Monday, January 20, 2014

Drugs are bad, kids.

Scene: Young woman comes in after a near-respiratory arrest following a night of fancy heroin indulgence. A dose of narcan brought her back to the land of the breathing.

Coworker: Ma'am, were you trying to hurt yourself tonight?
Patient: Fuck no, I got a little kid at home to think about!

We moved her into the hallway once it became clear she was going to be just fine, to watch her before she could go back to her little bundle of joy at the house. She was ever so grateful to be alive and kept loudly shouting out how happy she was to be in the ER, and how thankful she was to have met us. She came up with nice pet names for us all and even composed little ditties about how sweet we were. It was a serenade of kindness, let me tell you.

***
 As I was leaving the next morning the charge nurse brought a note into the break room, which had been found on a set of discharge papers.





This came from the girl next to the heroin overdose. Proof that there are, in fact, good people in the world. And that sometimes they come into the ER.


4 comments:

Stephen said...

Hi, nice blog Really very interesting post shared above. Awaiting for more posts like this.

Lauren K. said...

Interesting blog and what a true post! It's those moments that make us remember why we are in this career right??

ownuprojas said...

I like your outlook on things! It must be difficult to work in the ER and deal with so many personalities and issues in such a short time.
That note that you received from that patient is one of the reasons we go into nursing. They have a way of grounding us and reminding us of why we do what we do!

Carolyn said...

Okay I lol-ed.