A side effect of all this time off to be in the brilliant white light of my family was that I lost the cynicism and dark humor that is common of nurses in my field. I was away from it. I didn't see the tragedy or the horror of first line emergency nursing on a daily basis anymore. I didn't have to compensate with humor or a refined coolness of emotion. I was free.
But now I'm back and just as cynical and dark as I ever was before and I want to take this time to give you a few words of advice for living with an emergency room nurse...
1. Listen to us. We are tired and we are emotionally frazzled. We need you to listen. We don't need you to be the advocate for the patient, doctor, respiratory therapist, family member, lab tech, x-ray tech, paramedic, or receiving nurse. At this point, one or all of those are butt holes and we just need you to listen to us rant and be on our side. In fact ALWAYS take our side.
2. If we say that something is "cool" or "awesome" or even "badass" please accept that this is a way to compensate or compartmentalize some emotional things...Unless it's something lodged into a living human body... that's usually bad ass awesome and we aren't scared to tell you.
3. Be prepared for us to be acutely and expertly familiar with the genitalia of the opposite sex. It's part of the job. If I need to tell you about a penis that I couldn't find, a vagina that was especially malodorous, or a scrotum that was bigger than any scrotum in the history of scrotums. Just accept that I need to get this information out of my head and be my sponge.
4. When I come home, and I don't want to talk, leave me alone. It isn't you. I'm tired of people and I don't have words. I need quiet. Leave me alone.
5. When I come home and I look like crap and I ask you to give me a hug... hug me until I tell you to stop.
6. If I talk in medical talk over your level of understanding and don't stop to explain just smile and nod... this talk isn't for you it's probably for me and you probably need to refer to rule number one.
7. I'm not going to sleep with a coworker, police officer, fire fighter, medic, or anyone else at the hospital. Hospitals are gross and at any point of the night I may be sweaty, dirty, smelly or wearing someone else's body fluids. It's not grey's anatomy, believe me. Also, give me some freaking credit.
8. Anything that you say to me after my 12 hour shift is probably going to be forgotten. Don't be a douche when you have to tell me the same thing again after I've had some sleep. I'm still mentally checking to make sure I gave my third patient his script at discharge. If you need me to pick up something at the grocery on my day off please put it in writing or send me a text.
9. Let me sleep. Don't wake me up. I am tired. Please. Let. Me. Sleep.
10. If I tell you a dark twisty nursing story please don't hold it against me. Laugh like you enjoy it. I need you to make me feel sane.
11. If I ask you if my scrubs look too tight the answer is NO
12. If I cry when I tell you about my patient that didn't make it, just listen and let me cry. Don't minimalize my grief by telling me that he was "old" or that there was nothing that I could have done. Lots of times there are a million things in my head that I think i should have done and I feel guilty for not doing them faster or sooner. Just let me grieve.
13. Last one.... If I'm living this life with you, I love you. I want to be with you and I wouldn't spend 36 hours a week cleaning up other people's crap (literal and metaphorical) unless I was doing it for you.
Bottom line, we do a terribly tragic and mostly disgusting job. We do it because we love it and we do it because someone must.... but we do it for you too. We wouldn't be the person you loved unless we rocked our scrubs once in a while. We wouldn't be the one you fell in love with if we didn't stop at the wreck scene on the way to our vacation or rush the field when a kid was hurt at a football game. You love that about us. And we love you for loving us.
