• Why Your Imperfections Make You Perfect

    I’m now taking watercolor classes, struggling to create something that I can be proud of but mostly learning how to be humble and not compare myself with my fellow classmates. As hard as I try to enjoy the journey and not focus on the end result, I still strive to have my finished product an…

  •  I Am Grateful to the Nurses

    In 2013 I toured the new intensive care units back at the hospital where I volunteer. At the time I was acutely aware how outdated my nursing skills were and realized that I wouldn’t even be safe to flip on a light switch. The state-of-the-art machines were daunting. I never thought that three years later…

  • Patients Change Us: A Formative Nursing Experience — Off the Charts

    From boliston, via Flickr Many years ago, I was given the greatest gift by a patient who had no idea he would change my life and define my professional outlook as a nurse. While not every nurse will be fortunate enough to have such an explicit experience of the effect of the care they provide… via…

  • The Surreal Hospital Experience

    My husband was discharged from the hospital following two heart valve replacements, and a week later was readmitted with a side effect of the surgery that occurs ten percent of the time. He was taken to his room directly from the ER. I hadn’t the foresight to bring along my coloring book and pencils—mindless relaxing…

  • Hearing Zebras

    Zebra is the American medical slang for arriving at an exotic medical diagnosis when a more commonplace explanation is more likely.[1] It is shorthand for the aphorism coined in the late 1940s by Dr. Theodore Woodward, professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, who instructed his medical interns: “When you hear hoofbeats, think…

  • THE TIME IS RIGHT

    Originally posted on Getting Older: Charting the Uncharted: A friend deliberated whether she should visit her father for his 95th birthday. She was swamped with commitments. Since he was unaware of his birthday as well of his surroundings and didn’t even recognize his three daughters, there was no urgency to travel to another state. However,…