I walk into a patients room, introduced myself and explained to him that I'll be his nurse. The next thing that came out of his mouth was "I'm sorry but you don't look old enough to be a nurse."
Granted, I don't look my stated age but don't disqualify me. Have you ever felt disqualified or judged due to your appearence? How about if you applied for a job, house, car, etc and were overlooked by the person due to how you presented yourself?
Whenever you think nurse, do you believe that we are managed by the doctors? Do you think the media portrays as accurately?
More importantly, do you believe everything you see? Do you believe in the quote "seeing is believing?"
I admit, there have been times in my life where I thought seeing is believing and have told others "well, I believe it when I see it". It was like I needed to have visual evidence to be validated. In all truth, did I deserve the validation? Answer: yes and no. I only deserve if the person providing me the validation is receiving the validation themselves. They should not give me the visual evidence to only satisify me.
So when the patient stated that I did not look 'old' enough to be his nurse, I had to agree but I validated him and myself when I stated "I know I don't look old enough but I'm more than qualified to work as one."
As far as nursing goes, no, we aren't just managed by doctors. We have a nurse manager, who is a nurse themselves, and manages us. Granted, we follow the doctors (and other health care professionals) orders but you'll be surprised with how much of your care is managed by us nurses.
Also, please don't believe everything you see in the media about nursing. My profession is more diverse and sophisticated than what the media may lead onto.
I would like to hear from you. Do you feel judged by how you look or what others may think because of what they see? Remember, not all seeing is believing. You do not know that person's struggle or what they went through to get to where they are.
Thank you for reading! See you next post!
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Always,
Barbara