Tonight was a busy night. It was quiet until 6pm, and then it hit the fan. Two kids in the same car travelling at 80km/hr crashed into the embankment, a child fell off a diving board and hit her head, becoming unrousable, a boy having huge breathing difficulties..... all at once. As well as the other stuff coming through the doors at the same time. Lots of sick gastros, requiring IV fluids. It was busy and it was yuck, but sometimes I enjoy those shifts, because it proves to myself that I can actually do it. I am a good nurse. A good EMERGENCY nurse - which is a world apart from ordinary nursing. In our department, we tell the junior doctors what to do. Not the other way around. I boss doctors around. It sounds absurd, given my fear of authority. And I'll even have a go at the senior doctors sometimes. Like tonight, when we took a blood test from a child as we put in a drip, I asked for a drop to test her sugar level. It had all been used up into all the different bottles, but I insisted, saying "I want to know if this child is hypoglycaemic now, not in an hour's time." And so I got the drop, and she was. I then said "So you'll be wanting some glucose in that fluid then, won't you?" My 17 year old self would have been horrified at the thought of such assertion. The 22 year old version smiles inwardly. I just feel... capable there. I belong.
