Hidden Fears

The reason for the long absence is this: I have been precepting a new nurse (by new I mean super new, just graduated and knows very little about being an excellent nurse, new). She is with me for a total of eight weeks, she started out with one patient the first week, and we have added one patient per week so now she takes the 4-6 patients we have per shift.

It's really neat to have watched her grow over the past six weeks that I've been teaching her, and learning some things along the way. She made me remember what it's like to be new at this, how hard it can be, how you constantly doubt yourself and feel inadequate, how you cry a lot from the stress, how you have hundreds of questions to ask. Her confidence has definitely grown over the last six weeks, and I do see some ways that we alike. She's compassionate, passive, sweet, and she makes a great RN because she genuinely cares for her patients. It is not just a job, this was a dream come true, and though it may not be the specialty she wants for later in life, for now, this will due.

I love precepting, and it's pretty nice to get to sit back and relax more at work since she has all our patients, but I miss getting close with my patients. I do still interact with her patient load because she is still learning and has a lot of questions and new experiences, but I haven't had that closeness with a patient in quite awhile. I really look forward to having that back when I start work on the oncology floor next month. Less than four weeks left! Wow, how exciting.

Having free time at work has allowed me to read more, and I bring my books with me to each shift. While reading the last book, the author was speaking about his own life when I realized why I sometimes feel anxious when I think about the future: I fear stasis. I don't want to live in the same house in the same town or state for the rest of my life, I don't want to be stagnant, I don't want to work in the same specialty for my whole life, or stay in the same role. I want to experience so much of life, I want to travel the world, I want to live in different places through the years, I want to accomplish goals that I didn't think were possible, I want to join the Peace Corps with Tim someday, and I want to advance in my career. I also have the dream of going back to school for my Bachelors of Zoology degree.

As much as I fear aspects of my life never changing, there are certainly aspects that I never want to change. I would never want to change the man I am going to marry, I want to be married for the next sixty-seventy years, I always want my family to be living, I want to have the same three of four best friends, and I want to have the same dog. I realize not all these are plausible, but it is comforting to me that I do not fear these things staying the same for the rest of my time on earth.