Making Choices

This week I have been doing orientation shifts in the Hospice. I was so stressed! I chose to seek a new position. I talked to friends who are nurses and friends who know me well. I knew I was moving in the right direction. But to choose to move away from a brilliant team of nurses who helped me return to the profession and shared such difficult work with me was almost debilitating. Yet the patient load on that unit is getting out of hand, and the work is breaking me to the point that I just don't want to be a nurse.
Leaving the mother ship is also hard. I always worked in our local hospital. As messed up as some of the administration gets, it's like a high school team and I am always proud of the care we give.
I'm changing schools, but I like to feel I'm on the same team. Yesterday I took report from one of my favourite nurses while admitting a patient to Hospice. Yes, it's really me. The story is out.
But working in a small unit that is totally focused on the comfort of the patients and the care of their families is going to help me blossom. I miss pediatrics. I miss the kiddies and their families. But each of these patients at the end of life were once someone's baby.
Next week I spend a week a camp. I'm finding the board duties to be crushing. Will I choose to step down from that? It won't help them any, but maybe my other volunteer work, my music and my dream of writing will acquire some space.
I have a birthday coming next week, and I'm feeling like I need to act like a grown up. My baby birds have finished high school and are in university. My wings are spreading and I am planning my flight path. I want to travel away from the turbulence, into the blue skies.