If you know anybody who's on the fence about getting vaccinated (*TW* for anyone who's lost someone)

[renate]

(She gave permission to share https://tinyurl.com/evpxjfr7, so I hope it's okay to post the whole thing.)
https://www.reddit.com/r/nursing/comments/pk3v5e/written_after_a_particularly_hard_day/


On the day you die from COVID, many things will happen.

A colleague and I will enter the room to carefully prepare and clean your body.

We will shut off all the IV pumps.

We will turn off the ventilator.

We will silence and turn off the monitor that is screaming at us that something is emergently wrong.

We will remove the breathing tube from your throat.

We will pull out the intravenous lines.

We will remove the arterial line that monitored your dangerously low blood pressure.

We will remove the catheter that drained your bladder and measured as your urine output gradually decreased to nil.

In the end, they will leave the room and it will be just you and I.

The machines will be turned off.

The beeping will have stopped.

The alarms will be discontinued.

The room will be silent for the first time in days.

I might have music on, if your family told me what you like to listen to. I’ve listened to all kinds of music at the end.

Classic Rock. Big Band. South American flutes. Chinese ballads. Country and Western.

Today it was the Beatles.

“Yesterday… all my troubles seemed so far away… Now it looks as though they’re here to stay… Oh I believe in yesterday…”

I’ll cover your body with a sheet and try to position you so that you look as natural as possible.

I’ll dial the phone number or open the video chat and your family will pop up.

They will see you and begin sobbing uncontrollably.

They will tell you that they love you.

They will question their God.

They will tell you that they don’t know how they will go on without you.

They will thank you for being a great partner, great spouse, great child, great friend, great person...

They'll put the dog up to the camera so you can "see" them one more time.

Old grudges will be forgiven or put aside.

I will be privy to family secrets and skeletons that nobody else knows about.

I’ll never breathe a whisper; your secrets are safe with me.

I will listen silently as they beg and weep and plead and grieve.

I will close my eyes tightly at the scream that signifies pain so raw and deep that it stings even my numb and burned-out heart.

I will try to hold back the tears that gather in my own eyes as I empathize with the pain your family is feeling.

I will fail.

I will cry silently too.

I will wait patiently until their tears have slowed and they have told me that they are ready.

I will hang up the phone or shut off the video.

I’ll sigh to myself as I start to clean up.

The bag that your battered body lies in won’t be zipped up yet.

I know it sounds crazy, but I don’t believe in zipping up the bag until I’m ready to leave the room.

I can’t bring myself to clean your room while you lie there inside a dark zipped-up bag, ignored because you no longer breathe.

So, I’ll take down the drips.

It will take me a while.

You’ll have been on a lot of drips.

Sedation.

Pain medication.

Fluids.

Pressors.

Anti-anxiety medications.

A blood thinner.

I’ll take them all down and puddle the lines on the floor while I dispose of the excess contents.

I’ll gather the unopened supplies in the room and begin throwing them in the trash.

The new cardiac electrodes that don’t need to be placed on a chest that no longer has a beating heart.

The pulse oximeter that would read “zero” if I were to attach it.

The oral care kit that we used to try to prevent you from getting a secondary infection in your lungs.

The bags of dialysate that were used in a valiant attempt to preserve your kidneys.

The tubing that was attached to the ventilator to breathe for you.

The numerous pictures and cards that your family dropped off at the front desk of the hospital for us to hang in your room for encouragement and support.

All of it will go in the trash.

Nothing can be salvaged from a COVID room.

I’ll tidy up the many caps that have found their way onto the floor.

Caps from IV flushes. Caps from medications. Caps from IV tubing. Caps from respiratory equipment.

Caps that were opened and discarded so quickly as we worked so feverishly that they’ve long since been forgotten and relegated to the floor.

Finally, I will be done cleaning.

I will stroke your hair. I will hold your hand. I will position you so you look comfortable.

I will wonder why you didn't get vaccinated.

Fear? Conspiracy? Misinformation? Just never got around to it?

It doesn't matter now.

I will look into your face one more time.

I will zip the bag.

I will leave you in the room to be transported to the morgue.

You, however, will never leave me.

Memories like this are not ever forgotten.

Because in the end, on the day you die from COVID, it will be just you and I.

[Maine Abu El Banat]

1. Wow!

That is powerful

[Treefrog]

2. Nurses don't grave dance.

[qazplm135]

3. I know someone who won't get vaxxed...

and...she's a nurse. Sigh.

[OMGWTF]

9. She should be fired and get her money back from whatever nursing school she attended.

[Chellee]

12. I disagree.

She should be fired and NOT get her money back from whatever nursing school she attended. They tried. It's not their fault that she didn't believe any of the things she said she did in order to pass tests.

[Rhiannon12866]

25. My friend who works in the hospital ER told me that those who work at the local hospital here

Have to the end of the month to get vaccinated. Both this friend and another who works in the office there were the first I knew to get vaccinated - last January. I know an older man (mid 80s) who I used to see at local meetings who said he isn't getting vaccinated because his daughter is a nurse and she's not getting vaccinated and he gets his medical advice from her. He also said she's sooner quit her job than get the vaccine - so it looks like she'll have no choice. Meanwhile, the front page of the local paper today reported on the latest Covid death in the hospital here - an unvaccinated patient in his 40s.

[TNNurse]

10. As a retired RN (and I am so grateful to be retired)

I have no tolerance for this ignorance. Any nurse RN or LPN should lose their job and license for endangering their patients during a pandemic.

[qazplm135]

19. I get it

I cut her off even though she's otherwise a kind, sweet person with two young kids, but there's just something wrong in her head that makes her make poor decisions, and once it became clear I couldn't convince her otherwise, I had to cut ties.

[TNNurse]

20. I understand. This is not something we have ever had to deal with before.

How are we supposed to have had experience at handling this???

[qazplm135]

22. I just can't be supportive

of her decision to put herself, her kids, family and the public at risk, particularly since she's already gotten COVID once and her response seems to be that makes her immune.

I've lost all respect for her and you can't have a friend if you don't have respect.

[Nictuku]

4. Still teared up

Man, that really got to me.

[Aristus]

5. Of all the people whose pain anti-vaxxers don't care about,

nurses are right at the top of the list.

Anti-vaxxers are monsters...

I don't mourn when monsters die.

Nurses are better than me...

[Elessar Zappa]

6. Powerful.

I can’t imagine the stress and heartbreak these healthcare workers are going through.

[Biophilic]

7. Thought I'd gotten sort of used to these "notes" from nurses. I guess not. Damn! nt

[Moebym]

8. I know someone who isn't vaccinated.

She also smokes a pack a day.

I fear that she will one day end up on a cold slab, with the medical examiner opening her chest to reveal grotesquely scarred lungs from a combination of a decades-long smoking habit and COVID-19.

I haven't personally talked to her about this as we haven't been friends for too long, but a few of her other friends have. As far as I know, it hasn't worked, and neither has their pleading with her to quit smoking entirely. She has a family she loves, a pet cat she raised from kittenhood, and friends she cherishes, but she is risking losing it all by going unvaccinated.

[leftieNanner]

15. I think I recall from last year

That someone indicated that smokers were less likely to catch Covid. Don't know if that's true, but if she heard that, it might have given her the excuse she needed to keep smoking.

My dearest friend here in town is a smoker (she is vaccinated and doing all the right things) and it's been incredibly difficult this last 18 months. She lives alone and is retired - there's nothing to do but smoke. Wish she would quit.

[Moebym]

23. You might be onto something

My friend will use any excuse she can get to get out of doing things that make her uncomfortable, I'm sorry to say.

Her main excuse for not quitting smoking is that she knows of people who've survived into their 100s despite their lifelong smoking habits. She knows they're the rare exceptions, but she seems to be willing to take on the risk.

[liberalla]

11. Even with the warning I wasn't prepared for that.

That's some strong stuff...

[James48]

13. That's a good one.

I’m going to copy and paste that one. Maybe somebody will read it and change their mind, and get vaccinated.

[littlemissmartypants]

14. Powerful description every antivax person should hear.

Thanks for sharing this, renate.

❤

[Evolve Dammit]

16. extremely powerful for those who get it. I "got it" 19 months ago. Thanks Renate.

[groundloop]

17. And Then the Family Gets to Clean Up the Mess

We just went through this with my sister-in-laws husband who refused to get vaccinated. He went very fast, less than a week from feeling ill to death.

Now his wife is trying to hold it together while she figures out how she's going to make the house payment, car payment, pay for utilities, and somehow maintain a little bit of sanity.

[Tadpole Raisin]

18. Wow! Factual but emotionally charged recitation.

You are right, anyone who has doubts should be given this and allowed to read it while alone.

If that doesn’t move them I don’t know what will. On the other hand I’ve said that before.

Thank you for posting!!

[zentrum]

21. This Nurse is enduring

.......terrible pain. (

[Duppers]

24. As Elessar Zappa said above, Powerful. Very powerful!!

Sitting here with tears streaming.

I'd send this out but, thankfully, everyone I know is vax'd.

Thank you for this post. I'm keeping it, just in case.

[JudyM]

26. A mental picture is worth a lot. Thanks for posting this.

[FakeNoose]

27. K & R Must read and share!

Very powerful