Saturday Straight Talk: Giving

Since this is officially Nurse's Week, let's all take a moment and recognize the nurses in our lives.  Where would we be without nurses?

Dead, probably.  Not that I’m biased...but honestly.  Nurses save your A$$ in ways you’ll never even know.

Like when it’s July and all of the new doctors who JUST finished Medical School 1 week ago are now taking call and writing orders for patients.  Nurses catch all his mistakes before they get passed onto the patient.

Or when you’ve just delivered a newborn after 20 hours of labor and you’re bleeding out your va-jay-jay, have vaginal sutures from delivering your kid’s shoulders and have to pee?  It’s that Nurse who guides you to the bathroom, gets you all spiffy clean afterwards and teaches you how to make an industrial strength maxi pad surf board so you stay dry.

We go to bat for you against school boards, hospital administration, legislation and basically anyone who comes around and either stalls progress or compromises patient safety and care.

One thing is true:  Nurses Are BadA$$.

Some are outwardly BadA$$, and others APPEAR to be meek-but lo- they are anything but.

Nurses are the toughest fighters, because they fight for who and what they love.

The downfall is that Nurses do all that fighting at their own expense, often forgoing eating, drinking and pee pee breaks for 12-14 hours at a time.

You've heard me say this before, and I’ll say it again:  Your Greatest Strength Is Your Greatest Weakness.

Nurses are others-centric.  Giving and giving and giving is a part of the Nursing Culture.  The downfall is that it becomes the Nurse’s identity.

Now you can take that down any path you’d like, but at the end of the day-something got lost in translation.

Are we to give?

YES.

Do we know that “You can’t pour from an empty vessel?”

YES.

I challenge you to consider this:  Are we to be models of HEALTH for our patients?

ABSOLUTELY.  How else will our recommendations be taken seriously if our walk doesn’t match our talk?  I mean, Nurses do work in HEALTH care-as opposed to SICK care, right?

So if we put this in the simple context of health and fitness, where does the breakdown between telling our patients how to live healthy lives and our modeling that occur?

Straight Talk With Your Coach:  At The End Of The day, it comes down to INTEGRITY.

Integrity in upholding what you stand for as a HEALTH Care Professional especially through the ACTION you take in your own life. 

You cannot wait until the Culture of Nursing Or mainstream “Health” Care Changes before you stand for your own personal Health and Wellness.

I realize not everyone feels strong enough to advocate for themselves, or currently works in a place with Old School Mentality that giving until you bleed out of your eyeballs is worn like a Badge Of Honor.

Let me empower you with the CORRECT teaching from the great Jim Rohn:  “It’s not how much can you give, it’s how much can you give without destroying yourself.”

 Nurses, it’s time to get #woke.  The velocity of the Health Care System isn’t slowing down anytime soon.  No one’s gonna be losing sleep at night wondering if you’ve eaten your veggies today. 

We BOTH know that the current model of Nurses putting their health on the back burner is not only outdated, it’s a GAPING liability. 

You teach people how to treat you.  I guarantee that if Nursing were a male dominated industry, things would be different.  But since that’s not the case, it’s on you.

Be The Change You Wish To See And Raise your Personal Standards.