30 Second Dance Party

This is graphic. Parts will be hard to read. I write it because it's real, and I need to get it out. There are many of you who will understand all too well. Read if you like, I understand if you can't or don't want to. It's okay. Remember a while ago when I talked about the "reset button" after a grueling code in the ER?  This is another of those moments.

There is a patient I had a while back that continues to visit my thoughts on a frequent basis. She was 15 years old. She had been found by a dumpster minimally responsive. She had been left there by a man who had paid for her services and had no further use for her. She was intoxicated and high on several illicit drugs. In the brief time the police officers were on scene they answered three different phone calls from her John inquiring as to when she'd be ready to go out again. She came to the ER alone, unconscious, and cold. Among other life saving treatment, a catheter was used to get a urine sample in order to quickly tell what drugs were in her system. There were over-use injuries noted that are unspeakable. And she was fifteen. And she was drunk and high and homeless and a prostitute and fifteen. Our social worker was put on the task of locating a family member, guardian, or someone responsible for the child. A friend was eventually located who shed some light to the fact that the child had been living this lifestyle for two years, had run away from home, and that her mother was in the same line of employment.  She eventually sobered and warmed up. When she was awake, she wasn't scared. She wasn't upset that she was in the ER alone and hooked up to all sorts of cords and wires. It wasn't her first rodeo. When she was ready to be discharged she was belligerent. And she was fifteen. And there-in lies the true tragedy.

I see hard things. I see people die that shouldn't. I see people be kept alive in ways that I consider tortuous, treated by family members in ways worse than you'd treat a dog. I've saved people that have been stabbed, shot, raped; and I've taken care of people who have not survived these occurrences. I work every day as part of an amazing team, and we've all seen tough things. This one case, more than any I've been a part of stuck with me. It made it really hard for me to go to work for a long time. I kept telling people that I needed to live in a world where 15 year-olds weren't homeless alcoholic strung-out prostitutes. I needed to live in a world where that doesn't exist, where I can blind myself with rose-colored glasses to life's harsh reality.  I thought seriously about finding a new field of nursing to work in. I first thought babies. But I realized when you work in the NICU you sometimes have to deal with parents who don't deserve to be parents, with babies who suffer and will die through no fault of their own. I thought about doing pediatrics, but I know I couldn't handle seeing child abuse cases any more than I already do. I thought about every single avenue of nursing out there, and they all have their downfalls. It was a really bleak way to look at life. But I'm still at it. Still in the emergency department. Do you know why?

Tonight there was a moment on Grey's Anatomy where Meredith was finally able to locate the source of bleeding in a critical patient in surgery. She clamped the blood vessel and asked the interns in the room if anyone knew what to do next. The answer she gave them was "30 second dance party" and there, in the OR, they took 30 seconds to have a little dance party.  That's why I'm still where I am. That's why there's nurses that are still where I am after fifty years. That's why there's nurses that go back to work even after having to carry premature neonates down nine flights of stairs while bagging them during a hurricane-induced power outage and generator failure.  I saw three of those nurses a few days later being interviewed on TV a few days later, and they were asked how they were able to appear so calm in the face of so much chaos. They all three smiled and gave some form of the answer, you do what you have to do. The truth is, that's what we're trained for. That. Is. What. We. Do.

That is why I'm still here. Because of the 30 second dance parties after your septic patient finally has a blood pressure in the 70's. After the pulmonary fibrosis patient is finally able to be intubated on the seventh try because of scarring. After the gun shot wound to the chest and the eviscerated stab wound to the abdomen make it successfully to surgery. After the patient on every medication drip known to pharmacy stabilizes enough to be moved to the ICU. After the patient moves a hand after being given clot-busting medication following a paralyzing stroke. I'm here because of the baby who smiles and blows bubbles at you when they feel better. I'm here for the veteran's thanks for a job well done, when it is I that owe him more thanks than can be expressed. I'm here because sometimes, things go right. And when they do, there is ALWAYS a 30 second happy-dance party. Sometimes physically, but at the very least in my head. I'm here because I'm a member of a team that makes miracles happen. Yes, there are hard days. And there will be many more days, many more patients that will make me question if I have the stamina to do it again. Those patients really do take everything out of you. Everything. But I come back every day, because every day there are victories no matter how small. And no victory is too small for a 30 second dance party.