Caring Lessons Now #6
In Chicago today, it’s important to be Irish. We’ll leave soon to watch the greening of the Chicago River. The streets below my study window are filling with dots of green T-shirted people.
At the same time, people close to me are dealing with severe illnesses. Recently, a recipient of supposedly the best health care in America, told me an x-ray tech had said, “If you’re going to faint, I’m not doing you. My job is on the line if I don’t get good pictures.”
Not a good scene. When a patient is anxious, which is most of us undergoing new procedures, we don’t need to feel like we’re responsible for our technician’s job. After this tech walked out a second time, increasing this patient’s anxiety even more, a tech came in who gently and quietly said, “Everything’s going to be alright. I’ll going to go slowly and walk you through this. Now breathe in…”
The procedure took two hours instead of fifteen minutes, but the technician recognized and responded to the patient’s needs and protected her dignity.
Full of thoughts about persons suffering at this time, I awoke this morning to this blog post about people’s use (and misuse) of the word God. And then I landed on the final thought that Micah 6:8 says, “…And what does God require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”
I think the second tech understood this text. Far fetched? I don’t think so.
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Well said Lois. Acts of kindness such as the second technician showed will not only be comforting to the one receiving it, I believe it spreads a blanket of kindness everywhere. We all need to be kind to one another no matte the situation, not just to those in need, but those who are standing in line with us, driving, selling us products, serving us dinner, and of course, the most important of all — US!!!
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Thanks, Sandy. It gets my ire up every time I hear this kind of story. So unnecessary.
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Excellent post Lois. I agree that kindness should be an important part of our lives and interactions with each other. Thanks
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Thanks, Sharon. Yes, it should be second nature, and I hold health care professionals to an even higher standard.
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Just the other day my manager and I were talking about what it takes to get hired for our OR nurse residency program. She was saying she is discouraged of late by how many new nurses come across in interviews as only being interested in the science of nursing, not the humanity. For me, I chose this change of profession because I wanted to do something that meant something to other people. I feel like my best days at work are when I hold a hand. It’s a lot harder to offer comfort than to program a machine.
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Jennifer, You are so right. I tried to infuse the importance of the therapeutic relationship into my students that you have. Thanks for writing! Also, when I was teaching a concepts course to beginning sophomores, they gave personal examples of experiences they’d had in how NOT to be a nurse. It was disheartening, big time, but informative. We could easily see how we didn’t want to be. And should NOT be. Your manager is lucky to have you.
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