This summer, I had the unique experience of switching my nurse hat from PICU nurse to volunteer camp nurse for a 5-day sleepaway camp for foster kids through my church and Royal Family Kids Camp. For 5 days, 42 volunteers staffed a camp for 28 foster kids, ages 6-12, to give them a week where … Continue reading From PICU Nurse to Foster Camp Nurse: A Reflection
Christian nursing
No Ordinary Sunday
The readjusting back and forth between intensely challenging nursing shifts and everyday normal life is a real thing to navigate. It still catches me by surprise every time, how hard it really is. I am in the thick of a full 12+ hours of trying to manage chaos and logistics in a unit full … Continue reading No Ordinary Sunday
On Being a Christian Mother and a Pediatric ICU Nurse
There may be no greater revealers of my deepest wrestling with my humanity than the roles of both a mother and a pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) nurse. Everyone says becoming a parent changes you, and it does, in countless indescribable ways. Every healthcare professional says being close to sickness and death changes you, and … Continue reading On Being a Christian Mother and a Pediatric ICU Nurse
The Inner Stretch of Nursing: Guest Post for American Journal of Nursing
Nursing has a way of challenging - and sometimes flat out messing with - your perspective on life. So many Sundays, I've gone to church and started singing about truths I know to be foundational - God is good, mercy and hope are real, comfort is near. I have seen and experienced all of these … Continue reading The Inner Stretch of Nursing: Guest Post for American Journal of Nursing
The Messy Untangling: On Sorting Through the Hard Feelings after a Rough Shift
Today, I’m feeling it. The untangling after a particularly intense shift on all levels. I walked into a shift with a family whose child had taken a big turn for the worse and they had no guarantees that moving forward with certain procedures and therapies would turn things around for the better. We could only … Continue reading The Messy Untangling: On Sorting Through the Hard Feelings after a Rough Shift
When Wine and Pedicures Aren’t Enough: Deeper Level Coping as a Christian Nurse
Recently, I have been meeting some soon-to-be-brand-new nurses who have wanted to hear from me about how I cope with the hardest things I see as a nurse. It is a deep and necessary question every nurse has to work through if you want to truly open your heart to the reality of others’ suffering … Continue reading When Wine and Pedicures Aren’t Enough: Deeper Level Coping as a Christian Nurse
