The Teddy Award

No, this isn't about those skimpy nighties. This is about the true Teddy Awards. I will write the original here:

It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again...who spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly.

I believe we nurses deserve a Teddy Award. I believe we should be made to feel like what we do for our patients matters. Sometimes it just isn't enough to pat ourselves on the back and feel good inside about what we did that shift, about what happened and how well we handled it all.

Something is just wrong when the CEO brings food down to our break room and then says "Now bring those satisfaction scores up."

We truly spend ourselves in a worthy cause. We go limping home and try to rest and heal our sore spots and get ready to do it all again.

We wash off the blood and the gore and try to get the charcoal out of our clothes, and the thoughts of that homeless person we shuffled from one part of the hospital to another.

There are days it really feels like a strategizing game. Move this one here and that one there and get the admitted patients up to make room for more coming in.

Yesterday I passed the exam and am now a Board Certified Emergency Nurse. I feel great about it. It will get me no raise or promotions. But I did it.

I love what I do. I want to do it better every day. And I want some God damn kudos instead of having things I didn't do pointed out every day.

So everybody on my team gets a TEDDY AWARD, whatever that might look like. I love all of you.