Take a Walk though the Land of Shadows*

I worked a couple of nights this week. By nights, I mean that I go in at seven p.m. and work until seven thirty in the morning.

My body was confused as I tried to sleep all day before going in for my first night shift. I kept waking up during the day at mealtimes--then I ended up eating throughout the night, trying to stay awake. I also had a lot more caffeine than I usually do. On the second night, I took more vegetables to gnaw my way through (instead of higher calorie things) and that was slightly better. But I still had way too much caffeine.

The first night was very rough. There were the times in the night when I was sure I wasn't going to make it. The first one came early--around midnight, five hours into my shift. I thought I was going to have to ask to go home, I was so exhausted it was painful. I had more caffeine and white-knuckled consciousness until it kicked in. The second painful moment came around two or two thirty in the morning, when the caffeine had worn off and I was sure I wouldn't make it through the end of the shift, another five hours away. So I had more caffeine. Then I had more caffeine. Then I had more caffeine. Around five, I had more caffeine and started counting down until seven, when my relief was due in.

Between the moments of painful exhaustion, there were parts of the night that The Brain liked, too. I like moving about the campus in the night, for example. Everything is quiet, well-lit, and locked down--badges or a key (sometimes both) are needed to get in every single door and we carry walkie-talkies and hospital cell phones, safety measures that keep the kids safe and keep us in contact with each other at all times. As a result, I don't have the same worries about walking around alone at night that I would have if I were not at work. Sometimes I can see shadowy others across the campus moving about from place to place, and on their breaks some of my co-workers walk the lighted track at the far end of the campus as exercise. (I did, too, on the second night, when I had finished my charting and needed to get out of the cramped office for some fresh air.)

At dawn, I went out again and looked at the new day. The hospital campus slopes slightly downward and from the path at the high point there is a clear view across the valley, all the way out to the still-sleeping volcanoes. Outside it was calm and quiet and the light had that soft, new feel to it and standing in it I knew I had made it through the night.

The second night was easier, but just as caffeine filled. There is a rush of work at the start of the shift, medications to give and assessments to be done before the kids go to bed, then there is the inevitable charting, then a handful of routine tasks to be completed, and then a lot of peaceful silence. I like that part, the peaceful silence--if I can stay awake, I like that part.

On the second night, I worked with a woman who happened to have worked with my mother a long time ago. I like her a lot and I'm sad that I don't think I'll be working with her very much from this point forward. We chatted away though some of the longer hours in the night. I'm always glad to meet smart, sarcastic women. This is one of the great joys of life, in my opinion.

The person who came both mornings to relieve me is. . . I can't even describe him except to say that on the second night, I compared him to Yogi Bear. (My mother's friend laughed when I said this and said that she thought we were going  to get along great.) He's a well-meaning idiot. See what I mean, Boo-Boo?

I came home after both shifts and I slept. And slept. And slept. And now it's three-thirty in the morning and I'm wide awake. The Brain loves that topsy-turvy feeling of starting the day as everyone is finishing theirs and finishing as everyone is starting.

(*"Take a walk through the land of shadows" is from Memories Can't Wait by the Talking Heads. The other title choice was "Straight on 'til morning," which is, of course, from "Second star to the right and straight on 'til morning," from J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan. The Talking Heads only won out because I'm a child of the 80s--the song is from 1982--and, believe it or not, I have never read Peter Pan.)