None of my pregnancies have been what could be considered normal, so I typically spend the better part of pregnancy worried until things drastically changed. At 32 weeks I was in a minor car accident that required me to be admitted to the hospital for monitoring due to a positive fetal/trauma bleed test. After everything checked out, I was sent home with instructions to return if I experienced any pain or bleeding. Five days later I was awakened in the middle of the night by the worst pain I have ever felt in my life. After calling the on-call nurse, I was instructed to head straight to labor and delivery. I was experiencing a partial placental abruption. This began a terrifying ordeal that led to a three-week stay in antepartum followed by the premature delivery of my son (and his subsequent NICU stay).
I don't remember the day I first met Janelle, but she quickly became a dear friend to my husband and me. Because of my case, I had to be on near continuous monitoring. As any parent would be, my husband and I wanted to know what everything meant. Janelle understood this and spent many an afternoon explaining to us what the doctors were looking for, and assuring us of our son's safety and care.
There are many things that make Janelle a great nurse. She is calm in a crisis, always reassuring to the mother and father. She is nurturing, as evidenced by her attention to the mother's needs. She goes above and beyond, noticing when a mother needs extra snacks, extra rest, and even an afternoon juice drink to pick her up. But the thing that stands out the most to me is how she cared for me at the most stressful point of my stay in the hospital. At 36 weeks it became apparent that it was time to deliver my son. It all happened quickly and caught us off guard, so we were understandably nervous. Janelle actually wasn't my nurse that day, but she did what was necessary to help prepare me for the C-section. As they wheeled me away to the OR she walked the hall with us assuring me the entire way that I was going to be fine and my baby was going to be fine. She had been here many times before and her calm demeanor was a comfort to me. I said goodbye to her, thanked her for her care, and then was handed off to the labor and delivery team.
In the OR I began to feel nervous again. I had spent three weeks in antepartum with nurses, like Janelle, who knew my case and became my friends. In the OR I knew no one and it scared me. As the epidural went in I felt a rush of panic and as I turned around to be laid on the bed, Janelle was standing there. "This is going to be fine," she told me. "I'm staying here until he's born." She wasn't required to scrub in for my C-section, but she did. She knew I was scared and she came to help me. She held my hand. She sang to me. She took pictures of our entire delivery, telling us what was going on when it became more difficult than we anticipated. And she followed our son to the NICU when he was taken down there after delivery. She stayed with him while they stabilized him and came back to give us a report on him so we knew he was okay. This all happened as her shift was ending. She didn't have to be there, but she was. It meant the world to us that she would go above and beyond like that. And it forever knit our hearts to her as she stayed with us during such a stressful time in our life. Once we were moved to post-partum, she came to visit us (and our son in the NICU).
Janelle cares for her patients, she loves her job, and she works hard to not only get the job done but do it with excellence and nurturing care. I am not the only patient who experienced this level of care from Janelle. I have heard of many others, and I'm sure many more will tell of her care during the duration of her career. She is a good nurse, and our family is forever thankful for her.