The Touch of Kindness From Chicken Soup for the Soul: Woman to Woman
By: Tricia Caliguire

“Why do you want to be a nurse, Patricia?”

The two nursing instructors and the dean of nursing sat at their table, squarely facing me as I sat on my hard, straight-backed wooden chair facing them. “Two thousand young people have applied to our program.” The dean’s voice came from across the room, “and we will select sixty of them. Tell us why we should choose you.” She folded her hands and looked up at me from the stack of application forms.

I hesitated a moment, wondering what the other applicants sitting in this same chair had answered. What did they say that was music to the instructors’ ears? I tried hard to imagine what they wanted to hear from me.

I thought my reason for wanting to be a nurse sounded simple and silly, so I hesitated and was quiet. It seemed laughable that I should be applying to nursing school at all. During my childhood, I was terrified of doctors, nurses and hospitals. I dreaded every office visit even for an annual checkup! So it was a surprise to many that I now had the desire to become that which I had formerly done my best to avoid. But an incident from my childhood was compelling me, and I drew upon that now.

When I was six years old, my parents were told I needed to be admitted to the hospital for some “tests.” They drove me to the children’s hospital across town on a cold gray Sunday afternoon. I looked up at the imposing building and then quickly hid my face in my mother’s sleeve. I tried to resist going in, but my mother and father were holding my hands and I was whisked along against my will.

We exited the elevator, and my parents led me down a long hallway. When we came to a large room that was divided into cubicles, we stopped. We were directed to one of the cubicles by a stern gray-haired nurse who pointed here and there, showing us where my suitcase should go, where my pajamas and robe should hang, where the button was to press so a nurse would come when we wanted.

My father went downstairs then, and my mother tried to make me feel at home. The gray-haired nurse soon brought a supper tray, but I couldn’t eat. Everything here was so different from what I was used to. So my mother picked at the food on my tray while she tried to entertain me. She tried to cheer me by talking about how some of the children there were very sick, and it was nice that I was only there for “tests” and would be able to come home soon.

I wondered why my mother didn’t have a suitcase with her. Wouldn’t she need some pajamas and a robe, too? After the nurse took the tray away, I learned why. My parents were not allowed to stay with me. They were going home, and I was staying there. They were leaving me, and I’d never been away from them before. As my mother slipped into her coat and prepared to leave, I began to cry.

“No, no, Mama, please don’t go, please don’t leave me!” I begged. She just smiled slightly and told me she’d be back tomorrow, to be a good girl and do what the nurses told me.

As I listened to her footsteps fade away, I turned over in my bed and curled up in a tight little ball, facing away from the door. I tried to think of something happy. I tried to think of songs I liked to sing. I tried to remember the faces of all my stuffed animals at home. I thought hard, but my thoughts were interrupted by another nurse who said firmly, “Time for bed.”

I sat up then, and she removed my robe and pajamas and dressed me in a hospital gown. I lay back down and curled up tighter than ever and wept. The lights were turned out then, and I lay awake in the dark.

Much later, I heard someone enter the room, where I still whimpered in my bed. “You’re not asleep yet?” a pleasant, quiet voice asked.

“I can’t sleep,” I said, trembling.

“Sit up a minute and talk to me,” the voice coaxed. I sat up then, and in the dim light I could see it was a nurse, but not one I had seen before.

“I want to go home,” I said, sobbing again. The nurse reached forward and held me as I cried. “I think I’m going to be sick,” I moaned, and my stomach began to heave.

She held a basin in front of me and wiped my face gently with a damp washcloth. She cradled me then as I calmed down, and I lay limp against her shoulder as she rocked me back and forth.

After what seemed like a very long time, she looked down at me and said, “I have some work to do now, so I can’t stay with you.” Seeing my dejected look, she added, “But maybe you could come and be with me. Let’s see.”

In the hallway there were low wooden wagons with mattresses and pillows that the nurses used to take some of the children outside for some fresh air. She brought one of these to my bedside and beckoned for me to get in. As she lifted me down to the wagon, I looked at her shiny name pin and read “Miss White.”

Miss White wheeled me out to the nurses’ station and parked the wagon by the desk. I watched as she sat and wrote, and every once in a while she’d look over at me and smile. “Want something to drink now?” she asked. I nodded and sipped the apple juice she brought, and soon I drifted off to sleep. Early in the morning she rolled me back to my bed, and I was so tired that I hardly noticed when she told me goodbye.

My mother did come to see me later that day, and the next night was not quite as hard to bear. I had to stay in the hospital for only a few days before my brief ordeal was over. But I never forgot how terrified I felt, and I never forgot Miss White’s kindness to a desperately lonely and scared little girl.

This incident ran quickly through my mind, and I thought for a moment before I answered the dean’s question. Why did I want to be a nurse? I straightened up in my chair and lifted my chin and said, “Being a patient in a hospital is a frightening thing, for anyone. Some people conceal it better than others, but all patients are afraid. I remember being a frightened child in a hospital when I was only six, and there was a nurse there who was very kind to me. She was the one who made my stay bearable.”

The room was quiet as I went on. “I have always remembered her, and I want to be the kind of nurse she was. I want to be the one who cheers up a frightened child, holds the hand of a lonely older person, soothes the anxiety of a nervous patient.”

I was accepted to the nursing program and worked hard to learn the skills and techniques necessary to provide the best care for my patients. On graduation night as I stepped up to the stage to accept my diploma, I thought of Miss White and smiled. She would never know what a profound influence she’d had on me. She taught me the most important lessons in nursing. She taught me the significance of empathy for the patient and his or her plight, of compassion in easing the difficulty of another. What she gave to me was now my own to give, the gentle touch of kindness that makes the difference to our patients and to our world.