Ironies

I was driving down the road the other day and saw this license plate on a BMW:

BM-ING

Oh, the rehab nurse in me was just laughing out loud...if this man only knew how this would be received on my unit. Many punny comments would be exchanged and probably no one would want to ride in that car!

I'm coming up on my anniversary as a nurse and I keep thinking about some of the things that have happened to me since I've become a nurse.

1. I'm not too afraid of bodily fluids, but vomit gets me. Everything else--nasty, draining wounds, poop, etc., rarely faze me. It's that rascally vomit that is my Kryptonite. I go to that happy place really quickly when people vomit, or I'd be going to Emesisland with them!

2. I've learned to like gloves. It never bothered me if a foodservice person wasn't wearing gloves before, but it really does now.

3. I like teaching. In rehab nursing, we do a lot of this, and I've developed my own internal scripts, depending on the subject. One of these days, we ought to have a Rehab Nurse Learning Channel, tape our delivery of the educational topics and let patients watch on a patient channel, just like public access on cable.

4. I'm now fluent in several types of wheelchair drive systems. At least, I don't crash as much as I used to when taking them to the charging station. (Maintenance frowns on holes in the walls caused by staff).

5. I've always thought I was pretty resourceful, but I'm learning even more tricks. One of my recent patients, a quad with shoulder mobility, figured out how to use his rolled up washcloth (for his hand) to scratch his nose. It was great, but it kept falling out, so I used Kerlix and tape to attach it to his hand without gumming him all up. It worked great. At least it keeps him occupied enough, so he doesn't bug us ringing the call light to come scratch his nose!