Changes

When I think about how I was feeling the past few months this picture sums it up perfectly.  I thought in March that if I went on vacation I would come back and my  nursing light would spark again.

Wrong.

The light was dimmer when I came home than before.  My thoughts were a jumbled mess.  I was spending more time isolating myself from others and feeling nauseated with headaches daily.

I did not want to work as a manager anymore.

It had only been 9 months at the time these feelings started and a previous manager of mine told me to give it a year.  I toughed it out and kept exhausting myself with going back and forth with my future.

Another trip away, another thought that it might be better when I return.

Wrong again.

Washington DC and the eight nurses I am on the Pediatric Expert Panel with reminded me of why I became a nurse.  I became a nurse to help vulnerable children in a time of need.  Much of my job is spent fighting with adults to try and get adequate healthcare and resources for infants.  Healthcare is looked at as a business, not a service anymore, making leadership difficult.

I prayed a lot.  I finally made the decision to resign from management.  I gave my manager two months notice and did not know what I was going to do next but figured I would get some sort of guidance with my faith and be led to an opportunity.  At church the priest said that "you need to let go of some things in order to thrive with your relationships with others, especially your faith."  I got goosebumps.

I love to travel, I have the experience.  Las Vegas and Boston offered me jobs immediately.  I was excited and I was going to go out of town for 13 weeks to get away since life smacked me upside the head this year.  Then the contracts came and I began looking for housing.  Unless I sell my house here in Michigan, I would barely be breaking even.  So I have until August 13th to decide if I want to go to Boston or not.....

But I miss Children's Hospital more than anything....couldn't I just go back there?  The place that molded me into the nurse I am today, the place that gives me hope, the place that has put some amazing patients/families/and coworkers in my inner circle.

Too many decisions and I do not want to make them.  I just want God to give me a sign of what I am supposed to do.  I am 32, I need to be an adult and grow up already!

Out of nowhere I was contacted by Davenport University about some opportunities there.  I went to the interview thinking there is no way that I will get an academia position a week before I get my Master's degree.  I not only was offered for the position I was interviewing for but additional better opportunities.

Boston can wait.  That can be a destination for me to get away and treat myself.  This opportunity in academia might not come up again when I want it to, but Boston could.

Back to Children't to work in a hospital that I absolutely love and as a professor at Davenport!  I cannot tell you the relief and happiness I feel right now.  Nursing gives us so much opportunity and we can truly make a difference in so many aspects of life.

Follow your heart.  Do not stay in a position that causes you nausea and headaches.  Be happy.  Listen to what God has in store for you and ALWAYS BELIEVE!