And God's Eyes Were On Them
***To protect the anonymity of persons involved, I have changed or left out certain details. Nurse A refers to the alphabet rather than an initial, so in future stories there will be Nurse A, Nurse B, etc.. The heart of the story is the same though and I did not tweak anything when it came to the hug***
Alongside of code status, cardiac rhythm, admission diagnosis, and which arm has IV access, I scribble down a rough outline of who my patient is, trying to piece together what they’ll be like when I walk in the room. Within 2 inches of paper on my report sheet I have notes of particularly important preferences or things that must be done for each patient, such as whether or not they take their pills whole or in applesauce, if they like to ambulate through the hallway, or if they’re scheduled for a stress test.
So today I am doing just that, taking report on my patients and gearing up to start my shift. With this specific patient, whom I will call Lyle, I jot down “Hits and pulls” while I listen to Nurse A give me her story of how the night went. I’m thinking about his inability to move half of his body due to a traumatic accident which left him paralyzed, wondering how these types of patients who only have the usage of one side always seem so strong (I’ve met other patients with paralysis or muscular aphasia who can whack a whole tree down with their good side), and then I hear Nurse A say something in particular, so I cock my head and look up from my report sheet.
“He’ll hit you and scratch at your face, so don’t be afraid to be really stern with him, you almost have to yell, ‘cause he knows everything you’re saying, but he defies you and pretends he can’t understand. He may not talk but he's all there,” she said, pointing to her head so as to make the point.
Head still cocked, I smile wearily as my mind stumbles back to February 2016, and suddenly I am no longer in the nurse’s station, but a small, stuffy classroom, defiant laughter and wadded up paper bullets flying through the air. Over in the corner the class bully, a total of 5 tough-years-old, sets his empty juice box on the ground (only after inflating it with air) and, with an audience of three or four, jumps upon it with both feet so that it explodes like a bomb in my ears and causes me to swifty shift my gaze and face him. On the brink of addressing the situation with my limited Spanish, I grab his juice box off the floor and pull him aside, but then the students at the table behind my back begin a fist fight over the unequally distributed toys. In the midst of this, one of the smallest students, and the most frequently trampled during recess, comes up to me and says,
“Maya, tengo que ir al baño.” Accompanying kiddos to the bathroom is my responsibility, as I also have to portion out the toilet paper.
I’d like to say I managed to control the situation, but things only continued this way till the Profesora showed up and put everyone in their place.
They feared her and obeyed her.
They loved me and taunted me.
Defeated, I spilled out my sorrows to my quickly-becoming-best-friend Christy who, with a laugh, told me I needed to be stronger with them, raise my voice, not be afraid to use some force.
I had another person hand me a ruler, tell me to use it for rapping the student’s tables and making them listen. Others suggested a composition notebook, while still others would just have such a reputation as “mean” that they could walk in the classroom and make everyone freeze in place.
For a few days, I swayed in a state of indecision. Was I going to put on what for me was an angry facade, yell, raise my blood pressure and quiet their voices?
Ultimately, and for reasons that form several other blog posts, I chose that they would not always obey me, but they would always love me. So I never did carry around the ruler and instead I cuddled the chaos one frantic child at a time, till even the bully came around to hugging me one day.
Whiplash.
My brain matter hits the skull as it brakes back to the present moment. I’m still looking at Nurse A, still hearing her words, and thinking, “I don’t think so”. I thank her for report and begin the morning routine of assessments, medications, and problem-solving.
Stepping into Room 7, Lyle is pulling at his clothes, so I come over to his bedside and say,
“Good morning, Lyle. My name is Maryah and I’ll be your nurse today. Here, let me help you with your gown, we should try and keep it on for right now.”
No response.
“While we’re doing this, I am going to take a quick listen to your heart and your lungs, so hold still for a moment and then I’ll be done.”
Hand reaches out, grabs my stethoscope and my braid and yanks them both.
“Lyle, please don’t do that.”
He pushes me away.
Once my assessment is finally completed, it’s time to administer an IV medication.
“Lyle, this will be a little cold as I push it through,” but it takes a long time to even get my saline flush attached to the hub as he is swaying his arm back and forth, pushing me away, pulling off his clothes. I’m concerned that I’ll pull out the IV inadvertently, but I soon learn to go with the rhythm of his arm, administering the medication in a swinging motion, which surprisingly works. He still doesn’t like me though. I tell him I’ll leave him alone for a while, but I’ll be back in about an hour to check on him.
“If you need anything, here is your call bell.”
I walk out of the room and go to my next patient.
In and out of that room, I begin to gather different details from the family members that visit, gradually seeing a better picture of his life.
He'd been severely abused and neglected in a nursing home, by residents and staff alike.
There were other things which were better left unsaid.
About halfway through the day, I am in the room with him and he seems to be responding to me a little more, so I grab his hand and look him in the eyes.
“Lyle,” I begin, “I understand you haven’t always been treated like you deserve to be treated,” he looks at me with big eyes and then, right when I’m about to say,
“I’m sorry, and I’m here for you today to take care of you the best that I can,” he contorts his face and pushes me away with a cry.
I am surprised by the emotion that springs up within me, how I feel the depths of his hurt in that one little sob.
I’ll try again next time. So I collect my things and leave the room.
I think it was the MRI that did it. I had to take him down for the imaging and, explaining things to him the best that I could, he actually held still and cooperated. On our way back, I knew that things had changed between us when he held out his hand. This time though, it wasn’t to grab my steth, but to squeeze my hand. I squeezed back.
That was his peace offering.
From that point on, we laughed, we did vital signs, and we “talked” about what the doctor had to say. He listened intently. When it came time for me to go, I smoothed back his grey-white hair from his forehead and said,
“I am leaving now, and I won’t be back for a few days so I may not see you again,” his hand comes out to grab mine, but he won’t stop with that. Somehow he turns that whole functioning half of his into a hug, and lets my face be tickled with that soft hair, my back wrapped up with his good arm. He holds me there a few seconds.
Leaving the room, I knew I had learned something vitally important: there will be many people who will respond, who will eventually, with consistent kindness and gentleness, become your friend. Others will not have the capacity to do so. But still, you treat them with respect and kindness till the day you die, because you never know when they’ll reach out their hand and want to hug you.
Stay in an abusive relationship because you hope they’ll eventually change? That is not what I am talking about. Treating others with respect and kindness, as the fellow human-beings that they are? That is what I am talking about. I didn’t write this as a “look at what I did” kind of thing, neither is it to condemn the nurse before me. I understand we all handle things differently and have varied experiences as to how we respond to frustrating situations. I wrote this more as a “I don’t want to forget this” kind of thing, because I am aware that my heart is prone to wander, prone to lose sight of what is important, and prone to treat others with teaspoons of grace rather than the cups, pints, and quarts of grace that I have received.
In the school room I was so close to choosing anger. To choosing frustration. There are many areas in my life where I am still making that choice, still needing to calm myself and try and understand the other person.
So this is for nothing else but to remind my soul that there is reward in the joyful, patient enduring. And for that reason, I leave this here and pray it marks me deeply, that I may not forget.
Alongside of code status, cardiac rhythm, admission diagnosis, and which arm has IV access, I scribble down a rough outline of who my patient is, trying to piece together what they’ll be like when I walk in the room. Within 2 inches of paper on my report sheet I have notes of particularly important preferences or things that must be done for each patient, such as whether or not they take their pills whole or in applesauce, if they like to ambulate through the hallway, or if they’re scheduled for a stress test.
So today I am doing just that, taking report on my patients and gearing up to start my shift. With this specific patient, whom I will call Lyle, I jot down “Hits and pulls” while I listen to Nurse A give me her story of how the night went. I’m thinking about his inability to move half of his body due to a traumatic accident which left him paralyzed, wondering how these types of patients who only have the usage of one side always seem so strong (I’ve met other patients with paralysis or muscular aphasia who can whack a whole tree down with their good side), and then I hear Nurse A say something in particular, so I cock my head and look up from my report sheet.
“He’ll hit you and scratch at your face, so don’t be afraid to be really stern with him, you almost have to yell, ‘cause he knows everything you’re saying, but he defies you and pretends he can’t understand. He may not talk but he's all there,” she said, pointing to her head so as to make the point.
Head still cocked, I smile wearily as my mind stumbles back to February 2016, and suddenly I am no longer in the nurse’s station, but a small, stuffy classroom, defiant laughter and wadded up paper bullets flying through the air. Over in the corner the class bully, a total of 5 tough-years-old, sets his empty juice box on the ground (only after inflating it with air) and, with an audience of three or four, jumps upon it with both feet so that it explodes like a bomb in my ears and causes me to swifty shift my gaze and face him. On the brink of addressing the situation with my limited Spanish, I grab his juice box off the floor and pull him aside, but then the students at the table behind my back begin a fist fight over the unequally distributed toys. In the midst of this, one of the smallest students, and the most frequently trampled during recess, comes up to me and says,
“Maya, tengo que ir al baño.” Accompanying kiddos to the bathroom is my responsibility, as I also have to portion out the toilet paper.
I’d like to say I managed to control the situation, but things only continued this way till the Profesora showed up and put everyone in their place.
They feared her and obeyed her.
They loved me and taunted me.
Defeated, I spilled out my sorrows to my quickly-becoming-best-friend Christy who, with a laugh, told me I needed to be stronger with them, raise my voice, not be afraid to use some force.
I had another person hand me a ruler, tell me to use it for rapping the student’s tables and making them listen. Others suggested a composition notebook, while still others would just have such a reputation as “mean” that they could walk in the classroom and make everyone freeze in place.
For a few days, I swayed in a state of indecision. Was I going to put on what for me was an angry facade, yell, raise my blood pressure and quiet their voices?
Ultimately, and for reasons that form several other blog posts, I chose that they would not always obey me, but they would always love me. So I never did carry around the ruler and instead I cuddled the chaos one frantic child at a time, till even the bully came around to hugging me one day.
Whiplash.
My brain matter hits the skull as it brakes back to the present moment. I’m still looking at Nurse A, still hearing her words, and thinking, “I don’t think so”. I thank her for report and begin the morning routine of assessments, medications, and problem-solving.
Stepping into Room 7, Lyle is pulling at his clothes, so I come over to his bedside and say,
“Good morning, Lyle. My name is Maryah and I’ll be your nurse today. Here, let me help you with your gown, we should try and keep it on for right now.”
No response.
“While we’re doing this, I am going to take a quick listen to your heart and your lungs, so hold still for a moment and then I’ll be done.”
Hand reaches out, grabs my stethoscope and my braid and yanks them both.
“Lyle, please don’t do that.”
He pushes me away.
Once my assessment is finally completed, it’s time to administer an IV medication.
“Lyle, this will be a little cold as I push it through,” but it takes a long time to even get my saline flush attached to the hub as he is swaying his arm back and forth, pushing me away, pulling off his clothes. I’m concerned that I’ll pull out the IV inadvertently, but I soon learn to go with the rhythm of his arm, administering the medication in a swinging motion, which surprisingly works. He still doesn’t like me though. I tell him I’ll leave him alone for a while, but I’ll be back in about an hour to check on him.
“If you need anything, here is your call bell.”
I walk out of the room and go to my next patient.
In and out of that room, I begin to gather different details from the family members that visit, gradually seeing a better picture of his life.
He'd been severely abused and neglected in a nursing home, by residents and staff alike.
There were other things which were better left unsaid.
About halfway through the day, I am in the room with him and he seems to be responding to me a little more, so I grab his hand and look him in the eyes.
“Lyle,” I begin, “I understand you haven’t always been treated like you deserve to be treated,” he looks at me with big eyes and then, right when I’m about to say,
“I’m sorry, and I’m here for you today to take care of you the best that I can,” he contorts his face and pushes me away with a cry.
I am surprised by the emotion that springs up within me, how I feel the depths of his hurt in that one little sob.
I’ll try again next time. So I collect my things and leave the room.
I think it was the MRI that did it. I had to take him down for the imaging and, explaining things to him the best that I could, he actually held still and cooperated. On our way back, I knew that things had changed between us when he held out his hand. This time though, it wasn’t to grab my steth, but to squeeze my hand. I squeezed back.
That was his peace offering.
From that point on, we laughed, we did vital signs, and we “talked” about what the doctor had to say. He listened intently. When it came time for me to go, I smoothed back his grey-white hair from his forehead and said,
“I am leaving now, and I won’t be back for a few days so I may not see you again,” his hand comes out to grab mine, but he won’t stop with that. Somehow he turns that whole functioning half of his into a hug, and lets my face be tickled with that soft hair, my back wrapped up with his good arm. He holds me there a few seconds.
Leaving the room, I knew I had learned something vitally important: there will be many people who will respond, who will eventually, with consistent kindness and gentleness, become your friend. Others will not have the capacity to do so. But still, you treat them with respect and kindness till the day you die, because you never know when they’ll reach out their hand and want to hug you.
Stay in an abusive relationship because you hope they’ll eventually change? That is not what I am talking about. Treating others with respect and kindness, as the fellow human-beings that they are? That is what I am talking about. I didn’t write this as a “look at what I did” kind of thing, neither is it to condemn the nurse before me. I understand we all handle things differently and have varied experiences as to how we respond to frustrating situations. I wrote this more as a “I don’t want to forget this” kind of thing, because I am aware that my heart is prone to wander, prone to lose sight of what is important, and prone to treat others with teaspoons of grace rather than the cups, pints, and quarts of grace that I have received.
In the school room I was so close to choosing anger. To choosing frustration. There are many areas in my life where I am still making that choice, still needing to calm myself and try and understand the other person.
So this is for nothing else but to remind my soul that there is reward in the joyful, patient enduring. And for that reason, I leave this here and pray it marks me deeply, that I may not forget.
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