Why I do it

A lot of people have this reaction when they find out what I do for a living:

"Wow, isn't that depressing?". Even if they don't say that, the look on their face usually speaks for itself. Its similar to when someone bites into a lime, or has just witnessed a guy getting kicked in the groin.

I often talk about this fact with other nurses (like last night) about how many people don't understand how actually blessed I am to do what I do. I finally have come up with some better answers for why that is:

Yes, the job can be hard. When a young woman with small children and a loving husband finds out she has incurable disease; that's the hard stuff. When you see an agressive form of lung cancer rapidly take a sweet older gentleman and the stress tears apart the relationship he has with his daughter; THAT is hard. Then there's the woman I once treated who was pregnant when going through her breast cancer treatment and went on to deliver a healthy baby. When I find out her cancer came back and took her life when her baby was only 7 months old...that forced me to sit back, grieve for her family, and take a moment to ask myself, "Wow, how DO I handle working in this field?".

The answer is always the same. The most obvious answer to me, is that these events would happen whether or not I worked with these people. Even if I wasn't their nurse, I would still read about it in the paper or from a friend who's family is going through a loss. But I actually get to be in these people's lives. The woman with small children and a loving husband? I got to hold her hand through her first treatment, and have her thank me and tell me that I "made this easier" for her. The old man who's daughter was so upset that she walked out and left him there by himself? I got to sit with him while he waited for his ride so that he wouldn't be alone.

In this field you have to think: We have the facts. What is the goal? What do we want the outcome to be? Is the goal a cure? If that is the attainable goal, then I get to help cure a person's life threatening disease! The other day I called a 28 year old man who I had helped treat for Hodgkin's lymphoma 2 years ago. I was calling him to tell him his scan was clear and he was still disease free. Without treatment, his disease would have taken his life.

Let's say the cancer is advanced, and the person has 1-2 years at best, as long as they are on chemotherapy. Well, I get to help this person have 1-2 more years, and I also get to help make sure that those are 1-2 GOOD years, or at last mostly good. Even if the person is only expected to live 6 months, we can help give them more time, and even make them more comfortable. For some families, a few more months could be a blessing. I'm not going to lie, it doesn't always turn out this way. Those last months can be difficult. I witnessed this in my own family, and know that many close friends have witnessed it as well. So I don't want to sugar-coat cancer by any means. But I am required to hang on to the success stories, and see the good that comes out of these sitations.

We also treat patients on clinical trials at our clinic. I believe that every day, we are working on getting closer to finding the cure. 50 years ago, we couldn't cure people like we do now. So just imagine where we will be in another 50 years?

Okay, I have digressed and rambled, and rambled some more. But hopefully I have shed some light on why I do what I do, and why I think my job is more rewarding and joyous than people realize.