Bad News Travels Awkwardly

Nursing is considered a helping profession. Nurses are compassionate, and empathetic, and helpful.  They are trained to be sensitive to the feelings of others. My father and mother trained to be nurses; they met at nursing school. After graduation, my mom became a mom, but my dad continued working in the nursing field.  He is considered to be very helpful by everyone who knows him.

Both sides of my family also have a long history of nuns.  Nuns are helpful sorts, and we have nuns out the wazoo in my family. They're almost genetic.  Being a nun is all about service to others. Nuns are pretty empathetic, unless they are working at a grade school. With that sort of background, and that sort of career choice, you'd think that my parents would be good at delivering bad news.

You would be wrong.

Neither of my parents are good at delivering bad news.  My mom tends to minimize, if she mentions it at all.  It's been difficult for me to keep track of family members over the years; my mom either never tells me when aunts, uncles, etc., have passed away, or she mentions it in passing. Most of the time, if I mention a relative's name in passing, my mother looks at me like I am insane.  

"Aunt Dorothy died six months ago!"

"What?!! When?!! How?!!" 

"I just don't know why you can't keep track of these things."

To be fair, I gave my mom lots of fits growing up.  I got a double dose of the empathy gene, so I'm a crier.  Any bad news would have had me bawling for hours.  To my reserved and stoic mother, I must have been a complete mystery. By waiting to tell me bad news, she avoided the inevitable waterworks.  I was too confused to cry by that point.

My father, on the other hand, is all about ripping that band-aid off quickly.  He usually waits until I am doing something else, like eating or working on a crochet project. That's when I am a little distracted. He tends to make small talk before he drops his news like a brick of lead. 

"Oh, by the way--your dog has heartworms and the treatment will probably kill her. Gotta go. Bye!"

Then he leaves the room while I sit there, my spoonful of cereal/soup halfway to my mouth, my eyes filling with tears.  Phone calls are no different--everything seems completely mundane, and then the hammer: "...your dog died last night.  Call you next week.  Bye!" 

I've learned to adjust to these surprises as a matter of survival, and face these sudden news flashes with a little more dignity than when I was a kid.  I have even tried to find a bit more empathy for the two of them in my middle ages; they did their best, whether it was good or bad.  Everyone feels uncomfortable sharing bad news, no matter who they are or what they do. 

But it's not the news delivery--it's what a person does after that that counts.

It's a GREAT thing that I'm not a nurse.

While waiting in a tiny room the other day for the doctor to come and tell me that my son is ill with some random virus/bacteria/anthrax/creeping crud, I once again decided that I am happy that I am not employed as a nurse. If I am completely honest with myself, the rest of humanity is probably very happy about my career choice as well.

Both of my parents went to nursing school. That was where they met. I should have been a shoe-in for nursing with that background. The very first book I remember wanting to read was Gray's Anatomy. Growing up with the usual bumps, bruises, and virulent cooties of childhood, my parents never freaked out or overreacted. (Which was good--kids take their cue as to how to react from their parents. If the parents freak, you have hysterical children, and nobody wants that.)

While I could handle all the book learning just fine, I just don't have a very good bedside manner. If you're REALLY sick, that's one thing, but if you're just bellyaching or malingering, you will find me less than sympathetic, if not downright rude. My mother-In-Law often suffers convenient(for her) attacks of the "vapors"(for lack of a better word), where she will end up on the couch with a wet washcloth on her forehead and a wastebasket next to her. She remains on display until she knows for sure that she doesn't have to do whatever it was she is trying to avoid. She has done this so many times that I just stopped even acknowledging her when I walked by on my way to the kitchen. I'm not a big fan of drama. And what do you say to that after the 42nd time, anyway?

"Hey! I really like how you have that arm thrown up over your eyes--it really brings out the angst in your pretend illness!" (In the interest of marital bliss, I usually don't say anything at all.) When I am working with my middle school students, and they complain about being "sick", my usual response is probably not going to win me any humanitarian awards.

"Are you bleeding from an eyeball? No? Then you're fine." I am better with the younger kids, I do the standard Mom thing and put my hand on their forehead. If they feel warmer than expected, they go to the nurse, because a fever means that whatever they have is contagious.

Another reason I would not be a good nurse: if anyone around me projectile vomits, I'm outta there. I do NOT handle that vomit smell very well; it in fact encourages an immediate gag reflex that almost never ends well. If I can remember to breathe through my mouth, instead of my nose, I can sometimes manage without adding to the mess. But you don't usually see the nurses sharing a wastebasket with their patients.

A third reason I would not be a good nurse is my unfortunate tendency to react inappropriately to unexpected developments. If I kind of know what is going on or what is going to happen, I'm calm. If there is any sort of monkey wrench thrown into the mix, it's a crapshoot how I will react. It's quite terrible, actually. When my husband, who is terrified of needles, passed out during one of his chemo treatments, I just sat there and watched and laughed as he slid out of the chair. It was hysterical laughter, but still inappropriate.

The last reason that I would make a terrible nurse is my needle phobia. The idea of jabbing someone in the arm or trying to take their blood just gives me the heebies. If I were a nurse, I would have to take Xanax just to contemplate giving someone a shot. Then I would have to keep my eyes closed while I gave the shot. This would lead to some less than optimal needle sticks, and some angry patients. If I had to actually take someone's blood or put in an IV, I would be so icked out by the idea of the needle going into the vein, I would likely faint dead away.

So I would be the kind of nurse who rolls my eyes at you because I think you're bellyaching, who tells you to 'suck it up' when you're sick, who runs from the room when you barf, and who faints when I have to stick a needle in you. That's pretty sad, but realistic! Aren't you glad I'm not a nurse?