This is ironic- so to speak-considering how I was feeling just a few days prior to this.

The past two days I have had patients that encouraged me so much. When DC said "How do you remember all this stuff to ask me!?! And know the plans for me to go to rehab tomorrow? I give you bits and pieces here and there and you somehow put it all together," I was elated.  Her perplexity was my exact feelings at the beginning of orientation, constantly doubting myself, but this showed that maybe I really am getting the hang of it? 

DK has had had such a hard life with medical problems, could barely walk to the door and back, so many tubes in his body I couldn't even keep them straight-I feel so bad for him and he misses his family so much. Two months of living in the hospital is no fun-at least it's my choice to be there. He kept saying "I don't mean to be a bother" and " Thanks you for your troubles" etc. People like that deserve more of my time, opposed to the needy peculiar people who need each pillow propped and their table just right. 

The sitter for KT (developmentally delayed) commented in how her son had died young of developmental problems, and maybe God gave her a blessing in that, so she was never put in he situation to decide on a nursing facility to care for her loved one. Though no one should have to bury their child, seeing her optimism and God's grace in it all was encouraging.

I love all my patients, I really do, but it's so hard to show it and uplift their spirits.  Learning what each patient needs most-whether words, touch, presence, gentleness.. Is really going to be hard. And executing it could be even harder. I have to assert myself and feel the authority, so to speak, to deliver.