Samantha Jones

When I first considered pursuing nursing, I had a preconceived notion of what it meant to be a nurse. I believed nursing was a profession of helping like any other, that the role of a nurse was one in which services would be provided and patients would be assisted in their time of need. With the knowledge and experience that I have gained from my nursing program thus far, I have formed a new image of what nursing is.

While I still believe that nurses help those in need, I now see that nurses do so much more. The insights I have gained through each clinical rotation, as well as my own personal experiences, have allowed me to see every aspect of a nurse’s role.  By having the opportunity to care for my own patients, I have been able to see firsthand the impact a nurse can have on the lives of others. It wasn’t until after my first semester, when I returned home to help care for my uncle who was losing the fight against lung cancer, that I realized just what being a nurse meant.

Although my uncle was in hospice care and my mother had taken on the role of his caretaker, I knew that going home meant that I would be assuming a caretaker role as well. Although I had only completed my first semester of nursing school, the family looked at me as someone with experience and knowledge and turned to me for help. So, while other students were vacationing or just relaxing on their break between semesters, I began caring for my uncle alongside my mother. It was extremely difficult at first- to walk into the situation expecting to care for the man I had known all of my life but finding him barely recognizable.

The day to day care went on and my uncle continued to decline. The day we had all dreaded was upon us. When my uncle took his last breaths and my grandmother (his mother,) who was a nurse herself before she had retired, could no longer feel his pulse, she turned to me and asked me to check if he was really gone. At that moment I had to hold back my own tears and turn to my grandmother and tell her that her son was gone. It was the most difficult and heart wrenching moment of my life. I believe that if I can go through something as personal as this and come out above it, I will be a better nurse for it. That is why I believe that nursing is not only a helping profession but also a giving profession. I believe that nurses give their time, their care and their hearts to not only patients but their families as well.