<...I was a community health nurse for about 10 years before I returned to
the
hospital, and feel it is just where I am supposed to be practicing, and
believe you me, my work is cut out for me!  So, please encourage those of us
who do work in the hospital and are working to change things!  We need your
support!>

Linda and all of you who work in hospitals: as one who knows from long and
hard experience what you're up against, I will tell you my hat is off to all
of you! I've said it often in private posts, and I'll say it again here. I
have the utmost admiration for those of you who keep on fighting the good
fight, in the real front-lines. I couldn't take it any more, so you have my
respect all the more. You make a huge difference, and the work you do is
inestimably important, and you deserve the respect of all of us who care
about women and babies and families!

I am so very glad you are there! And one thing I did learn, and am still
learning: you never really know when something you've said or done has made
an important difference in the lives of those you are serving. The early
postpartum days are more than just "fog" and exposure to bad practices -
they are also a time of incredible openess and vulnerability, to the good as
well as the negative. So many times I hear (from women whose "babies" are
now in high school!) that "oh, you were the one who told me that_____, and
I've never forgotten that!", or "you were the only one that made me feel
like I could do this". You just never know. And part of what you do working
in the hospital environment is influencing  colleagues, which has a big
ripple effect - and again, you usually never know about it. (Until you just
happen to overhear someone who usually just rolls her eyeballs at you,
repeating to a patient or to a doc something you've said countless times,
thinking it was all going nowhere...)

So three cheers for you hospital nurses!!!

Cathy Bargar, RN IBCLC Ithaca NY

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