As I reflect on the last year I can see many ways in which my nursing background has helped shape the person I am today. Though I no longer practice nursing in any kind of traditional role, the knowledge and skills I gained regarding people and health, illness and dying, has helped me cope with not only the death of my husband and a new career, but has given me the hope and strength to carry on forward.
Nursing is far more than giving medications or treating wounds, it is a way of knowing, of viewing, and understanding the meaning of life as a flesh and blood human being. Nurses are a connection to the universal life and continuation of life that is part of every human story.
In this new year I hope you realize that as a nurse you have the capacity to help, and guide others, through a more spiritual understanding of each person's role and path, as they live, and die, and that you will always remember that your strength both as individuals and as a profession helps to bind and hold upright this fragile human race.
Wendy Getchell
