Thank you Jim! I have loved nursing. All. The. Things. :) Most of us who stay do. But it is a tight community. Trust/teamwork/adrenaline — life and death situations, not mine, but other people’s.

There have been moments too. We had a live shooter once in the OR where I worked a while back — thankfully — no one was hurt. I’ve been kicked and bitten by patients — sometimes by accident — sometimes on purpose.

My favorite challenge was putting a patient who was out of their head — going through withdrawal or some such thing — in the ICU — in restraints. We used to use leather ones back in the day — Old school. You had to call security to bring the leathers. But these big burly guards weren’t allowed to touch the patient. Us 5 foot nothing nurses had to get the wild people into the restraints on our own. Unless we got hit by said patient. Then security could intervene — AFTER we were knocked on our asses.

But we had to be hurt before they could do anything. I always thought that was a stupid rule. However — I got really good a ducking and slapping people in leathers. Not something one can really put on most resumes. :)