It was the end of the day when it happened. I had only triaged about 60 patients–a slow day shift, compared to the 120 patients we had been accustomed to handling. Slow as it was, I noticed I showed more concern for each patient; “is this one COVID positive or just maybe seasonal allergies?”
I wasn’t scared, that’s the wrong word. “Concerned” maybe? “Anxious?” I’m not sure exactly how to describe it, but I know it was different than before. Everything seems different than before. This is not our “normal.” But is it the “new” normal? Maybe “anxious” is the right word after all.
Anyway, the end of my shift was near, and I was looking forward to starting my new end-of-shift routine: disinfecting everything on me and changing my clothes in the parking lot when it happened.
I saw the house officer wheeling in a cart from the EMS bay. We use that cart frequently to bring in large amounts of food when we all order from the same restaurant. I hadn’t had time to take a lunch break because, even though we had not been busy, we had to reduce the staffing level to match the lower patient volume. Just because we are in a pandemic does not mean the hospital can forget about productivity and staffing levels, after all. So, even though we weren’t busy, we all still had to work just as hard as before–“harder,” I would argue, because we had less staff than we were used to.
So why, with thirty minutes left in my shift, was the house officer bringing in that cart? What was delivered? “Did they bring us dinner?” I asked myself. No, they never do that. This was something for the night shift.
As I got closer, I saw so many styrofoam food containers were piled on top of each other that they were almost stacked too high–almost falling over. It smelled like Chinese food (my favorite).
Was this some kind of mean joke? Bringing in a lot of food at the end of our shift? Wheeling it past each day shift nurse with the smell trailing behind like a tease. My stomach growled. My curiosity peaked. “Who ordered this?” “Why didn’t they bring us any during the day?” “The night shift just got here–why do they get all of this food?” “I’M HUNGRY!”
I began hassling the house officer, mostly jokingly. She told me that she didn’t know who ordered the food, giggling at my obvious jealousy. I followed her into the break room where the night shift was gathering, getting ready to start their shift. Their eyes lit up with joy when they saw this unexpected delivery–such a nice surprising way to begin their night.
Obviously being playfully sarcastic, I gave them a hard time, joking as if they had done this on purpose as something against their “rival” day shift. I left them alone to enjoy their meal.
ANOTHER CART. “Seriously??” This time, filled with multiple carafes from Starbucks!
Again, I followed the cart into the break room. (Jokingly), I burst back into the room. They all laughed at my fake anger and very real jealousy.
As it turns out, there was so much food that they could not have possibly eaten it all. Not to mention, one of them brought homemade dessert and someone else brought doughnuts. Of course, they shared all of it with the day shift nurses.
We are family, after all. Part of the same crew. All dealing with this together. And even in the face of this hidden thing that is making everyone anxious, we are still ER nurses. There is still time for laughing and playing and sibling rivalry between the shifts. We are still the same people. And, like the children we are, we will still fight about food.
