A Cup of Comfort

So I think this might be the appropriate prelude to the blog I haven't wanted to write. So every quarter the social workers and child life specialists put on this thing for each floor called a cup of comfort. They create a warm ambiance and have gourmet teas and desserts for a couple of hours in the conference room on the floor as a respite (be it brief) from the stresses of work. Burnout is high in healthcare so this is a way to combat it. It's a nice idea. Somehow in my 9 months at work I've never heard about this. However I did finally hear about it yesterday and it came at a good time. I've had a rough few days at work. Mainly because I watched a patient die late last week. He was an 11 yo boy with a terminal medical illness at the end of life admitted for comfort care. However I did not expect the patient to die the day he did. I've had patients die before and witnessed their death but this one really shook me. For one thing I've never watched the full process of death, I was in the this room for a full hour from when his sats dropped until he took his final breath. It was a traumatic experience to say the least and I cried there...when I left the room....at home that night....for the unfulfilled potential, the pain of his family, for the gact that we life in a world where 11 yo boys die. Then the thought that I had to go to work the next day and face that potential with another person all over again. But despite all of the pain, all of the shock and sadness I think I've realized that I wouldn't change anything. One the great privaleges of my job is the people I get to meet and the relationships I get to form. I'm happy to have gotten to cross paths with this special boy and to have met his lovely family. I'm sorry it could not have been longer and that it couldn't have been under different circumstances but I'll never forget him.