I’ve been thinking about the world a lot lately.  I’ve been hearing a lot of people say that they want things to get back to normal soon.  While I would like that but I think that we all may have to adjust to a new normal until this virus is under control.

When I first got diagnosed with alopecia, all I wanted was to go back to normal.  I didn’t want to have to face a new normal for myself.  In this society, to be beautiful women are told to wear makeup, be a certain size, and have long flowing hair.  I don’t wear makeup and I struggle to be a certain size.  If I didn’t have long flowing hair, was I going to be attractive to men or to myself.  I had just fallen in love with myself and I couldn’t see myself without hair.  I worked with my life coach through my issues and I accepted my alopecia.  I don’t know if my alopecia will return in the future but I hope it won’t.  It was a grieving process that I went through.  I had to get used to having a huge bald spot on my head.

This week, I was had been planning to take the train to Seattle and go whale watching.  I decided that it wasn’t a good idea.  I work with covid patients and it is getting worse in the area that I’m in.  It wouldn’t be safe to travel right now.  I want to be able to travel but I have to not only think about myself but other people as well.  This is the new normal that I have to get used to.  I don’t like wearing a mask at work and when I go outside, but I do it because it helps.

Life is just a series of getting used to a new normal. 

For example, getting a new boyfriend or girlfriend is a new normal to adjust to.  Going through a break up is adjusting to a new normal.  Losing weight and eating healthy is a new normal to adjust to.  Getting diagnosed with a disease will be a new normal.  Getting a new job will be adjusting to a new normal.  Buying a new house will be a new normal to adjust to.  Getting a new haircut is a new normal to adjust to.  Getting a bald spot or losing hair is a new normal to adjust to.  Not being able to be with a loved one that is in the hospital is a new normal to adjust to.  Being a travel nurse and moving every 3 months is a new normal to get used to.

Sometimes adjusting to a new normal is not welcome like this pandemic.  Sometimes a new normal will thrust us into the grieving process.  Sometimes a new normal will change our lives for the better.

I learned that the more I try to fight a new normal the harder I make my life.

Right now a lot of people are adjusting to a new normal at the same time.  This virus has changed the way a lot of people are operating today.  I now have to wear a mask when I go whale watching, even when out on the ocean.

It does help to have someone to talk to about adjusting to a new normal.  That’s why I have a life coach.  If you need help, I am here for that too.  I’m training to be a life coach.  Message me if you would like details.

 

I was recently having a talk with my life coach.

I was explaining to her that I was nervous and proud of my parents.  My parents had attended a march for civil rights.  I was proud that they went but there was another part of me that was scared for them.  We are still in a global pandemic and my mother has respiratory issues.  I was nervous that she would catch the corona virus.  If she had told me before she attended the march, I may have tried to talk her out of going.

My life coach told me that my trauma working as a nurse was leaking into my relationships.

I thought about that.  As a nurse, I do experience trauma on the job.  There are a lot of emotional trauma and even some physical trauma.  I had seen some nurses physically hurt by patients and family members.  It is emotionally hard to see another nurse get hurt at work and then you still have to finish your shift.  It is emotionally hard on nurses to see patients die with no family or friends around them right now.  Nurses can talk about it with other nurses but most of the time we can’t share it with anyone else except for a therapist.  Most hospitals have a counselor but most nurses don’t use them.  I know that I’ve never used the counselor at work.

I’ve been a nurse for 15 years and I have seen some things.  I bet most nurses could say that as well.

Nurses have to wear a lot of different hats.  We have to be not only a nurse but a therapist, wound care nurse, patient advocate, and those are just a few of the hats we have to wear at work.  We can’t share most of the things that we go through because of the laws.  That is why it’s so hard to tell someone who isn’t in the medical field exactly what you do.

I also realized that it makes my life easier to live when my parents are in good health.  My life would change drastically if they got sick, especially if they were sick with the corona virus.  There is no cure or vaccine right now for the corona virus, I would just have to watch them suffer if they got sick.  I don’t know if they would be the lucky ones to have no symptoms with the virus.  That is why I was so nervous when they went to that march.  I do understand that we are also in another pandemic with racism.  I just don’t want anything bad to happen to my parents.  I just have to believe that as the Universe always takes care of me, then the Universe will also always take care of my parents.

I would say that most nurses have some emotional trauma from work.  It would do us all good if we got a therapist to talk about what we go through.  It may not be enough just talking with the other nurses.  That is one of the reasons that I trained to be a life coach to help nurses.