A Letter of Encouragement to Our Healthcare Workers
Our healthcare workers are heavy on my heart today. This letter is for them.
To our healthcare workers:
First of all, thank you. I wish I could offer you more than words, because they don’t feel sufficient enough to express my gratitude.
You are brave, even if you don’t feel it.
You are kind.
And you are so incredibly strong.
I can’t imagine the things that you have seen, the choices you have made, the conversations that you have had.
I can’t understand the fear that you must experience on a daily basis.
You are a HUMAN, just like the rest of us, being faced with impossible scenarios.
No one should have to watch their patients die alone in a sterile hospital bed.
No one should have to wear SCUBA GOGGLES to protect themselves for lack of equipment.
And no one should have to carry so much grief for all of these families who are losing loved ones.
And yet, here we are.
YOU are doing it.
And it is SO hard.
I wish that I could help you bear this burden somehow.
I wish that I could take some of this heaviness so that you don’t have to hold it alone.
I wish that I (and others) could share this experience with you so that we could better understand it.
But we can’t.
And it sucks.
I am tucked safely in my home while you are fighting on the front lines and it doesn’t seem fair.
But, when things feel out of control, I try to focus on the things that I can control.
I can’t control this situation. I can’t eliminate the uncertainty. I can’t control the decisions that other people make even when they impact what I do.
But I can control myself. I can control my actions.
So that is what I’m doing here in writing this letter.
I want to encourage you to PLEASE TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF.
You need to take care of YOU so that you can keep taking care of everyone else.
This is not something that they taught you how to do in school.
In fact, what you learned in school is probably the opposite. You are all experts at pushing through the tough stuff and carrying on.
But right now, WE NEED YOU to be gentle with yourselves. We need you to show the same compassion to YOURSELVES that you are showing to your patients and their families.
You are facing the impossible. And it is going to take its toll on you one way or another.
So you need to stay vigilant. You must ferociously guard your time and your energy.
No, it’s not selfish to unplug at the end of a long shift. It’s not “bad” if you don’t feel like calling your mom because you’re exhausted.
Give yourself what you need during this time to keep yourself as MENTALLY healthy as you can.
Give yourself the grace that you DESERVE to process everything that you are witnessing and experiencing.
Don’t numb the pain. Numbing is not kind. And, it will only work for so long before everything starts to bubble to the surface.
Cry. Scream. Write in a journal. Take a bath. Light candles and sit in complete darkness. Throw something. Break something. EXPRESS it, however you need to. But don’t bury it.
“That’s the thing about pain. It demands to be felt” — John Green
When you walk into work, you are bombarded by emotions — both other people’s and your own.
You have to get through every shift without having a breakdown.
Honestly, I don’t know if I could that.
But I DO know that these feelings of grief and despair and anxiety do NOT own you.
You are STRONG, BRAVE, KIND, and RESILIENT, even if your thoughts and emotions tell you otherwise.
You are HANDLING this. Stop “should-ing” yourself (“I shouldn’t have been so short with that person,” “I should not have eaten that cupcake from the break room,” “I should be more positive”)
Just STOP.
You are doing the absolute best that you can. BELIEVE THAT. Thoughts and feelings of helplessness and unworthiness are NOT who you are. They are not the truth.
The truth is this:
You are a mountain — standing tall and strong in the midst of this crazy storm. These circumstances, thoughts, and emotions are just like the wind and the rain and the thunder.
They are really LOUD and SCARY, but they cannot actually move the mountain.
YOU — the essence of who you are; your soul — cannot be moved.
It cannot.
I am not dismissing the reality of this storm. This shit is REAL. You will walk away with bumps and bruises a plenty, I’m sure. And you will have scars to remind you of these times.
But — even after all of this — you will still be standing. Your spirit will remain.
And the way that you weathered this storm will never be forgotten.
We love you.
Love,
Lauren
Originally published at http://fullwellself.com on April 16, 2020.
