by Danielle Tantone | 12:29 pm | Faith, Family & Relationships
I have never been a poet.
My thoughts come out in paragraphs,
not alliterations, allusions, anaphoras and assonance.
But I too prefer writing to speaking.
The time it takes to type slows and smooths the jumbled edges of my feelings.
On the outside I’m scattered and busy and running around…
Making sure everyone is fed…
Cleaning up messes and answering calls at home or at work…
Running up and down hallways and stairs to get everyone what they want…
trying to keep peace where there is always discord…
trying to keep the angry, hurt, self-centered and yelling people calm and happy…
trying to keep us from sinking…
trying to pull us out from a deep pit…
trying to keep just a little time for myself, to calm my own frayed edges…
trying to write the things that are in my heart, to publish the stories that I know I must…
I wake in the middle of the night. Sleep still stinging in my eyes, the aching pulse of too few hours closed.
And there is so much I think I “should” do as long as I can’t sleep.
But all I can think about is you, my baby girl.
How I wish you would let me in.
As your mom I have the right to look inside the window like a voyeur in the night.
But I don’t want to be an uninvited guest in your heart.
I want to have a secret code name that lets me in too.
I want you to know that I see you.
You are more than a piece of play dough for me to mold.
You are beautiful and perfect, inside and out,
even as you roll your eyes, argue and ignore.
I see you and I know you.
And I love you no matter what.
And I don’t think your feelings are stupid, your problems trivial, your drama silly.
And I never mean to discount them or discount you as I try to smooth it over and make you smile.
I always try to jump too fast to the silver lining.
But I’m learning that joy needs sadness too.
I don’t always have to rush in and fix it.
It’s OK to just be sad or angry.
All those ups and downs, those feelings, desires, doubts and questions…
I have felt them too.
And the deepest pain as a mom is to see your baby hurt.
The baby cries and you cry too.
The baby falls and you want to run and scoop her up, cradle her in your arms, rock her gently until everything is OK.
You’re still that little baby whose booboos I kissed.
Only now you squirm away instead of letting me hold you.
I had to let you go much earlier than is normal.
Divorce. My fault. My doing.
I used to cry every time you were at your other home.
So many regrets.
So much of your life I miss.
My heart aches to see your heart aching.
And I wish you would let me in the door.
For just a cup of tea.
Some stories by the fire.
A game? A craft? A recipe?
We don’t have to talk too much.
It’s cold outside peaking in the window.
And I have things to share too.
Won’t you let me in?
by Danielle Tantone | 9:32 am | Health & Wellness, Mindset, Mental Health & Entrepreneurship, Nursing, Night Shifts & School
Most of my patients are older, but yesterday, I took care of a young man who had jumped in front of a bus. On purpose.
He was young, with so much life ahead of him. A boy really. Less than half my age. I wonder what he was thinking as he stepped out in front of that bus. How he felt just moments before it hit. He was quite perturbed to still be here instead of wherever he believes he would have gone if the bus had successfully killed him.
“Maybe you were spared for a purpose,” I said to him late in the afternoon, after I had been in and out of his room several times and gotten to know him a bit. “Maybe there’s something on this earth that you are meant to do, someone you are meant to be.”
I don’t know if my words made it past the haze of his suicidal ideation and deep depression.
There is a side of me that remains bright-eyed and optimistic and wants to think I could make a difference, even when I’ve known too many wonderful people who have chosen to end their own lives, either quickly or slowly.
The rational, educated part of me knows that mental illness is complicated and you can’t just erase it with love and positive affirmations. And yet. Perhaps I could be a spark that could ignite a desire to live from deep within, and cause him to seek out the help he needs. Maybe, just maybe, my care and compassion can give him an ounce of hope.
At the hospital, you can always tell there’s a suicide patient by the haphazard pile of stuff strewn about outside the room. Trash can, linen basket, metal cupholder, sharps container, anything that could be removed and used as a weapon or a hanging device.
They place a sitter in the room to constantly keep eyes on the patient, and she documents what he’s doing every 15 minutes. I have been a patient sitter a few times when they needed me there. It was pretty hard for me to sit there for 12 hours instead of buzzing about like I usually do.
But this time, I was the PCT, Patient Care Technician, and he was one of 10 patients in my care. So I buzzed in to check his vitals, empty his catheter, help him to the commode, straighten up his sheets or get him a blanket, ask him if he wanted to wash his face or brush his teeth.
It’s a little like being a mom.
A few times throughout my busy, bustling day, I got to sit there longer, so the sweet sitter could take a break. I think this one touched both our hearts.
Most of the day he stared stonily at the TV or out the window. I wondered what he was thinking.
I asked him questions about his family. I asked him if he liked the holidays, hated them, or really didn’t care one way or the other. He said he didn’t care one way or the other.
Finally, I got him to smile, but the first smile didn’t quite reach his eyes and I told him so. Which made him laugh slightly and then a real smile lit his whole face up.
“You have to find the things that make you do more of that,” I said. “What would you do if you didn’t feel so depressed?” I asked. He said he would go to trade school and become an electrician. I said that sounds like a wonderful job. Electricians fix things, make them work. Light things up.
I truly believe that every person on this earth is unique and special and has a purpose, and I told him that.
I hope he finds his own light.
I hope he knows I really care.
And secretly, selfishly, I hope that he will remember my smile, my words, my energy and my love, and that it would make a difference.
We aren’t allowed to keep in touch with patients. He doesn’t even know my last name and probably won’t remember my first. But I’ll remember him, and I pray that I made a difference. Chances are he won’t be there when I return to work after Christmas. I have the next several days off. I hope he won’t be there, because laying listlessly in a hospital bed in an empty room would be depressing for anyone. But I also hope, I really do hope, that he finds his desire to live, gets help, and makes a life for himself.
I pray that getting run over by a bus and surviving becomes a catalyst to turn his whole life around. And I do believe that’s possible…
*Details changed or omitted to protect patient’s identity.
by Danielle Tantone | 4:49 am | Breast Cancer, Health & Wellness, Nursing, Night Shifts & School, People Stories
At work yesterday I walked into the room of one of my patients in response to his call light, asked him how I could help, smiled and looked him in the eye, as usual. Overcome with emotion, tears sprang to his eyes as he explained that he just felt so anxious and overwhelmed at learning a few moments ago that the surgeon would be amputating his big toe today. He had known he was having surgery, but not until today had they mentioned amputation.
“It’s just a toe, but still. It’s part of my body,” he said.
I stopped what I was doing, came around to the bedside and placed a hand gently on his shoulder. I looked into his eyes and told him that I understood and I was sorry. And while I have always been an empathetic person, easily able to put myself in another’s shoes, now I actually do completely understand what it feels like to have a part of your body amputated.
I shared with him that I too had recently had part of my body amputated. Both my breasts, in fact. A bilateral mastectomy.
Breasts are not the same as legs, arms, feet or toes. In some ways they seem less important, and in some ways even more. Breasts are perhaps the most defining characteristic of the female body. And yet seven weeks post op, no one even knows I have “robo-boobs” unless I lift up my shirt (which thankfully my job neither requires nor allows).
I don’t even mention it to most patients. Unless they notice me struggling to reach up above my head. Or unless it seems fitting or important to share. My own pain, my own experience as a patient, will make me a better nurse.
So much more I want to share, but another 12-hour shift beckons, and it’s been so long since I have even posted anything, that I figured something is better than nothing. More to come. I promise.
