It’s the nightmare phone call that every parent dreads they will get. My heart began beating out of my chest as I answered the phone. “Mom, the doctor asked me to call you. He wants to meet with the family first thing in the morning. How soon can you get here?” “I’ll be there as soon as I can. I love you.” That call was just one of the many calls, like that, I had received over the past two years. My son Ryan was dying from kidney and heart failure. It was, however, the last call like that, I would receive.

With every call I answered, my head and heart did the exact same thing when there is a crisis. My head and heart disconnected. My nurse brain would begin running the “nursing process” subconscious program it’s been running for forty plus years.  Assessing the situation, planning my response, and evaluating how best to implement a life-saving plan for Ryan. After all, I’d help save many patients over the years. This...

The most common concern I hear by the individuals I work with is this...."I’ve been feeling stressed out, overworked, overwhelmed and I have absolutely no energy left by the end of the day. I can’t go to sleep at night and if do get to sleep, my eyes pop open at 3 am, my brain starts racing 100 miles an hour, and I can’t go back to sleep. Do you think I have something serious wrong with me?"

Sound like anybody you know or love?

It is not surprising when one considers that most of us run at "break-neck" speed throughout the day trying to keep up with the demands of life. Most everyone I work with attempts to balance the needs of their children, aging parents, a spouse or significant other, civic responsibilities, and friends almost daily. Many tell me that breakfast and lunch consist of a quick bite of something from a fast-food restaurant eaten in the car on the way to the next meeting/event/responsibility.

 Am I describing your life now....?

Sounds...

Five minutes of stress can reduce the body's immune system function

for up to five hours.

Does the above statement surprise you?

Stress.  It seems so vague and non-specific. You may be wondering, well, what exactly is stress and why should you be concerned about it? 

Most people tend to think of stress as something that happens to us. We think that the situation is the stress.  Something does happen to  us, however it's what happens on the inside  that characterizes it as stress.

Stress is actually the mind and body's response to any demand that disrupts your balance.  The cause of stress (a stressor) can be a real event or an imagined one.

The stress response is commonly referred to as the "fight or flight" response.  We instinctively go into the fight or flight mode as a form of protection.  This natural response is a built-in mechanism that serves our higher good...to protect...

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I'll be sharing the journey with you as I have five...

In a heart stopping, can’t catch my breath moment, my son Ryan was diagnosed with kidney failure, and my life was transformed instantly, immeasurably, and irrevocably. Secondary traumatic stress, the silent killer of nurses and caregivers, became my future diagnosis. It was a condition I had experienced in the past while caring for my mom when she was dying with cancer.

Upon hearing Ryan’s diagnosis, my head and heart disconnected, fight or flight hormones surged through my body, my autopilot “Nurse Brain” kicked in, and my “Code Blue” crisis programming began running my life. The autopilot program ran my life non-stop for almost three years before he passed. 

Fear and the fight to keep him alive became my primary driving force as one of his caregivers. The 911 story that played on repeat in my mind was “You know what to do, do your job and save him.” God and Ryan had other plans.

Like so many other nurses and caregivers I...