I'm sitting here, post iron infusion, thinking of all the things I need to do over the next several weeks and my mind is all over the place. I keep thinking about a question the nurse asked me today. "Do you miss working in the medical field?" I said "No" very quickly. I still do counseling for a few patients, but I don’t carry as many as I used to.
Although I have been a nurse for many years, several as a critical care nurse, a few months ago I took over a position in management again. However, not in the medical field this time. Let me digress a little. I have been in management most of my nursing career after leaving critical care. Either specialty offices or groups of people. The longest non-hospital position I had, I managed a team of doctors and medical assistants. I did a lot of teaching in that position both with the staff and with the patients. It was busy and I did well. Eventually I seemed to be doing more counseling than actual nursing.
Most things come to an end eventually, and due to a little burn out, I took another position in nursing and management. This involved managing a team of nursing assistants and patients. Once again doing more counseling. After a difficult illness I decided to work as an independent contractor for a company doing physicals, in home testing, and again, counseling. But when Covid hit, those companies closed, allowing me to keep the patients I was counseling.
No matter what job I had, I always ended up doing counseling, either by contract or by necessity, to keep an office running and the day progressing. So, through Covid and after, I continued to counsel patients in a wide variety of areas. Eventually, I began to counsel young people from the country of Bangladesh, through a Facebook group I had become involved with, and I still do some of that. And all of this I was doing out of my home. Eventually… major burnout.
So, that brings me to the present. A few months ago, I took a position in management again totally away from the medical field. I desperately needed a change. You could call this in the field of retail. Much busier than I imagined, with a diverse group of people, but I seem to be doing well at it.
But as I was having the infusion today and thinking more about the difference between working in the medical field and working in a non-medical job, it brought up another question. What defines an emergency? As a critical care nurse or in nursing in general, it could mean cardiac arrest, bleeding out, blood clots in the lungs or brain, falls, kidney or liver failure…
too many things to name.
This morning, I was faced with what was an emergency in my current position. The girl that works the pizza cart suddenly quit. This was not even my problem as I don’t staff any pizza carts. But those that do, wanted to see if I could loan them someone to do it. Then one of my employees has no daycare on Friday due to the holidays. Other employees forgot supplies for their shifts and I did a lot of running back and forth today. Of course, none of these things were actual emergencies. But it’s a matter of perspective.
What brought everything into perspective for me today, was an actual emergency. I was looking for one of the managers in the other company on site, and found a couple of them guarding the door to the ladies bathroom. I asked what was happening and was told a lady in the bathroom was on the floor needing medical attention. I am still ACLS certified and offered to help. But I was told a few non-medical people were handling it and the rescue squad was right outside the emergency door. However, they were having trouble getting the emergency door open. I could answer the question at that time. Do I miss it? Absolutely not! I turned around and returned to my office to deal with the ‘real’ emergencies of the pizza cart and the daycare situations.
I can’t say I never deal with medical problems as I have some staff members with serious medical conditions. I also have some staff with difficult personal issues, some work related and some life situations in general. All of these things can affect work performance. So, is this retail position the one job I have had where I don’t do any counseling? Don’t ask!
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