Because of Him

Today is the day I’ve been waiting for all my life.... I didn’t always want to be a nurse but once I knew I knew. Growing up it was just me my little brother Anthony and my mom our dad walked out on us right after my mom had Anthony said he wasn’t ready to be a dad to one kid let alone two. My mom did the best she could and I will always have so much respect for what she went through and did for us growing up but she gave up her career to raise us and we pretty much lived pay check to pay check my whole life. So before anything I promised myself I would make something of myself so I could take care of my mom like she always did us. I had no idea what I wanted to be in life but I knew it had to be something I would love if I planned on doing for the rest of my life.

When I was 13 Anthony got sick he was only 10 and since we were already living pay check to pay check his treatments were a strain on my mom who started working 3 jobs to make sure he was taken care of as well as us being fed and a roof over our heads. He was sick for a long time and no one could figure out what it was so there was tests after tests in the hospital and long stays just for them to try and figure out a way to fix my little brother. We spent a lot of time in the hospital that year and the nurses and staff were so good with us. Sometimes my mom would go to work at night and I would stay with Anthony because I never wanted him to be alone. When he would finally fall asleep I couldn’t sleep I was to nervous that something would happen to my little brother and I couldn’t help him.

I met a nurse that I would have to say changed my life and made me know that I wanted to be a nurse and help families just like she did mine. When Anthony was asleep she would come in and check on me and see if I needed anything I was a little shy so I always said no but after a few weeks and she kept coming around we got close. I might have even got a little annoying but she never seemed to mind. I would follow her around the hospital all night patient to patient she would explain everything to me as we checked every kid in the pediatric unit at St. James memorial hospital. As I learned everything I would always apply it to my brother thinking maybe that’s what he has if we figure it out we can help him. She even thought me what she called the most annoying part of the job but very important charting. After a long year in the hospital they figured out what was wrong with Anthony he has an infection in his liver that didn’t show up on any tests they had performed on him. They used this new test that isn’t widely used to infuse some kind of neon light into him to see if anything lite up and low and behold it did. I was sitting at the computer with Amy that’s the nurses name when we saw it I’ve never been so happy in my life we figured it out we knew how to fix him.

And that’s the day I knew that me Claire Warren wanted to be a nurse here at this hospital on the pediatric wing helping kids just like Anthony and maybe make a life changing impression on a young kid like Amy did for me. So today I walked into that same hospital for the first time as Claire Warren RN little did I know my life was about to change once again when I saw him.....

To be continued....