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    My Hands: Selected Poetry from a Nurse
    My Hands: Selected Poetry from a Nurse
    My Hands: Selected Poetry from a Nurse
    Ebook54 pages20 minutes

    My Hands: Selected Poetry from a Nurse

    By Paul Phelps

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    About this ebook

    This book was inspired by ten years of work in Acute Care Hospitals, mostly in the ICU and the ER. These poems were inspired by actual events in my life. They are my interpretation of these experiences and their aftermath. My hope is to inspire other nurses, patients, and families through these words.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherInspiring Voices
    Release dateDec 10, 2013
    ISBN9781462408443
    My Hands: Selected Poetry from a Nurse
    Author

    Paul Phelps

    Paul Phelps is a registered nurse for Banner Staffing Services in Greeley, Colorado. He works at McKee Medical Center in Loveland, Colorado. He spends most of his hours in the ICU or emergency department. He has been a nurse for ten years and has worked for Banner Health for twenty-three years now. He makes his home in Greeley for eight months a year and spends his winters in Port St. Joe, Florida.

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      Book preview

      My Hands - Paul Phelps

      We Care

      We do our job because we care.

      We care about you, your family, and your friends.

      We have cultivated our craft

      to be able to care for you

      when you are at your most vulnerable,

      when you are too sick to care for yourself,

      when you need our medicine, our machines,

      when you can’t breathe on your own,

      when you can’t feed yourself,

      when you can’t get out of bed

      or even clean up after yourself.

      We will bathe you, change your sheets.

      We will feed you and bring you warm blankets.

      We will wipe your brow, hold your hand.

      We will pray for you and with you.

      We will work for you.

      That’s why we are here.

      That’s why we are nurses.

      We do it all for you.

      Another Soul

      We can keep a body alive—almost forever—

      but can our technology keep the spirit alive?

      We have machines to keep you breathing,

      medicine to keep your heart beating.

      We can feed you through an IV line

      or through a tube into your stomach.

      We can put in catheters to catch your urine

      and tubes to catch your bowel movements.

      But where do we draw the line?

      When is enough enough?

      We wait for the family to make the decision.

      We have care conferences to discuss

      their loved one, the prognosis, the medical condition.

      We call their clergy or our chaplain.

      Good-byes are said, tears fall, prayers

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