Nurses renew annual vows

By CONSTANCE SEE

Whitefish Pilot

With a cumulative 400 years and two months of experience in the field, 11 active and three retired nurses renewed their vows at Colonial Manor on May 9.

Following the brief candle-lighting ceremony and cake, several nurses gathered in the office to share stories.

Julie Meeks has been a nurse since 1990. Over the past 15 years, she remembers a couple of times when a patient became blue and started slipping away.

"One lady was dying and I gave her oxygen to revive her," Meeks said. "When she came around, she asked, 'Julie, what did you do that for?' She died two months later. Sometimes that makes you feel sad, but I think most of them know when they're going to die and are ready when it happens."

Marilyn Pyke said she always knew she would become a nurse. As a little girl, she liked to hang out with both sets of grandparents and their friends. One of her first jobs was babysitting the elderly.

"I love the geriatric population," Pyke said. "People ask me, 'How can you work in a nursing home?' I say, 'I couldn't work anywhere else.'"

Pyke said when residents pass away, she knows they've had a long, productive life. She takes comfort in that fact. Working in a pediatric hospital would be much more difficult to handle when death occurs.

"A lot of times, God prepares us for it here," Pyke said. "We watch some of them suffer with long-term illnesses, and as they die, there's a peace that washes over their face when they're gone."

Rose McElderry became a nurse because she hates filing. When she joined the Navy in 1972 as a corpsman, all the other jobs offered to her required filing. She soon discovered nursing was anything but mundane and quickly grew to love her new career.

Patricia Kingsolver said she enjoys listening to the stories residents and their families tell, especially about the homesteading era when the Flathead Valley was covered with trees, not houses. She wishes more people would stop by to talk to residents and hear their stories.

"Long-term care is not just a place to come and die," Kingsolver said. "We're a family here. I went through nursing school saying I'd never work in a nursing home, but after about four years in acute care, I came back here. I got to know my residents, and I won't give it up again."

All the nurses said they enjoy the job because it allows them to make friends, and unlike jobs in an office or grocery store, they can share a hug or pat on the shoulder with their patients.

Building close bonds, the nurses said they cry when they lose a patient. Many attend their former patients' funerals, to process their own grief.

If she could change anything, Pyke said she'd try to help people who bring family members in, to let go of their guilt. When they first arrive in a long-term facility, patients can be nervous, but once they settle in, it's easier on them and the families, with 24-hour care and more than one person to do the caretaking, Pyke said.

A pharmaceutical consultant from Spokane came to visit Colonial Manor one day and gave the staff one of their most treasured compliments.

As she entered the building, the consultant said what impressed her most was how happy all the residents seemed. They were, she said, the happiest group she'd ever seen.

"We were all going to change the world one day when we first became nurses," McElderry said. "You believe you're going to, but you find out it's the world you work in that changes you."