Yesterday, I cried for the first time at work. An irate family yelled at me and made a scene on the unit. And for whatever reason, I took it personally.
As I helped make sure that my patient in another room took their morning medication safely, out of the corner of my eye I see this particular person come in with their other family members and I hear her yell, “I want to speak to the nurse.” I couldn’t come out of the room at that particular moment, and so I peek my head out of the corner of my other patient’s room because I could sense she was upset/anxious and yell, I’ll be there in a moment, I’m helping another patient right now. Not even thirty seconds later, I hear her yell again, “Where is the nurse? I WANT TO SEE THE NURSE NOW.”
Without trying to make my other patient feel any less important, I tell them to not feel rushed – that I would stay in the room until he finished his medication and that I help him with whatever else he needed at that moment. At the same time – not even another ten seconds later, I hear this family member storm out of the room and walk up to the nurse’s station, aggressively asking to speak to the charge nurse.
I walk after her and lead her back to the room where she explodes. She accused me of neglecting her mother. She said that I had been so busy – that she had never seen me in the room taking care of her mother. Her mother was confused and babbling numbers, hallucinating and seeing things… (which is most likely delirium related to a lengthy hospital stay – which also has no intervention other than reorientation and patient safety measures). She says that I can’t do my job and that clearly I’m too busy to take care of her mother. She demanded that her mother be transferred to ICU immediately. She even said that she had stayed with her mother in the ICU the entire time, and that she was “sorry” that she couldn’t stay here too and do the same so that she could “help us out”.
This entire time that she is exploding, my blood starts boiling. You see, it’s true – I WAS really busy. I had a patient in the previous day who was throwing up blood, undergoing a post-op hematoma complication and another with their blood pressure in the 180’s, altered mentation, and a growing distended stomach – she had to be upgraded to ICU. Another who was being prepped for cardiac catheterization, only to find out that she actually needs open heart surgery and was extremely anxious. And in between running around, calling doctors, answering phones, answering questions and making sure everyone was okay despite their instability and urgency – I actually was checking in on this patient. Repositioning her. Putting her leads back on when she kept pulling it off every 15 minutes. Putting her gown back on when she exposing her self. Redirecting her and saying hi to her. Making sure she was clean. Making sure that her wound dressing was changed. Giving her sips of water to drink every hour, offering her a choice between the apple juice, orange juice, and lemon water. Making sure her orders were perfect so that she could be transferred out to rehab on Monday….
As she continued to wag her finger at me and the charge nurse – I butt in and say my piece – that I am taking care of her – that because this patient is the way that they are, I am that much more vigilant to come in and check on her… and that’s all I could say before running out of the room and crying in the stairwell.
There was so much more that I wanted to say, and I guess that’s one reason why I was that much more frustrated and emotional. She doesn’t even know 1% of the things I do for her mother. She has no clue. She is here for an hour at a time and leaves. I can’t talk back to her because it’s unprofessional. I have to take it and apologize… When I have nothing to apologize for except that there is only one one of me.
This is what is wrong with healthcare and nursing. As a caregiver, it is an expectation that we are there for family and patients in their most vulnerable and difficult times in life. I whole-heartedly accept that as a part of my job and embrace it as a privilege I have to be that person for these people in their times of need. I have held hands of patients dying. I have sat in a room with family members as they cried. I have given explanations and education five different ways to the same family members so that each person understood what was going on. I have calmed down family members who were verbally abusive towards staff and other family members… I have done all of that in one twelve hour shift.
But… there is only so much that I can do. I am a self-proclaimed superhero in scrubs, but I’m not perfect. This moment – it re-opened up a lot of wounds that I’ve tended to over the years and the frustration I have with myself and people who are less empathetic and are more ignorant leaves me so discouraged. People like this, it’s why young nurses leave bedside. People like this, it’s why people are so quick to say, “I could never do what you do.”
Today I am grieving and recovering. It still makes me tear up to think about everything this family said to me. I hope she is never on the receiving end of those sharp words.