To wonder how the hell drs, nurses and surgeons cope with dealing with death and emotional distressing situations as a regular occurance

[LardLizard]

Like the ones that work in areas of high stress like surgery or a and e etc

I'm a very nervous patient and have been treated with such respect despite ultimately being a total wuss about things that are completely routine which must be very frustrating for the staff. But I'm always made to feel like my concerns are valid, they care and they will do anything they can to help

Your concerns are valid. And it's not frustrating for the staff xxx

Ministerforcheekyfuckery, what a moving post. Especially this bit:

You have to remember that the more disturbing the information they're sharing with you, the more courage it must have taken for them to share it. To have them place their trust in you to that extent, to be the safe adult they feel they can unburden themselves to, is an absolute privilege. Witnessing their pain is traumatic but hopefully in time you also get to watch them heal and know that you've helped them on that journey to recovery

You are a star. What a difference you must make to these broken children and adults. That you help them through what to most of us would be unimaginably horrific is amazing x

My dh is a surgeon and I am a nurse. I used to spend my time running around on the arrest team and also looking after people on the ward who died frequently. We just don't panic at the time because there is no time. It's all very methodical and every single person knows their role. We always have a team 'huddle' after and no one is afraid to cry or get upset. A cup of tea and back to it. I'm now in palliative care and I love it. Now it's not about saving people but helping them have the best death possible. I always tear up or cry when someone dies. I think the day I don't is the day I don't deserve to wear a uniform any more.

With my dh when he is home that's it. He isn't a doctor, just daddy. If he ever has to work at home it is always when the dc are in bed. We talk a lot together as I would have looked after the patients on the ward and then sent them to him.

I find the teams we work in are very close and we can talk about our feeling together. I think its also just in your personality too. Some people are just very methodical yet caring and excellent in a crisis.

@Ohmydayslove we all do and we learn from it. The day we stop learning is the day we should stop doing it. I have young colleagues that complain about a certain type of patient. They think that they are deliberately choosing a behaviour that results in a need for specialist care, then going home, rinse and repeat. They don't have the life experience, yet, to realise that it can't be fun to have the treatment we give, so the lives the patients are leading can't be very fulfilling. It isn't a true lifestyle choice. It's a path created from years of decisions/experiences/choices that now has no way back without a massive amount of help that just isn't there.

Also it is lovely to read about other professionals and the roles they play and the horrors they also face. It's hard work in health care sometimes but reading about people that clearly love what they do and do it with such care is heartwarming.

Seeing people make so many terrible decisions. Again and again. Be victims of crime & be victims of the terrible situation they came out of thus they did the crime.

Not medical, but I deal with lots of people who struggle in that way. I hear their dreadful histories, the abuse, the breakdowns, the violent relationships, the addiction, the children taken into care. It's hard sometimes to keep professional boundaries without losing empathy.

I'm lucky, because I work in a very supportive environment, our managers are great, we look after one another within the team, when a challenging client brings a worker close to the end of their tether a new worker might be allocated, there's plenty of opportunity to vent and supportive debriefing after any incidents. But I've been doing this for 11 years and I'm glad I'm only 3 years from retirement.

It's getting harder and harder out there for people with poor coping skills, and the agencies that can help are losing resources at precisely the time when the service they provide is needed more than ever. But then I look at the good outcomes: the woman who'd been sleeping in her car for 2 months following a relationship breakdown and losing her live-in job, now rehoused in a lovely flat, the family with a young mum with severe MH problems whose eviction has been prevented, getting a young family rehoused after their mother suffered a devastating stroke at the age of 31 - and the satisfaction of knowing that we've made a positive contribution to those lives makes the rest of it worthwhile.

Oh, and black humour, chocolate and lots and lots of tea.

This thread is amazing. I'm a teacher, and always have people say what a noble profession it is. No - what you all do is the noblest. I am constantly blown away by how wonderful the people working in healthcare are, from the GPs and nurses at my local surgery to the consultants and surgeons at the hospitals.
Thank goodness for you all. Never forget how incredible and important you are x

I found dealing with dying patients hard in the community(district nursing) because you're on your own ,the worry that you've done everything after you leave them would keep me awake at night...did it for years and now I am in a different role and the difference in my stress levels is huge.
I come home daily and have such sad tales of people's lives , I spill them out to dh and looks on horrified ..I'm blown away daily by what some people have to deal with in life.

Fascinating reading all the responses. I am a Funeral Director/embalmer and often wonder how all the medical professionals and others who deal with the people and families, before they are in our care, experience it all.
I agree with finding the good things in your day, having to chat to family/friends, knowing you are doing your job to help to the best of your ability as ways of coping.
There are days I come home and hug my children tighter and for longer, need to speak to my dad to hear he loves me, message my best friend to say i miss her.
I can understand how some people become desensitised and others see it as a vocation.

baby, I do a lot of adult education in a HCP role. I wouldn’t / couldn’t be a teacher in a million years. Now that is a tough job!

baby I live on a street of mainly teachers, I always say I could never do what they do. I admire teachers and respect them along with medical professionals. Extremely grateful for all you and others do.

baby I would hands down rather run an arrest than stand in front of a classroom full of kids. A friend of mine is a teacher and I think her days sound more horrific than mine!

Thanks everyone for the thought provoking and insightful posts.
I'm Offsky

I'm.a student midwife. I have my own bit of history of having some tough life experiences of my own, and also of losing my own baby in the third trimester of pregnancy.

I've not experienced the loss of a baby yet on my shift but I have worked as part of a team caring for some very ill mums and babies. There are definitely nights i go home and hold my own children a little tighter and appreciate our health and our safe home. It's tough sometimes but I try to look for little things I can do to make the experience a little easier for the people I care for. Some women have complex social situations, have experienced losses, have poor mental health. I try to treat everyone with a love and kindness, whatever their situation.

Remarkable thread. Thank you all.

So many fucking fabulous humans on this thread. Thank God for all of you.

A&E worker here. You truly do just learn to live with it. but we all have lots of wrinkles

I sat and held a ladies hand for 3.5 hours in A&E the other day whilst she died. I cried for and with her. She didn’t have any family that wanted to be there. It’s a privilege, and that was a very rewarding moment. I knew nothing about that lady, but I hope she took comfort that I stayed with her.

Nemo my wonderful ds is just about to turn 6. He really is the light of our lives (we’ve not been able to have another). I’m slowly getting getting there with my mental health than you But the job you guys do is so important the babies might be the ones needing the medicine but they parents are healed just as much by the care and kindness you give

From an older colleague many years ago, I learnt to imagine curtains closing as I left work. It was a stage where the show had finished and it really really helped me to leave it all behind

In my job I rotate around. So I could be in a&e in the morning. ITU in the afternoon and theatre inbetween.

I couldn't work with paediatric patients. I did 2 weeks cover recently in a children's hospital and I cried several times every day. I just couldn't detach myself.

Usually, I kind of just try to block out what I am seeing/ hearing and do my job. Mostly it works

Some patients do stay with you though. We had a young patient recently early twenties who died unexpectedly after a freak accident/ turns of events. I saw her mum walk into a&e and then heard her cry from the relatives room.It will live with me forever. I cried so much when I got home. I think I hurt for her parents more. Heart breaking

I do think people in these kind of careers do work hard/party hard ( in my dept anyway) and I believe it's a coping mechanism ' you only live once 'mentality.

That and a huge amount of dark humour.

I'm a doctor.

To what extent doctors cope is variable. There is a high incidence of mental health issues and suicide amongst doctors.

To an extent I have become desensitised, but I am still upset or even traumatised by some of the things I see at work.

It's not the trauma and death that traumatise health care staff. It's the entrenched bullying, blame culture, and unreasonable hours and expectations.

i cope.
emergency services worker. its just part of the job. what i find harder is the expectation we are just robots who can work 12 hours and do overtime and do a million other things for nothing and get nothing but scorn from our superiors. and the lies the govt keep telling over and over and over.
im just out of a pay freeze. i worked 6 years for the pay id have got after 3 years. ill be working in a front line position until im 60 for a pension - which means i wont be getting my pension because there is absolutely no way a 60 year old woman will be doing my job at 60....thats a joke. fighting with drunks on a saturday night a 60?
dealing with 20 year old drug dealers running away at 60?
gassing domestic violence suspects who want to fight with you when they are 21 and had 11 cans of stella and trying to detain them alone at 60?
for a pension thats worth peanuts because i joined this job at 37 and will be out of it soon i think - experience counts for nothing anymore and my job is no longer a job for life. its job for while your fit enough to do it.

What loopy and ShesAYamEater said. Of course the upsetting situations are, but their nature, very upsetting. What is really difficult though, is the huge amount of pressure, expectations and being able to do all of this in a system which simply cannot cope. Media reports as well slowly chip away at morale.

That’s the reason I left ward nursing. Arguably I see much more death and upset in my current job but it is 100 times less stressful than when I was on the wards because I have the time to provide that care now to patients and other members of staff.