OF A NURSE EXTRAORDINAIRE!

I got to the hospital this morning at the ungodly hour of 0645 and found my patient sleeping peacefully. I was assigned this patient (or actually I chose this patient) the previous day when I heard she had a Upper GI Bleed. Not sure why, but GI bleeds interest me! Soo knowing this I was pumped for the day. I had all her meds researched the night before, omeprazole 20 mg OD PO, docusate sodium 100mg PO BID, Lactulose 30cc OD PO, metoprolol succinate 25mg PO BID...what class the drug came from, the reason the pt was getting it, side effects/contraindications, nursing considerations...i had it allllll down! what seemed like an impossible tasks a few weeks ago was nothing for this nurse extraordinaire. i even got to flush her saline lock. I'm starting to like this nursing business.
The family was also in visiting and were optimistic of having their mother return home in a couple of days...(i forgot to mention the patient is 99 years old)...but the Dr delivered very sad news that her condition is an "irreversible decline" and she will likely not make it until Monday. I was slightly surprised, and will not be surprised if she makes it past Monday. While she has irregularly irregular afibrillation in addition to her GIB in addition to old age, to me she doesn't look ready to die. she even drank Pepsi today! from a spoon, but still.




Something else today made me stop and think. One of my classmates had a pt today in a lot of pain and needed to be restrained b/c of aggressive behavior and his daughter who happens to be a Dr came in to visit and yelled at him for complaining about being in pain (or something of the sort...i wasn't in the room...), but my classmate found this very upsetting and had to leave the room and she cried and we talked about it and it made me start to wonder. I have never gotten to know any of my patients well enough to feel such emotion for them, and its not like I never cry, hell I even cried watching The Family Stone with SJP! I started to wonder if not getting emotionally involved is a bad thing? Maybe I've been listening and reading too many nursing stories of how nurses must be empathetic and caring and feeling and yadda yadda, but I feel that the care I provide is good. I put lotion my dying pt's back today and rubbed it and elevated her feet with pillows because they looked slightly red and she smiled when I talked to her, yet if she dies overnight or even on my shift tomorrow I think that will be OK. Maybe it is different b/c she is not in pain...and maybe it will be different when I do my Paediatric rotation in a few months...I'm not sure where I'm going with this, it just made me wonder how I can sometimes get so involved with my patients yet remain emotionally neutral, and whether or not that is a good thing....