Sometimes people tease me about the enthusiasm I have for caritas nursing. Many people just do not understand how some nursing theory could get me so excited so I thought I would elaborate...I have been studying caritas for almost two years now and because of the heart work I have done I leave work invigorated and re-energized. Jean Watson talks about the importance of being present and that is something I am really trying to focus on. When I hear a monitor or an IV beep and enter the room I always shut the door quietly behind me. I than, make eye contact with the patient and the family members. I introduce myself (if I am not their nurse) and let them know why I am in their room. I take care of the monitor or flush the IV and try to connect with the patient or family members while I’m in there. I have been a nurse now for almost 7 years. I no longer have to focus on the task of flushing an IV or increasing a patient’s oxygen, now my primary task is making the connection with that person. I thrive on it. I leave the room knowing I’ve done more than tend to a noise I have (hopefully) provided a genuine connection and usually feel invigorated myself because in return the patient has provided me with a connection, filling my cup once again and leaving me hungry to do it again. It doesn’t take any longer yet it is so much more rewarding than just tending to the monitor. I have connected to the heart of what I do and it all started because I allowed myself to connect with my own heart. I desperately want to spread this to the people I care about, the nurses I see that have lost that sparkle they once had, the ones that are teetering on burn out. There is something we can do to breathe life back into our nursing practice! Something we can do to re-energize our careers and our lives and remind us why we followed the calling to be a nurse to begin with and that is something I simply can't get enough of!
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Presence
The phrase, “at one ment” to me means completely living in the present, living moment to moment and making the most of every single one. Being completely authentically present with yourself and others in every moment of everyday. One analogy I have for this is that of being in labor. I am hoping to have an intervention free labor with this baby and have been reading in preparation of doing so. One of the books I find especially inspiring is, “Birthing from Within” by Pam England and Rob Horowitz. In it they say, “…mothers aren’t at their births, they’re in their births: they’re in labor, in a trance, in their body, in pain, in joy! (pg. 50)” When you’re in labor the pain is unlike that of anything else and yet women do it, without the interference of medications and epidurals, every single day. The medical model teaches pregnant women about the phases and stages of labor from a medical perspective. The hospital birthing classes encourage mother’s to bring pillows and spend a little time on certain breathing techniques while the woman is comfortably snuggled up to her significant other relaxing on her pillow. Does anyone really think those relaxing moments spent in birth class will prepare a woman for the pain of childbirth? No way! Although, without anyone to tell her any different, the woman believes these are the tools that will help her bring her baby into the world. I know this because I believed it too. With my first son I took the labor classes and felt like I knew what to expect in labor, I held the ice cube and used the breathing techniques that they recommended and thought I had a pretty good understanding of how to ‘do it’. I also knew the medical interventions were just around the corner and were there for me to use if the pain was too great. I thought I had a pretty high pain tolerance so I wasn’t too worried. I also felt the medication would be safe (after spending more time dedicated to the procedure of an epidural than that of a water birth) I felt completely educated on the process and effects of medication in childbirth. However my son’s birth was a completely different story.
My water broke at 7pm, I was 40 weeks and 4 days pregnant and more than excited to get the party started (so to speak). I knew they wouldn’t let me eat once I was admitted to the hospital and with the excitement of my water breaking and getting the bags in the car I completely forgot to eat. By the time we arrived at the hospital I was ravenous. I quickly shoved a couple cookies in my mouth and headed, happily into the hospital. When I got there they explained that they had to check to make sure my water had broken. This check was performed with my hips awkwardly on a bed pan and no lubrication (because it would skew the results of the amniotic fluid testing). It was incredibly painful. I laid there, feeling completely exposed with searing pain as the resident shoved a speculum inside of me. Tears poured down my face as my husband looked on helplessly. Why didn’t they trust my account that my water had broken? Why did they need to subject me to this painful testing? No one had warned me about that in birth class.
Once it was confirmed that my water had indeed broken they started pitocin. I was contracting regularly but my progress was deemed insufficient for the hospital’s timeline and the medication was initiated. The contractions were like nothing I’ve ever experienced before but I was coping. The nurses continuously offered pain medication. While I was tolerating the pain thus far I thought to myself…if they want me to have it so badly they must think I’m not tolerating it well enough or the pain is going to become completely unbearable and they don’t think I’ll be able to handle it…I better take the drugs.
They gave me a medication called stadol. At first I was completely giddy, giggling and laughing. I completely lost all grip on reality, I didn’t know where I was or what I was doing. Then, suddenly, out of nowhere a contraction would come, a raging, tearing, pitocin contraction would rip right through my body. I was so out of touch, not even remembering I was in labor that the pain would completely blindside me. At one point I remember being on all fours on the floor near the foot of my bed. I was retching and throwing up and the pain literally felt like it was tearing me in half. At that moment I looked up into my husband’s scared eyes and told him that I was dying. I was completely convinced that this pain could only mean one thing and I was dying. It was absolutely terrifying. There was no nurse in sight.
Finally my husband begged the nurse for an epidural and before I knew it I was sitting on the edge of my bed. The contractions were ripping through my body yet the anesthesiologist told me to be still, be quiet and shoved my shoulders into a hunched position. My enlarged uterus made it nearly impossible to breathe and yet he was shoving my body over top of it leaving very little room for air exchange. The haze of the stadol was fading however now I felt like I was suffocating, unable to catch my breath because of the awkward position I was being forced into. He paid no attention to the monitor, did not look to see if I was contracting or not, just expected me to sit there quietly and hold my breath until he was done. He shoved the long needle into my back, I winced in pain, he pulled it out and without warning shoved it in again in a different spot. After several attempts he threw the entire tray and began to yell at me for not telling him that my spinal anatomy wasn’t ‘normal’ (something I’ve never been told in my life). Finally he placed the epidural but it was quickly discovered it wasn’t placed correctly, my left side was completely numb but my right side felt everything. The pain of the contraction was no longer distributed over my entire uterus but was concentrated into one small area on the right side of my body. It was horrible. Finally after several more painful adjustments the epidural left me completely paralyzed from the chest down. This was frightening in its own way; I remember laying there in the dark desperately wanting to turn over but being unable to even reach the call light. I wondered if I would stay this way forever.
Finally the doctor checked my cervix and told me I was completely dilated, it was time to push. I had no idea how to do it, I couldn’t feel a thing. I was worried my baby would never come out. At one point she rolled her eyes and asked the nurse to call her husband (from my bedside phone). The nurse dialed the number and said, “What would you like me to tell him?” The doctor said, in a completely frustrated and annoyed tone of voice, “Tell him I am stuck in the middle of a delivery and will be late getting home today.” This made me feel even worse. I pushed even harder, unaware of the sensations in my own body but trying desperately to please the doctor who had become so despondent with my progress. Then suddenly my door burst open, several medical students ushered into my room (without any consent from me), all with a view of my exposed perineum. One of them looked at me and said, “Cool! You’re having a baby!” and gave me a thumbs up. It was humiliating and only made me want to cover up, roll over and disappear.
Finally my son was born. He was very quiet, barely made a sound. He was pink at first but quickly became blue. His oxygen saturation was dropping. Within a half an hour he was rushed to the NICU. I laid in my hospital bed that night feeling as though I had failed. I failed myself, with my poor pain tolerance and weakness by needing pain medication and I failed my brand new baby boy. I could hear the newborns crying in the rooms next door and felt completely empty inside. My birth class didn’t prepare me for any of this.
How I wish someone would have told me labor and birth is hard work! It is painful but you can do it! I would have relished in that encouragement from the medical staff. I wish someone would have told me that there are side effects on the baby when systemic, opiod medications are used. I wish someone would have encouraged me to trust my body, to trust that it will tell me how to breathe and what positions are best to get the baby out safely. I wish someone would have told me to be present in my labor to take it one contraction at a time, one moment at a time. That is what at one ment means to me, to be completely present in the moment to make the most out of each breath and to trust your body, your soul, your consciousness.
I am hoping to translate this into my daily interactions. I like to tease that women are the best multi-taskers and maybe we are! But the truth of the matter is if we want to do something really well we need to completely focus on that task. I want my focus to be presence. There is such a difference between feeling like someone is really being present with you and when they're not. When I am talking to someone I can feel is distracted I find myself cutting it short, not even telling them what I truly want to because I can sense they're not listening to me anyhow. I want my patients (and peers! and family! and friends!) to feel as though I am completely listening to them, to offer them the opportunity to truly be heard. Who knows, maybe we unintentionally make patients feel this way so they cut their own conversation short and leave out important details regarding how they're feeling or new symptoms they've noticed because they get the sense we don't really care to hear them. Being authentically present with someone is more than just a touchy-feely idea it could be a critical tool in our assessment.
My water broke at 7pm, I was 40 weeks and 4 days pregnant and more than excited to get the party started (so to speak). I knew they wouldn’t let me eat once I was admitted to the hospital and with the excitement of my water breaking and getting the bags in the car I completely forgot to eat. By the time we arrived at the hospital I was ravenous. I quickly shoved a couple cookies in my mouth and headed, happily into the hospital. When I got there they explained that they had to check to make sure my water had broken. This check was performed with my hips awkwardly on a bed pan and no lubrication (because it would skew the results of the amniotic fluid testing). It was incredibly painful. I laid there, feeling completely exposed with searing pain as the resident shoved a speculum inside of me. Tears poured down my face as my husband looked on helplessly. Why didn’t they trust my account that my water had broken? Why did they need to subject me to this painful testing? No one had warned me about that in birth class.
Once it was confirmed that my water had indeed broken they started pitocin. I was contracting regularly but my progress was deemed insufficient for the hospital’s timeline and the medication was initiated. The contractions were like nothing I’ve ever experienced before but I was coping. The nurses continuously offered pain medication. While I was tolerating the pain thus far I thought to myself…if they want me to have it so badly they must think I’m not tolerating it well enough or the pain is going to become completely unbearable and they don’t think I’ll be able to handle it…I better take the drugs.
They gave me a medication called stadol. At first I was completely giddy, giggling and laughing. I completely lost all grip on reality, I didn’t know where I was or what I was doing. Then, suddenly, out of nowhere a contraction would come, a raging, tearing, pitocin contraction would rip right through my body. I was so out of touch, not even remembering I was in labor that the pain would completely blindside me. At one point I remember being on all fours on the floor near the foot of my bed. I was retching and throwing up and the pain literally felt like it was tearing me in half. At that moment I looked up into my husband’s scared eyes and told him that I was dying. I was completely convinced that this pain could only mean one thing and I was dying. It was absolutely terrifying. There was no nurse in sight.
Finally my husband begged the nurse for an epidural and before I knew it I was sitting on the edge of my bed. The contractions were ripping through my body yet the anesthesiologist told me to be still, be quiet and shoved my shoulders into a hunched position. My enlarged uterus made it nearly impossible to breathe and yet he was shoving my body over top of it leaving very little room for air exchange. The haze of the stadol was fading however now I felt like I was suffocating, unable to catch my breath because of the awkward position I was being forced into. He paid no attention to the monitor, did not look to see if I was contracting or not, just expected me to sit there quietly and hold my breath until he was done. He shoved the long needle into my back, I winced in pain, he pulled it out and without warning shoved it in again in a different spot. After several attempts he threw the entire tray and began to yell at me for not telling him that my spinal anatomy wasn’t ‘normal’ (something I’ve never been told in my life). Finally he placed the epidural but it was quickly discovered it wasn’t placed correctly, my left side was completely numb but my right side felt everything. The pain of the contraction was no longer distributed over my entire uterus but was concentrated into one small area on the right side of my body. It was horrible. Finally after several more painful adjustments the epidural left me completely paralyzed from the chest down. This was frightening in its own way; I remember laying there in the dark desperately wanting to turn over but being unable to even reach the call light. I wondered if I would stay this way forever.
Finally the doctor checked my cervix and told me I was completely dilated, it was time to push. I had no idea how to do it, I couldn’t feel a thing. I was worried my baby would never come out. At one point she rolled her eyes and asked the nurse to call her husband (from my bedside phone). The nurse dialed the number and said, “What would you like me to tell him?” The doctor said, in a completely frustrated and annoyed tone of voice, “Tell him I am stuck in the middle of a delivery and will be late getting home today.” This made me feel even worse. I pushed even harder, unaware of the sensations in my own body but trying desperately to please the doctor who had become so despondent with my progress. Then suddenly my door burst open, several medical students ushered into my room (without any consent from me), all with a view of my exposed perineum. One of them looked at me and said, “Cool! You’re having a baby!” and gave me a thumbs up. It was humiliating and only made me want to cover up, roll over and disappear.
Finally my son was born. He was very quiet, barely made a sound. He was pink at first but quickly became blue. His oxygen saturation was dropping. Within a half an hour he was rushed to the NICU. I laid in my hospital bed that night feeling as though I had failed. I failed myself, with my poor pain tolerance and weakness by needing pain medication and I failed my brand new baby boy. I could hear the newborns crying in the rooms next door and felt completely empty inside. My birth class didn’t prepare me for any of this.
How I wish someone would have told me labor and birth is hard work! It is painful but you can do it! I would have relished in that encouragement from the medical staff. I wish someone would have told me that there are side effects on the baby when systemic, opiod medications are used. I wish someone would have encouraged me to trust my body, to trust that it will tell me how to breathe and what positions are best to get the baby out safely. I wish someone would have told me to be present in my labor to take it one contraction at a time, one moment at a time. That is what at one ment means to me, to be completely present in the moment to make the most out of each breath and to trust your body, your soul, your consciousness.
I am hoping to translate this into my daily interactions. I like to tease that women are the best multi-taskers and maybe we are! But the truth of the matter is if we want to do something really well we need to completely focus on that task. I want my focus to be presence. There is such a difference between feeling like someone is really being present with you and when they're not. When I am talking to someone I can feel is distracted I find myself cutting it short, not even telling them what I truly want to because I can sense they're not listening to me anyhow. I want my patients (and peers! and family! and friends!) to feel as though I am completely listening to them, to offer them the opportunity to truly be heard. Who knows, maybe we unintentionally make patients feel this way so they cut their own conversation short and leave out important details regarding how they're feeling or new symptoms they've noticed because they get the sense we don't really care to hear them. Being authentically present with someone is more than just a touchy-feely idea it could be a critical tool in our assessment.
Consciousness
Oncology families are often in the hospital for long durations. The nurses get to know them at a very intimate level. Sometimes this can be a wonderful thing, other times it can be detrimental to both the family and the nurse. If a family gets a reputation for being a particularly “difficult” family this affects the treatment they get by staff and can be the start to a very vicious cycle.
We had a family on our unit for an extended period of time. The patient was dying and the family was not ready to accept that. Despite the pain that would result in pursuing treatment that doctors and nurses all felt was futile, the family pressed on. This created a very difficult emotional burden for the medical staff. The family was clearly under an immense amount of stress. They were continuously researching alternative cures, diets and therapies. They were constantly second guessing the interventions that were being offered and asking for additional therapies that were beyond the policies and procedures we have grown accustomed to. They were under a great deal of financial stress, refinancing their house to pay for medical helicopter rides to Mexico for alternative therapies. They were also under immense emotional stress, the panic of losing their only son, combined with the marital stressors of financial worries and very little time spent on their relationship added to the stress of trying to shield their daughter from the gravity of the situation was draining them completely.
The emotional stress had to be relieved somehow and it came to a head against the medical staff, particularly the nursing staff. The father of the patient demanded certain medications at very particular times, if nurses were one minute late in administering he would go completely ballistic. He would demand lab tests to be drawn or to speak with the physicians at inopportune times and when the nurse could not appease his demands instantaneously he became irate. It was a completely exhausting situation. Many of the nurses that were a part of this patient’s care team eventually burned out and requested a break. This would leave nurses who did not know this patient or family at all responsible for his care with very little background or knowledge on how to cope with this family.
One morning I was assigned to this patient. Upon seeing his name underneath mine I felt the anxiety rising. The patient was extremely complex physically but it was the social aspect that had me completely petrified. I went into the patient’s room for my first assessment completely nervous, feeling as though I didn’t know where to place my hands despite my nursing experience. Upon speaking with the patient however my feelings of anxiety melted away. The child was amazing, he was brilliant and kind and so full of joy. Before I knew it my guard was down completely and I felt myself actually enjoying being his nurse. I received a phone call around 9am that morning, it was his father and he would be coming into the hospital within the hour. He made several demands for interventions that would be made available upon his arrival. I felt the anxiety creeping back into my soul. I allowed myself some time to investigate these feelings. I placed myself in the patient’s shoes, a young man just desperate to live, someone who is trusting his parents are making the best decisions for him and yet feels the discord among the hospital staff and the people he loves most in this world. I than placed myself in his father’s shoes, imagining (as best I could) the emotional trauma of watching your precious son’s life flickering out before your very eyes. I found a new place of compassion and a new line of thinking in which to approach this family, a new filter in which I could see their emotions, their demands and unique needs through. I entered the room with a new perspective and hope on how the day could unfold. The rest of the day went seamlessly. The patient’s pain and nausea were well controlled and his father actually had a sense of peace about him. We had several caring moments together and I left the hospital that evening feeling renewed.
I absolutely feel you can change your consciousness by your thoughts and intentions. I feel that we are easily brought to a lower frequency by those around us unless we make a conscious decision and effort to choose the higher frequency. I also know it is a lot harder to maintain the higher frequency than it is to fall (unconsciously) into the lower frequency of negativity of those around us. I know this is a choice, a conscious choice that must be made and renewed frequently in order to maintain the higher frequency. We can’t allow the preconceived emotions and interpretations of others to be influencing our own consciousness we must enter a situation with the consciousness to be the light and treat the situation as such.
We had a family on our unit for an extended period of time. The patient was dying and the family was not ready to accept that. Despite the pain that would result in pursuing treatment that doctors and nurses all felt was futile, the family pressed on. This created a very difficult emotional burden for the medical staff. The family was clearly under an immense amount of stress. They were continuously researching alternative cures, diets and therapies. They were constantly second guessing the interventions that were being offered and asking for additional therapies that were beyond the policies and procedures we have grown accustomed to. They were under a great deal of financial stress, refinancing their house to pay for medical helicopter rides to Mexico for alternative therapies. They were also under immense emotional stress, the panic of losing their only son, combined with the marital stressors of financial worries and very little time spent on their relationship added to the stress of trying to shield their daughter from the gravity of the situation was draining them completely.
The emotional stress had to be relieved somehow and it came to a head against the medical staff, particularly the nursing staff. The father of the patient demanded certain medications at very particular times, if nurses were one minute late in administering he would go completely ballistic. He would demand lab tests to be drawn or to speak with the physicians at inopportune times and when the nurse could not appease his demands instantaneously he became irate. It was a completely exhausting situation. Many of the nurses that were a part of this patient’s care team eventually burned out and requested a break. This would leave nurses who did not know this patient or family at all responsible for his care with very little background or knowledge on how to cope with this family.
One morning I was assigned to this patient. Upon seeing his name underneath mine I felt the anxiety rising. The patient was extremely complex physically but it was the social aspect that had me completely petrified. I went into the patient’s room for my first assessment completely nervous, feeling as though I didn’t know where to place my hands despite my nursing experience. Upon speaking with the patient however my feelings of anxiety melted away. The child was amazing, he was brilliant and kind and so full of joy. Before I knew it my guard was down completely and I felt myself actually enjoying being his nurse. I received a phone call around 9am that morning, it was his father and he would be coming into the hospital within the hour. He made several demands for interventions that would be made available upon his arrival. I felt the anxiety creeping back into my soul. I allowed myself some time to investigate these feelings. I placed myself in the patient’s shoes, a young man just desperate to live, someone who is trusting his parents are making the best decisions for him and yet feels the discord among the hospital staff and the people he loves most in this world. I than placed myself in his father’s shoes, imagining (as best I could) the emotional trauma of watching your precious son’s life flickering out before your very eyes. I found a new place of compassion and a new line of thinking in which to approach this family, a new filter in which I could see their emotions, their demands and unique needs through. I entered the room with a new perspective and hope on how the day could unfold. The rest of the day went seamlessly. The patient’s pain and nausea were well controlled and his father actually had a sense of peace about him. We had several caring moments together and I left the hospital that evening feeling renewed.
I absolutely feel you can change your consciousness by your thoughts and intentions. I feel that we are easily brought to a lower frequency by those around us unless we make a conscious decision and effort to choose the higher frequency. I also know it is a lot harder to maintain the higher frequency than it is to fall (unconsciously) into the lower frequency of negativity of those around us. I know this is a choice, a conscious choice that must be made and renewed frequently in order to maintain the higher frequency. We can’t allow the preconceived emotions and interpretations of others to be influencing our own consciousness we must enter a situation with the consciousness to be the light and treat the situation as such.
Work Horse
"I am almost sitting on my body as if I were a horseman riding on a horse. I beat it or praise it, I feed it and clean it and nurse it when neccessary. I urge it on without consulting it and I hold it back against it's will. When my body-horse is well behaved I generally ignore it, but when it gets unruly - which is all too often - I pull out the whip to beat it back into reasonable submission...I no longer approach the world with my body but on my body...My consciousness is almost exclusively head consciousness - I am head, but I own my body. The body is reduced from self to property, something which is 'mine' but not 'me'."
Wilber 1981, p. 106
I really love this quote. We beat our own bodies into submission; we treat the body as though it’s our own but don’t view it as a part of ourselves. This reminds me a lot of the biblical perspective, that our body is a temple for God and we should treat it as such. We are clearly facing an epidemic of obesity here in the United States, yet instead of asking our bodies how we can resolve this or how they would like to be treated, instead of listening to cues about what makes our bodies feel good and energized (i.e.: healthy fresh foods, exercise) we simply feed them junk and wash it down with diet pills hoping to “whip it back into submission.”
Frequently I feel as though I do this to my own body. When I am at the gym and doing a self driven workout I will often push myself to the point beyond exhaustion, I’ve even pushed myself to the point of passing out or getting sick. I want to make sure I am getting the most out of my workout and never stop to check with my body and see how the workout is affecting it. It’s as though I am working out on my body instead of with it. I can contrast this with attending a yoga class, while I am often pushed to my physical limits the instructor is there to frequently remind me not to push myself beyond what my body is ready to do that day, to listen to the physical cues my body is trying to send and respect that. Upon completion of a yoga workout I feel myself refreshed and yet physically exhausted and so very proud of the things my body was able to accomplish, compared to that of a self driven workout in which I feel as though I come up short, questioning if I worked hard enough. I don’t know why it is so hard for me to be sensitive to my own body when it comes so easily for me to be sensitive to that of another’s.
When I am in my care giving role, whether that is as a mother, a wife or a nurse, I am very aware of the entire embodied spirit. As I’m tucking my children in at night I don’t only make sure they’re wearing pajamas that are warm or cool enough, I ensure the blankets are straight and of the right thickness to get through the night. I smooth out the sheets beneath them and untwist their clothing so they will be comfortable, if they have a cough or runny nose I put some Vicks cream on their chest and feet. We say prayers and I ask them if they would like me to sing a song to them. I make sure they have just enough white noise to help them sleep. I attend to their physical needs but do it from the most loving place in my heart; I am also attending to their spiritual needs as well. It is a very comforting ritual for all of us.
When I am attending to my patients I make every attempt to do the same. I do not place a stethoscope on their bodies until I have established a sense of trust with them, I make sure to enter the space with my heart open so I can be listening (on all levels both physically and metaphysically) to the individual needs they may have. If I move a blanket to perform a medical task I do not leave the room until I’ve replaced it. I touch their bodies in ways that are not just completing my medical tasks but in ways to offer reassurance, gently squeezing a hand or placing my hand on their shoulder before inserting a thermometer in their ear. I try to discuss things beyond the medical diagnosis, beyond the hospital, I try to get the know them. I closely monitor not only their heart rate and other vital signs but the expression on their face, the white in their knuckles, the position of their legs to get an indicator of how their body is responding to my touch, my interventions. I feel a deep connection with that patient and leave the room feeling restored myself, knowing my actions came from love and feel completely invigorated when I know the patient understands my intentions as well. I truly feel I am able to see my patients and their families as entire beings, as embodied spirits. I don’t know why it is such a struggle for me to see myself in that same light.
Wilber 1981, p. 106
I really love this quote. We beat our own bodies into submission; we treat the body as though it’s our own but don’t view it as a part of ourselves. This reminds me a lot of the biblical perspective, that our body is a temple for God and we should treat it as such. We are clearly facing an epidemic of obesity here in the United States, yet instead of asking our bodies how we can resolve this or how they would like to be treated, instead of listening to cues about what makes our bodies feel good and energized (i.e.: healthy fresh foods, exercise) we simply feed them junk and wash it down with diet pills hoping to “whip it back into submission.”
Frequently I feel as though I do this to my own body. When I am at the gym and doing a self driven workout I will often push myself to the point beyond exhaustion, I’ve even pushed myself to the point of passing out or getting sick. I want to make sure I am getting the most out of my workout and never stop to check with my body and see how the workout is affecting it. It’s as though I am working out on my body instead of with it. I can contrast this with attending a yoga class, while I am often pushed to my physical limits the instructor is there to frequently remind me not to push myself beyond what my body is ready to do that day, to listen to the physical cues my body is trying to send and respect that. Upon completion of a yoga workout I feel myself refreshed and yet physically exhausted and so very proud of the things my body was able to accomplish, compared to that of a self driven workout in which I feel as though I come up short, questioning if I worked hard enough. I don’t know why it is so hard for me to be sensitive to my own body when it comes so easily for me to be sensitive to that of another’s.
When I am in my care giving role, whether that is as a mother, a wife or a nurse, I am very aware of the entire embodied spirit. As I’m tucking my children in at night I don’t only make sure they’re wearing pajamas that are warm or cool enough, I ensure the blankets are straight and of the right thickness to get through the night. I smooth out the sheets beneath them and untwist their clothing so they will be comfortable, if they have a cough or runny nose I put some Vicks cream on their chest and feet. We say prayers and I ask them if they would like me to sing a song to them. I make sure they have just enough white noise to help them sleep. I attend to their physical needs but do it from the most loving place in my heart; I am also attending to their spiritual needs as well. It is a very comforting ritual for all of us.
When I am attending to my patients I make every attempt to do the same. I do not place a stethoscope on their bodies until I have established a sense of trust with them, I make sure to enter the space with my heart open so I can be listening (on all levels both physically and metaphysically) to the individual needs they may have. If I move a blanket to perform a medical task I do not leave the room until I’ve replaced it. I touch their bodies in ways that are not just completing my medical tasks but in ways to offer reassurance, gently squeezing a hand or placing my hand on their shoulder before inserting a thermometer in their ear. I try to discuss things beyond the medical diagnosis, beyond the hospital, I try to get the know them. I closely monitor not only their heart rate and other vital signs but the expression on their face, the white in their knuckles, the position of their legs to get an indicator of how their body is responding to my touch, my interventions. I feel a deep connection with that patient and leave the room feeling restored myself, knowing my actions came from love and feel completely invigorated when I know the patient understands my intentions as well. I truly feel I am able to see my patients and their families as entire beings, as embodied spirits. I don’t know why it is such a struggle for me to see myself in that same light.
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