What does it mean for me to be a risk taker?
Hmnnn...honestly, I would have never thought my career choice would have ever made me a risk taker. However, with the pandemic going on right now being a nurse is being a risktaker in a way. I am often nonchalant about things and take on a “it is what it is” attitude and do my job. Early on I did not grasp the magnitude of the situation and did not take it seriously like most of us. Now, every time you clock in your risking your life and that’s real. It actually is that serious and quite scary. It took one time of me rushing into a COVID+ patient’s room without proper PPE for me to realize that.
Okay, small anecdote time:
Some patients are just plain stubborn and put being comfortable over their life. Granted, oxygen masks are not the most comfortable, but they are very much necessary. As I am making rounds I see one of my patients oxygen saturation dropping into the FORTIES (Normal is 95-100%) !!!!!!!! I am losing my shit banging on the door for him to put his oxygen mask back on. Well, he didn’t and I ran in without my full PPE to put his oxygen mask on without a thought. It takes seconds for someone to die and the amount of time it takes to put on the overwhelming amount of PPE is too long.
It is instinctive for most healthcare workers to have a save mentality and put others before themselves, so during this time making sure you are safe first takes some practice and an experience like mine definitely got me together. After I decompressed and sat down I thought “Oh, shit ! That was not smart at all. I could be dead in a week.” I was SCARED and just prayed and prayed to make it through the next week without any symptoms.
Shout out to God and my immune system for allowing me to tell the story a month later.
People have thanked me for my service during this time and it still feels weird hearing it and I never know how to quite reply. But I know that I am happy to be healthy and able to take that risk clocking in each shift choosing to help someone during this time.