this is why i love my job

 this is going to sound crazy, because it starts with a sad story.  

since friday, i have been looking after a man, who until thursday was completely independent.  he had chosen to move here to live near his daughter, as he was on his own up north, and felt he was beginning to struggle more.  on thursday, the hospital that he attends up north told him he had a bed here, put him in a TAXI on his own, for a two hour ride, bearing in mind he has parkinsons disease, and sent him to our hospital.  he turned up at the dialysis ward, who knew about him, but not that he was due to arrive that day, seeing as they had no beds and had not authorised the transfer.

he met with the renal consultant, who decided to send him to an assessment unit within the hospital to wait for a bed on the ward. basically the only reason he was coming to hospital and not straight to his daughter’s house was because he does his own dialysis at home and needed to transfer the care to here from up north.  there have to be assessments etc so a short stay in hospital is needed.  so while he was on the assessment unit, bearing in mind he also has parkinsons and had spent two hours in a taxi before being passes from pillar to post, he fell and smashed his head.  and ended up with a massive bleed on the brain which is non recoverable.

it’s the saddest thing i’ve ever heard.  he had a repeat CT scan yesterday and the bleed had grown.  basically he may survive with no quality of life, or he may not survive at all.  i sat in with the consultant while he told this to the family, who are understandably devastated.  they were expecting him to move in with them, fighting fit, a loving family who wanted their father/grandfather with them in his twilight years.

i’m not ashamed to say i cried with them, and spent most of the day with a lump in my throat.  what do you say to someone in that circumstance? he  was old, sure, but actually despite his medical conditions, lived a completely independent life.  now they don’t know if he’ll survive the week.  

these are the days where my job sucks.  where i don’t know what to say and if i did it wouldn’t make it better.  they seemed to appreciate what i did for them.  i suppose the best i could do was show them that i really cared for their dad, that i would look after him as if they were nursing him themselves, and i did that.  i told them every thing i was doing, i asked them if they agreed on his behalf to have these things done, if they wanted to stay or wait outside, if i could get them anything while they were waiting, and that i would be there all weekend so someone who knew the whole story, and knew the family, would be there.  

it’s sad.  it makes me sad, they’ve been robbed of the quality time they thought they would have. i just thought, all the whingeing i do about what i don’t have. i’m incredibly lucky to have what i do.  this is why i love my job though.  i get to look after families like this, who even in their grief are so appreciative of everything i’m doing for them. i get to look after lovely, amazing people for a living. i get paid to do that.

xx

xx