sometimes healing doesn't exactly mean getting better

I have been doing such a different kind of nursing recently that with this job change I feel as if I am coming back to my roots. I am now doing long term geratric nursing and sure it's a far cry from the "hospital scene" but none the less it's medically based. Until working at my last job I had little knowledge of behavioral nursing and while I learned to excel in that branch it wasn't something that I truely enjoyed. Last night was my first night out of orientation and it wasn't without a bit of trepidation that I began my shift

I had a dressing change to do on a new hospice resident and was looking for a good time to do that amongst all the other things that were filling my shift. I don't need to go into detail of the extent of her condition but will say that she has been given a very poor and this dressing change is a sad side effect. The easiest way for me to approch this procedure was by getting comfortable and sitting on the floor. Not knowing what I was going to face I had not collected any supplies. I sat there and began to remove the bandages. I knew my patient was uncomfortable and in effort to ease her and to change her focus I asked about her family. She shared little, it was a sad story but she changed our conversation to tell me what she was thankful for. She mentioned her extented family that has risen to the occasion and provided for a lot of her needs and for her church family.

I am listening and making the proper input as I continue to remove the dressings. I am down to the wound and my mind is racing as to how to approch the treatment of this wound. My resident is apologizing for what I have to do and that's when I let her into my little secret...I LOVE WOUND CARE. I really do, most people may never understand that but it's an area of medicine that really facinates me. I don't know what I expected for her response to be but I was shocked when she went back to the earlier conversation and said, "I thought of something else I am thankful for...you."

I most likely will not be able to see this resident get better, to recover or to maybe even to see this wound to heal but last night I saw a part of her heart heal.