Basic Instincts
A nurse's first unsure steps into the profession give way to a certainty in the value of her role

By Penelope Canel, RN
Third Place Essay Winner 2002

If I had to do it over again, I'd still be a nurse today.

I remember the first days of clinical rotation in nursing school and the nervous excitement that accompanied them. Everything was new: learning about any and every kind of disease, disorder and malady. Then came processing all that information in a useful way and applying it to a practice, and then meeting my first patient.

I think the real challenge and enjoyment, though, came when I was hired for my first nursing job. I fell into becoming a pediatric nurse by luck. Or at least that's how I like to think of it.

At that time, unlike today, few nursing jobs were available. As graduating seniors, we were told by our nursing instructors, "Take what you can." Accepting a job on a pediatric hematology/oncology unit would not have been my first choice at the time; it probably would not even have been in my Top 10. With reluctance, I accepted the position to get experience and maybe, as they say, a "foot in the door."

What I found, though, was something that I never would have expected in my life.

As some of the "greenness" of being a new nurse wore away, as I gained more experience and settled into the real world, I was faced with frustration over my job and life, wondering if I had made the right decision in my chosen career path.

I received my answer in a bittersweet way.

I was talking with a close friend of my mom's, someone we have both known for many years. About 20 years ago, her child was diagnosed with cancer. I remember when he was sick and was receiving treatments at the hospital. They would have to make frequent trips to and from the city. I know the experience was exhausting for them.

She told me here as I was trying to figure out my life, "You don't realize what you do, as a nurse. You don't realize the impact that you have on a family. If it had not been for the nurses, I don't know if I would have been able to get through that. They were the ones that were there as support. Even when family didn't understand, the nurses did. I needed them."

As she tearfully talked with me, I realized that what I do could be important to so many people. It was a validation of sorts. Maybe this was what I was supposed to be doing. I am helping people, simple as that.

I was able to begin focusing on the experiences that were accompanying my days at work, and it was here that I found a human strength like no other. The families of these children wished harder, hoped higher and prayed more than any I have ever seen. It is strange how illness can do that, especially one that is life-threatening.

I found in my "everyday" days that these people would allow me to share in their lives. Not just by being their nurse-the one who pokes and prods at them, the one who wakes them up at 4 in the morning to take their temperature, the one who gets excited at the fact that their urine output is adequate-but by being a person in whom they could confide. They would share family stories, even the difficult ones that led up to their child being diagnosed and treated for cancer.

In a way, they sort of helped me figure out how I could best help them. We learned from each other. That is when nursing, to me, started to make sense. I began to find purpose in what I was doing.

I was making a difference.

As I switched to an outpatient setting in the same specialty, I was challenged with a busier environment, hectic, with lots of people coming and going. Some may even call it crazy at times. I wondered if I would be able to connect with these patients and their families in the same way that I had while I was an inpatient bedside nurse.

As an outpatient nurse, I had the opportunity to experience primary nursing. With this, I was given the responsibility of being a contact person for the families of one doctor's patients, someone they could call with concerns, problems, questions. This role could be difficult at times, especially in a busy clinic. Sometimes, I felt as though I didn't have it in me to be that person.

One day as I was returning from lunch, the mother of one of my primary patients was waiting in the hallway. She saw me and came closer as I approached the nurses station. She appeared to have been crying and started to again as I came near. I did not know what was wrong. I was afraid that maybe her child's disease had relapsed. This was a mother who was usually stoic.

She reached out to me and told me, through her tears, "I just wanted to thank you for everything that you have done, for my daughter and for me. She is completing her therapy today. I have been waiting for this day for two years now. Thank you for always making me feel better and easing my worries. You are a great nurse."

As we embraced and talked some more, I realized right then and there that this was the reason why I chose this path, as challenging as it may be. Knowing that something that I did, no matter how small, made someone's life a little easier-that makes it all worthwhile. This is why I became a nurse and the reason that I still am one today.

To put it simply, nursing is one person helping another. Nursing is lightening another's load. Nursing is a basic human instinct.

If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't change a thing.