The Nurse Goes Back to School

I hate those Back-to-School advertisements.  I know they’re just trying to sell their overstocked 3-ring binders and Hello Kitty lunchboxes, but the mid-summer media jingles are like pins in my ears.  It happens every July, don’t know why I should be surprised.  And just as I have delightfully forgotten how my alarm clock functions, August has rolled around and impending doom (AKA the new school year) is an inescapable reality.   

  

It sneaks upon me just as I get used to the calm rhythm of sun-soaked living.  The evil calendar page turns and I am facing a mailbox stuffed with health forms and new medical records.  Tiny paperwork tasks join larger jobs of restocking and writing care plans, and before I know it, my to-do list is decidedly longer than my grit.

Wasn’t it just yesterday I defrosted the ice pack freezer?  I’m relatively certain I just waved good-bye to last year’s batch of frequent flyers. Guess not because in less than two weeks, I will once again experience the return dozens of anxiety-ridden children (impossibly 2 inches taller than last time I saw them.)  They’ll be sporting tanned faces, new haircuts, and have eyes wide with anticipatory fear.  Some will be ecstatic, but most will arrive with stomachs tied in knots as their new sneakers squeak down the shiny buffed halls of Penn View.       

                                                                                                        First day bellyaches are inevitable. Many of the known cherubs will check in with me before the first bell.  They need a little fix of nurture from the nurse they’ve known since kindergarten (not to mention some of my magical saltines to remind them that my office is still a safe haven.)  They’ve yet to meet their new teacher and it will be at least four school days before they are comfortable enough to ask said teacher if they can visit me again.  Some teachers will send them willingly- hangnails, broken shoelaces, or half-baked descriptions of pseudo-illness, it doesn’t matter- they’ll send them.  Other teachers are more judicious about wasting class time and won’t allow students to come to my office unless they are bleeding from the eye.  (Those kids see me at recess and during specials, when the homeroom teacher is a safe distance from the request.)  I saw a first grader once who claimed he had sustained a cardiac arrest in math class but was not given permission to see me for evaluation until recess…..

After a decade of this August to September pattern, the tempo is predictable.  You’d think with an entire summer to walk and be otherwise active, I’d be physically fit for my return to the workplace.  But factor in the annual consumption of sweet tea and it will become clear that once again, none of my work clothing is a comfortable fit.  But an easier snapping of trousers is soon to follow because I will start burning off my summer accumulation of bliss with the constant motion that is my job.  One days-worth of hand-washing alone is good for at least a zillion calories.  Throw in the hundred sore throats I check, the thousand times I duck when a snotty child coughs directly in my face, the myriad of Bandaids I apply, the ice packs I wrap, the tiny hearts and lungs I listen to, the countless walks to the farthest end of the building for the kid who repeatedly forgets to come by for medication, the numerous pokes to sweet little diabetic fingers for constant glucose checking, the jogs to the playground when someone is injured and “can’t move” and the constant lunch interruptions, and I’ll be back in shape in no time.        

So my life should calm down to a reasonable cadence by late November.  I’ll have a handle on the 100+ new students I am suddenly responsible for, I will have organized the mountain of new medications which will be dumped upon my desk the first day of school (some without names.)  I will have finally received the final emergency information card which was due prior to the first day of school but I find myself pleading for despite weeks of classes.  I will have tracked down the 20^th EPIPEN for one of the children with a life-threatening allergy (which was also due the first day and finally arrives after the ninth note to home and the third pleading phone call…) 

Notwithstanding the sudden and jolting shock to my relaxing summer, I am thankful for my job.  For there are things this job gives me that make it worth the stress of reorganizing my life every September.  This job gives me 550 little people to love.  It gives me a window into their lives and a chance to share a little joy with someone who might need me. It gives me two months every summer to recharge and remember I am something besides a nurse to children.  And it gives me a fresh start on a new page every new school year.  Who gets to start fresh in their job every year?  I can try to make things better.  And for that I am grateful.  I just have to remind myself of that when my morning alarm goes off next week and scares the daylights out of me.