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Working for a time in pediatrics showed Kathleen Thompson,
RN, that nursing is the right career for her and that
sometimes it's better that dreams don't come true. From
her first days on the back of a half-Arabian horse as
a 12-year-old in Arizona, she grew up wanting to be
a veterinarian.
"I found that when I was in pediatrics working
with children, they can't tell you what's wrong. It
drove me crazy," Thompson said. "And it's
the same thing with the animals. I don't know if I really
would have been able to do that long term."
Thompson, 41, now works at the other end of the spectrum
from pediatrics in a cardiac stepdown unit at St. John's
Regional Health Center in Springfield, Mo. Besides the
adult patients, a bank of telemetry monitors tells her
exactly what's going on.
The 31-bed unit often runs at full capacity, which
Thompson attributes to growth in the Ozarks. "For
three months," she said, "we've been sending
patients home, stat cleaning the beds and bringing patients
up from the ER or CCU who have been waiting for six
to eight hours for a bed."
The cardiac unit also is where Thompson can practice
patient education, one of the things she likes best
and the reason she plans to pursue a BSN degree and,
eventually, a position as a patient educator. "I
spend a lot of time sitting with patients and doing
education," she said. "The BSN would be enough
to get me where I want to be. I don't see myself going
into management because, frankly, I like direct patient
care."
Thompson said it took as long as 10 years-more than
half of her 19-year career-to internalize that she couldn't
fix everything and everyone. "Up until then, I
would come home and worry about Mrs. Smith or Mr. Doe,"
she said. "Being able to leave [patients] at work
was probably the hardest thing I had to learn-and the
most important."
Nursing skills still go home with Thompson, however,
to 40 picturesque acres in Buffalo, Mo. There, besides
three children, she cares for three Arabian horses,
18 Nubian goats (the ones with long ears) that she milks
and breeds, and four fox terriers she shows in national
competitions. "We call them fox terrors,"
Thompson said of her "old lady dog," 15-year-old
champion Patches and the others that include Patches'
great-grandson, Harley.
Except for sutures and major veterinary issues, Thompson
said she rarely needs a vet because of her nursing experience.
She does her own vaccinating, worming, hoof trimming
and most other medical care.
"In March, I had a baby goat born during a really
bad cold spell," Thompson said. "He had gotten
chilled to the point he was limp and barely breathing.
Without my nursing background, I would've lost the kid."
She knew to bathe the newborn in hot water to raise
its body temperature. Then she sat with him in a heating
blanket, tube feeding him by the ounce through the night.
In late April, the kid was 5 weeks old with a hearty
appetite, so much so that he jerks a feed bottle out
of her hand, Thompson said.
"I have lost kids, unfortunately, but I probably
save more than I lose," she said. "The same
with baby horses when I've had problems with them."
The acreage and animals are her refuge. "My front
yard looks out over my big old red barn and a pasture
and then up into a woods on a hill," Thompson said.
"It's fairly private. I sit down and pick up a
book or pick up my guitar or the computer after I've
taken care of the animals and done my playing with them
and shut myself away from the world."
But by the time her days off are over, Thompson said
she looks forward to the next eight-hour shift at St.
John's, much the same as she looks forward to home at
the end of the workday.
At home, the phone-equipped with an answering machine-usually
isn't allowed to intrude because, as Thompson said,
"If work calls and asks me to go in, I'm a soft
touch. If the machine picks up, I don't have to tell
somebody 'No.' I know a lot of people who handle it
that way."
Contact
Cathryn Domrose at kaguilar@well.com.
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