working through new nursing thoughts

sooo, i guess i've become a bit of a job consumed person as of late. its funny, one of the most repeated tips that the senior nurses offer me while on the floor is to always ask for help if your workload becomes too much to bear, before you "feel like you're drowning." There is actually so much reference to drowning, and i think its quite an accurate, and shocking metaphor for the work that nurses do on this really fast paced floor. i mean, i've never had a job where the work was likened to such a severe panic as losing your life.

as a newbie, i  often feel like i'm about to drown, like i have a little raft but its leaking air. There is an expectation to move rapidly through patient's rooms, which has taken a lot of the satisfaction that i could have from actually getting to know my patients, talking to their families, forming a relationship with them and employing a more holistic approach to their health. Thats just  not possible with the amount of tasks that need to get done in any given hour. I feel like i'm storming into people's rooms, performing any number of procedures to them that are invasive, try to keep a smile on my face and a pleasant demeanor to relieve the anxiety or terror of the child and worried parents, and exit the room as quickly as i came in. its fucking hard. every time i have to help hold a small child down to get an iv placed, or get catheterized, the terror in their eyes  it just breaks my heart. and not having the opportunity to sit with them or help comfort the family through a really rough hospitalization feels wrong to me. there's really nothing pleasant about them being in the hospital, and its hard to be a part of this scenario that will most likely be remembered as a really hard (if not outright traumatic) period of their life. 

so there is this sort of numbing that happens to healthcare workers, to just cope, i see it happening in me too, and i'm grieving it. i have to detach myself enough to pick up and move to the next thing. and quickly. I think one thing i'm trying to learn is how it seems that most the other nurses came to this work because they "wanted to work with kids," which i admire, but i'm not sure how they are gleaning satisfaction from it, or where they are finding the positive connection. I'm wondering if I just have a more cynical view of "the power of" western medicine and healing that makes it hard for me to feel good about the whole slew of invasive procedures and inherent depersonalization within the great big beast of the hospital machine. In the bigger picture, its hard for me to feel that what i'm doing is helping them get better, since the results are not pleasant, immediate or apparant. I guess part of that is that a lot of the kids on our floor actually don't get better, they are chronically ill, alot of them stay for months on end in the hospital. So the medical care you provide just feels really disruptive to their lives as children, but on the other hand, that care is necessary for them to live, so its complicated.  Well, so i see what i do as part of this form of care for chronically and acutely ill kids, but maybe i'm just meant to be a different type of healer. I know the "grass is always greener" but i'm just yearning for a more gentle and intimate setting to work with people. I fantasize that if i was a midwife, it wouldn't be like this, i can spend however long getting to know my clients, offering resources, support and guidance and all that warm fuzzy stuff that i'm really missing right now. I don't know. I'm at least going to stick it out for a year or so. The job market sucks. I'm feeling a little defeated and wondering how to cope. Today i feel like quitting and becoming a barista.