It just never gets easier. Every situation is different, but every outcome the same.
I hate those stupid surveys that float around email that always ask “Have you ever seen a dead person”
Actually, I have, and I have seen more than I wish. It’s not some thrilling bit of info for an asinine survey. It’s a real event, with real people and real emotions.
You want to know what it’s REALLY like? Think of this:
The family is sobbing in the hallway while the person to whom you spoke a day ago is now a discarded shell, the actual person having escaped to places Other.
The feeling of shutting off an IV and taking out the IV catheter from a vein that does not have any blood pressure.
The sound of the “death rattle” when the dying person loses their gag reflex.
The feeling of utter helplessness when you know you can’t do anything to make anyone feel better.
The fleeting feeling of fear when you give the dying person just a little more morphine because even though they are non-verbal, they are grimacing, and the hope that you didn’t give enough to kill them but just enough to comfort them. While at the same time the rational thought that even if you DID give them enough to suppress their respirations, your INTENT is to provide pain relief, and therefore you did nothing wrong so you give the morphine.
The sound of the shroud when you unfold it from the bag.
The fear in the families faces when they come to say “I think you’d better come….” and can’t finish the sentence.
The sadness in your own voice when you tell them that you cannot hear their loved one’s heart beat, and that you cannot hear their loved one breathing.
The difficulty in watching other grownups cry.
Having to call a doc and say “I need you to come pronounce my patient”
The heavy feeling of walking into the supply room and getting out the morgue kit.
After all their pain…all their tears….they thank you. The family who loses a cherished loved one thanks you.
You go home, and hug your children and cuddle up to your spouse, trying not to remember the sounds of grief that echoed down the hallway as you punched out and left work.
Tags: catheter, Deanna, RN, dearh, dying, iv, morphine, patient, rn
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Dear Deanna, I want to thank you for caring so much. My daughter lost her fiance to the ravages of cystic fibrosis last January. He coded and then spent 5 days in the ICU until it was determined that he was brain dead and we decided to pull him off the vent and allow his body to follow him. The wonderful care we all received from the nurses and RT’s will never be forgotten, despite all the technological needs that my son-in-law needed, they never forgot the emotional needs we all had, especially since Mike’s death was so unexpected at that time. I am also a nurse and saw nothing but the best from my colleagues in our time of need. Thank you again for caring so much, it’s that caring that helps families thru those very difficult times.
I also have the job of dealing with the dying patient almost every day at work. I am an Oncology Nurse. People often ask me, “are you used to the death and dying process yet?” and my answer is… I will never be used to it, but I know that the patient is better off no matter how sad it does make me. We loose several a week and it does not get any easier with each one. Each patient becomes part of your lifelong experiences and In the End… it is your Family that you run to and hug… Just as you did!
Karen I am very sorry for your loss. That must have been so hard on you and your family. I wish you all the best.
Crystal, Oncology Nursing is so tough, isn’t it? I didn’t do it for very long–five months I think. But those few months taught me more than I think I ever learned in school as far as the human experience. I agree that one never gets used to the death and dying process…how can we when each patient is a complete individual? I give you lots of credit…I think oncology is one of the hardest nursing specialties.
I to have had my share of dying pt’s and it is never easy to comfort the family,I have decided that if it ever becomes easy its time to get out of nursing because I feel then I will have lost my compassion. I look at caring for the dying pt as the last caring thing I can do for them,and their family. I have experienced a bad hospice nurses caring when my father was dying from cancer and it was not a good experience she was very unprofessional and cold so from that experience I took away a good lesson on how not to be.