It doesn't hit the hardest until hits right at home

Monday, a family member was admitted to the ICU for hyponatremia. In other words, their sodium was at 92. Our normals are supposed to be between 135 - 145. So the hypo, means low, while the natremia means sodium. So together you have a low sodium.  Levels shocking to all medical staff involved. Levels, who for anyone else, would have sent them straight into a coma, into a world of the unknown, and an outcome that only looked grim. Seizures, comas, death. The outcome, the prognosis was scary. But those are just the textbook definitions. Like mentioned earlier, although their levels were at alarming lows, the prognosis was fair, was positive, and the only way was up. Of course, it would just take time. I would give them all the time in the world if it made them better, made them healthy, and made them into who I remember.

We are taught at school to only get involved so much. While it is okay to share compassion, your heart only grows cold as the years go on. Sure, we feel for our patients, we want them better, but it is not our job to become attached, a lesson that was hard to cross. I have previously blogged about letting my guards down at work, and fighting back the tears. But to get where we are going, we must put on our fighter faces, and do our job. Because our job is their lives, so we must stand up tall, brush off the emotions, and step up to the plate with a huge shield over a heart. A task I have slowly learned to do.

I absolutely love what I do, and yes I am very compassionate towards my patients, but I do not show signs of weakness, and do my best to be a rock in their ever crumbling worlds.

This task isn't as easy when it hits right at home. You grow up your entire life seeing someone walk just fine, talk all time, feed themselves, and ultimately live their life just fine altogether. Then all of sudden it is taken away, and all the easy tasks are hard, complicated, and tiresome. But you encourage, you nag, and you don't stop because you know they can do it, and everything you have wants them to be able to be who they were. That funny person with too many jokes that I just started to understand a few years ago.

Over the past few days, I have sat in the hospital room, secretly fighting for someone to get stronger, do their best, and most importantly they hope that they make it home sometime before the next Alabama game. I really didn't think I would become as emotional as I did, but when the hard times happen to those close to you, its the only option that seems right at the time. And I guess you don't really know how much you love someone until you see them in a different light. A light that isn't shining quite as bright, and a light that was almost taken away in a flash. The darkness was a heartbeat away, and the scary truth is still ahead in the future that has yet to take place.

I pray everyday for their strength, their courage, and their ability to fight through this journey.  I know they can do it.