My most memorable experience as a nurse

By Bob Goldnetz

My most memorable experience as a nurse is probably one of my saddest, but also exemplifies why I became a nurse and do what we do.

They never found out what was wrong with him. He had a lot going on from previous co-morbidities, admitted with COVID. All the tests were negative, but in retrospect they think he had tuberculosis.

He had been in the ICU previously and had been doing well. I had actually sent him to the floor. That was about a month before I came back after vacation and saw him again. It had been a month of complications and deteriorations. He was going to be transferred to hospice and life support withdrawn later that day.

He was unrecognizable; every kind of tube possible, swollen, pale, surrounded by IV poles all clustered with drips.

The family came to say goodbye. His mother and father apparently had become estranged from him. Unfortunately, they could not enter the room due to his COVID diagnosis. They had their own co-morbidities. So, impossibly, they said goodbye to their son from a small window in the door. As a new father I cannot imagine how they felt. I also find it unfathomable how to sum up what I needed to say or express from a 6×6 window in a door.  At that moment, several feet from a doorway to a bed felt like miles.

They asked me to tell him that they loved him. To let him pass peacefully. And to make sure he was not in pain.

It’s a great responsibility we face every day. Perhaps one of the greatest obligations we can only learn from experience is how to guide someone into passing with respect, compassion, and dignity. What a sad experience. What a humbling task. What an honor.

I was responsible for how he would leave this plane. I was the last person, the last human contact, voice, presence, touch, and energy he would feel.

I prepared as best I could to make sure he was comfortable. It felt quiet as we prepared to terminally extubate him. “Don’t Worry About a Thing” by Bob Marley came into my head and It felt right. I will never know if he could hear me, the music. But I like to think that he could and that it soothed him.

We withdrew the breathing tube and stopped his life-sustaining medications. He lasted barely a minute. I told him I was sorry. I was sorry we couldn’t do more and that we had not been able to save him. I told him that his parents loved him and everything was going to be okay; to not be scared. It’s okay. He can go. And he did.

So, although it was an incredibly sad situation, I think of what a mercy it was that he was allowed to pass in peace. What a courageous last gift of a parent to a child.

This is a patient encounter I still think about often. A time where I felt I fulfilled my calling. I relied on my experience, feelings, and instincts to provide what I think of as one of the greatest services to another human being. No one should be alone or in pain when they pass on from this world. As nurses, we deal with many moments of heartache. Sometimes we just have to remember that “every little thing, is gonna be alright.”

Bob Goldnetz is an ICU travel nurse who has worked at various levels of hospitals across the country. When he’s not learning how to be a new dad or taking care of patients, you may find him backpacking, snowboarding, skiing, surfing, mountain biking, paragliding, or rock climbing.