Back to work and...

"She never gives out/She never gives in/She just changes her mind.
 She's always a woman to me."
 Billy Joel, She's Always a Woman to Me (The Stranger, 1977)

Q. is a character. A short, thin, sassy, color-coordinated one. So much so, that she put those color extensions in her hair to cheer up the patients. She put red and green in for Christmas. She put football team colors in during football season. Other colors for baseball. And there was always purple, because it is her favorite color.

Q's laugh, high-pitched and resounding, could be heard all over the unit. One regular patient told me, "I know Q's here whenever I come, because I hear her." She'd fly into a room and give patients she knew a big hug and tell them, "C'mon Mr./Ms. So-and-So, you need to get up and see those therapists. They're waiting for you."

She would also clean them up and get them ready for relatives, trips to x-ray, or only to roll out in their wheelchair or stretcher on the unit. She had her favorite patients, and she'd tell you who they were. She was known to negotiate to get the ones no one else wanted. And when she was done with them, they wanted her as their nurse every day.

One day, Q. told me in the hallway, when I was done with one of her patients appointments, "RehabRN, I really have a pain in my side." I told her, "Q, you'd better check that out. Don't hurt yourself."

In a couple of days, Q. was at work and she told one of the staff she was having chest pain. Since she didn't fit the profile of a heart attack victim, staff still worried about her because she didn't like to complain. R., the staff member she told, took her to the ED down the road, so she wouldn't have to go alone.

Q. got the workup and she didn't have a heart attack. She had terrible labs, though. By the time the weekend came, Q. got the news: she had cancer. She started treatment immediately. She went through a short rehab to get her well enough to go home, but she went downhill quickly. She was sent to World Renown for better treatments, but she didn't make it.

Today we found out Q. lost her battle. Her infectious laugh will never be heard again, nor will we see those crazy colors for the patients.

The Hotel Rehab will be pulling out the black bunting again.