The man in room 4.

To nurses and doctors and carers everywhere, this is for you.
Let me say first that I know you are busy, everyone knows you are busy, it's part of the territory and although noteworthy and deserving of much praise when handled well, it must be said that because it is such a well known fact that nurses and doctors are busy, I think, in fact I KNOW that you knew it before you chose your career. So, being busy is no excuse.
I am going to be specific in my particular gripe and talk about MY dad, MY mum, ME, however I would lay money down on the presumption that the world over there are other families feeling exactly the way we do right now. Listen well.
In room 4 is a man of 70 who is father to 6, grandfather to 18, greatgrandfather to 2, he has been foster father to innumerable children and teenagers, around 100 I am told. He has a wife of 48 years. He has one brother, his mother died a few years ago at the age of 99, his father committed suicide when my dad was young, in his teens.
He has worked all his life and even at his age, right up to the day he was taken ill, has worked and supported his family and others. He is beloved. He is respected. He is clever to the point of stupidity, genius often brings eccentricities and certainly sees common sense off at the door. When his father killed himself ( gassing himself under the stairs to be found by his oldest son) my dad had to forgo his scholarship to a prestigious university and work in a god forsaken car factory to help support his mother. When he met MY mother there and eventually married her he was told that he would 'get nothing' from his mother when she died.....she kept that promise. My dad helped his brother ( who never married because nana managed to prevent the chance he had) with all the legalities of that will without a murmur. He is a good man.
The man you see in room 4 isn't the man we all know. He is afraid and he is lonely and every day, through no fault of his own he is alone. He didn't bring with him the violent bug that has ripped through your hospital, he has been stricken with it and been forced to use a cardboard bedpan in a commode, he has been forced to feel humiliation waiting for you to empty it. He has been stuck in a room without his family and friends allowed to visit him. We are all trying to understand that for you, this is an extra burden on your already heavy workload, we're flouting your rules and pretending we haven't seen your handwritten DO NOT ENTER signs on the door, we are thinking up excuses for ignoring the NO VISITING rule, we are disinfecting ourselves and risking our health every time we walk through those doors ..why are we doing that?
We're doing it because the man in room 4 is beloved. He is ill and who knows, he could be dying and guess what? To hell with anyone who tries to make us stay away. There won't be a single day that we will stay away. He will see the face and feel the hand of someone who loves him every single day he is with you, whether you like it or not because HE likes it, it makes him feel safe when everything else is making his head spin.
I'm writing this tonight because today, when I 'popped' in with some clean sock,a C.D player, some batteries and a stack of Harry Potter book C.Ds so that while he is in that room and while he is too weak to read or do crossword puzzles or those Sudoku puzzles that make my brain explode at the very sight of them, he can listen to something he enjoys and maybe even take himself away to a happy place for a while...while I was standing across from your desk and was told ( without you even looking at me I hasten to add) that he wasn't in his room because he was having a CT scan and anyway the ward was closed so "don't bother waiting because we don't know when he will be back and the longer you stand there the more chance there is you'll get the bug" While I was taking in the fact that *sigh*you didn't know WHEN visitors WOULD be allowed, tomorrow is another day yada yada yada... I was overwhelmed by the urge to do something so outrageous that you would remember me for ever.
So I may get the shits ( pardon my language, I have no idea how to spell diarrhoea and spellcheck was no help, it wanted to replace with a choice of diary, dear or dire, the last of which is probably the best choice but I'll stick with 'the shits') I can live with that but I know I would never be able to live with looking back and wishing I had risked it for a chance to make my dad happy.
You were saved from who knows what outrageous act , by the gentle voice of a doctor who hasn't yet been jaded by the cares of the NHS or, just imagine, actually has a heart and is the kind of Doctor that everyone prays for when they, or a loved one, are really ill... when I said my dad's name, he stood up from his corner where he was obviously writing some notes, he came over to me and shook my hand , he introduced himself to me and he spoke to me as if I was the daughter of a man who is loved, imagine that!
I had asked one of you if we were right to be as worried as we are by this illness, you had stared through me and said " the doctor will review the scan results.. blah blah blah"
He told me that yes, we were right to be worried.....oh wait, dad has been with you for 8 days, I know that every time you come on shift you are given the lowdown on everything of importance pertaining to every patient. I know that perhaps you can't give details but what you can do is be nice. HOW HARD IS NICE?!?!? How hard would it be to say " it must be so worrying for you, tomorrow the doctor will have some answers, maybe if you call around sometime o'clock"
In 3 minutes that one doctor told me that dad is getting worse, his blood results are getting worse, they have no idea what the problem is but they are trying to find out. They have ruled out the obvious and remain baffled. He is ill and they don't know why.
Nothing he said was good news, nothing he told me was promising but the very fact that he looked at me and spoke to me as if I was a human being and took those 3 minutes to make me feel as if my asking a question was a normal and valid thing to do, well he helped me, he cared and isn't that what your job is? Don't you, when choosing to be a nurse or a doctor, by that very step, sign yourself up to thinking and CARING? If speaking to relatives and patients is an inconvenience, if it's just too much to ask, then for heaven's sake go and work in a car repair shop, you could look at every customer and suck in your breath, mutter about how expensive it'll be and no-one will be think a thing of it.
There is a scripture that says be careful to entertain strangers for thereby many have entertained angels unawares. What I think that is telling us is that we should be careful to treat everyone we come across with respect, we never know who those people are, they could be angels, who knows? Well I'm telling you that the man in room 4 is our angel, he has watched over us and protected us all our lives.
Everyone entrusted into your care belongs to someone, if not, well then those people deserve even MORE of your time, even MORE gentleness and compassion.
Please care for the people you have chosen to work with, treat these people as if they were your loved ones, try and be patient with irritating relatives who are terrified for their loved ones, imagine that the maddening wife, son, father or daughter is you, because God forbid, one day it could be.