nurse Diaries: Finding Joy in the ICU

In the hushed corridors of the ICU during the night shift, a profound moment of compassion and devotion unfolded, and I was honored to be a part of it. In one of my patient rooms, I had an absolutely lovely lady in the advanced stages of cancer. Her condition worsened by the hour. Beside her a loving husband struggling with the impending loss of his beloved wife. Their story, however, was not…

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#Breaking Rules #ICU Nurse #Night Shift #Nurse Empathy #Nurse Life #Patient care

[xenomorphing]

one of my patients coded last night. I've been in codes before, but this was the first time it was MY patient. my adrenaline is still ramped way the fuck up. thankfully we were able to stabilize the patient and also thankfully I do not work tonight bc I can't seem to calm my brain down

I cannot WAIT to transfer units in January, the icu is just not for me anymore. wayyyyyy too much stress. I'm just not built for it

#icu nurse #life stuff #code blue

[andhumanslovedstories]

I work in float pool which means I don't have an assigned floor, I just go wherever in the hospital is short staffed that night, and it gives me an interesting perspective on the hospital that I don't think you get when you have a home unit and only occasionally work outside of it. Namely that almost every unit in the hospital is convinced that they have the most difficult unit, and the weird thing is that almost every unit is correct. And sometimes I wish I could convey respectfully to the occasional person every unit in the hospital is hard in a unique way but also it's not unique that your floor is hard, if that makes any sense.

#this is my respectful yet slightly bitchy way of saying that sometimes i think ED and ICU nurses think medsurg is easy

[populationpensive]

Working in an ICU...

...Means that you meet people on the worst day of their lives.

A colleague of mine said this over the weekend, which was a very rough weekend for me in so many ways. My patients were complex and very sick. The families were challenging. So. Incredibly. Challenging.

I see the worst things that can happen to people. Every. Day. I am able to push it out most of the time. Some times, there is a true shit storm of circumstances that emotionally bankrupts me. That was this weekend for me.

I think it is sometimes easy to forget how vulnerable patients and families are in the ICU. It's easy to forget it is the worst day of their lives. And when these families can't control the illness of their loved one, I think they look for literally anything they can control. Sometimes that results in verbal abuse about policies, staff, and treatment. It can be so hard to deal with this. The amount of patience it takes is astronomical.

I will freely admit that I am very detached. You almost HAVE to be to a certain extent to DO the job. But even the most detached people have a breaking point.

It makes me grateful for every family that simply thanks me for my time. Every colleague that "gets it". Every person willing to listen to me when I am going home from work.

So, to all you health care people that struggle with this as I do, we've got this. Some how, we've got it.

#health care #icu #critical care #pablr #pa-c #medblr #nurblr #physician assistant #physician associate #pa school #pa-s #pre-pa #md #do #medical school #nursing #nursing school #rn #bsn #pharmblr #pharmd

[yvmoveon]

Was charge nurse in NICU this weekend. We’re moving on up. 😌🫶🏾

#they actually feel like i’m capable #whew lawd bb #p #spilled thoughts #i’m finally getting confident in myself as a ICU nurse #almost 1.5 years after lawd !!! 😭🥲

[wastehound-voof]

There's a woman at work who is sick and chooses to wear a mask. Great. But every time right before she has to cough she pulls down the mask and coughs freely into the air in front of herself. WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU WEARING THE MASK?

#i truly want to know her reasoning #and she claims to be a nurse #her second job is a janitor in an icu

[kenniegeex2]

It’s a Taylor Swift song and I guess I’m the villain.

#personal #selfie #nursing #icu nurse #Taylor swift #Maddy McKenzie #villain

[lesbiansandgayssupporttheminers]

They make nurses a serious pay offer, so they call off the strikes. HTH.

Nurses believe ICU is already unsafe, so you can’t guilt them into not striking.

#uk politics #strikes #nurses strikes #ICU strikes #solidarity with the nurses

[albonium]

cross your fingers touch wood and more importantly vote left wing to give appropriate budget to your healthcare system and workers my mom is out of the coma she was extubated yesterday and she's doing relatively well

#i told the nurses if i could id do a cartwheel in the icu and my sister said do you want a bed next to mom 💀

[prick-love-for-arting]

"Don't worry, Aone, I've only got a few hours to go"

more hospital AU! I've mentioned nurse Aone, but also I think him and Futakuchi run into each other as one leaves and the other arrives most of the time. They have breakfast/dinner together. Sometimes Futakuchi works longer hours and Aone isn't always the biggest fan.

#art #haikyuu!! #aofuta #aone takanobu #futakuchi kenji #fan art #digital art #sketch #haikyuu art #hq rarepairs #hospital au #i forgot to ramble in the tags #how could i #anyway better late than never #so more AoFuta hospital au headcanons! #they take a while to actually get together and during the long mutual pining the other ngc catch on and mess with Futakuchi about it #but also its not like they wouldn't do the same to every other developing relationship in the group like no one is safe #again ICU nurse Aone he cares a lot about every single one of the patients he works with and is also the muscle on the unit