An Unexpected Hurt

I never thought I'd be a nurse. I had no great yearning to heal the sick and comfort the dying. I went into nursing because I thought "Why not?"

After twelve years I don't know what else I could be. I can't imagine not knowing what I do about looking after others. I've even forgotten what it must be like to not know about health and not have an understanding of illness.

What I have found is that I can deal with many sad and traumatic events, and even though it makes me unhappy, I often can keep myself separate from it. But there are times that really do get to me, and it's often the unexpected things. Let me explain...
I remember quite a number of years ago an elderly Scotsman called Mr Donaldson. All the time he was in hospital he never had a visitor. His wife had died several years earlier and his two children lived abroad. He hadn't seen a family member in three years. It wasn't that they weren't close, it was just that neither sons or father could afford to visit each other.
Mr Donaldson had a bowel resection and the formation of a colostomy. He went home two weeks after his surgery. When he went home he looked reasonably well, although understandably weary.

It was near christmas time, and in my part of the world Christmas means summer. This Christmas the whole town was on the street watching as the national pipe band competitions take place. For a whole two hours pipe band after pipe band filed by dressed in full Scottish regalia, kilt, dagger and all.

I was enjoying the parade, and then I saw Mr Donaldson, standing in a shadowed doorway at the back of the crowd. He looked even more pale than when he left. He looked even more thin and stooped. I was close enough to see what looked like moisture in his eyes. His eyes never left those of the pipers. He was wearing a kilt.

I found myself near tears. It felt like this parade was just for Mr Donaldson, as if it was some final farewell.

Another week later and Mr Donaldson was back in hospital. He was anemic, his colostomy wasn't working, and he was coughing up a lung. They took him to the operating room where he died.