The grass was not greener

I woke up at 6 this morning- it's my day off. I decided to get up and have breakfast with Josh, since he has to work, we see each other less often now, and it's better than staying in bed letting my thoughts race.

I have had so many deaths these last two weeks. It's like the universe it trying to prove to me that I'm making the right choice. It has been all I can do not to break down while my patients' families are grieving. I had one patient actively dying, his family didn't want hospice and didn't want him to have morphine when he was agonally breathing. It took him the whole day to die. I had another patient last night who was too young to be dying of cancer, and yet...and then I had a patient who was alert, stable, but non-verbal and had a feeding tube- she was put on hospice, taken off dialysis- it won't be long before her toxins build up and she does start declining. To me, it seemed like euthenasia.

I try to think what if it were me- is any form of being, better than not? It is true, she had no quality of life. If I couldn't bike ride in the woods, or even set foot outdoors to feel the sunshine on my face, then it is time for me to go home.

It is scary and strange how modern medicine mas made it the status quo to keep dead people alive. Has my time in ICUSD made me callous? I know the pain on families faces when they are asked if they wanted us to keep going with treatment. I cannot imagine being on the other end of it. No one wants to be the final word on stopping treatment- even if it is clear the patient is suffering. Here is always the question- what if this works?

I'll be happier, I think, to not think about these issues all the time during the peak of my life. But when you are surrounded by suffering day after day, you cannot help but think of it.

I suppose this blog will serve as a reminder, when I get complacent (bored?) in my new job that the grass was not greener. The grass is struggling to fight off winter; brown, decaying, stressed from summer's demands. It cannot hold on much longer.