I realize that this post will be sliding past a whole lot of back story and dropping any reader into a context which may be unfamiliar. In my world, it is enough sometimes just to tell a thing and, hopefully, the blurry edges will sharpen in the light of time and further words spilled in similar fashion. Perhaps a sentence to offset this hope. I am a registered nurse who spent the first ten years of his nursing career in a modern, resource laden American emergency department and who now finds himself in a hospital in rural Kenya, attempting to learn their routines and find a role in which to serve.
"I wish I had a white coat" was never once uttered during my time as a healthcare provider in the states. My typical uniform in the ER was a black or grey scrub top and pocket heavy cargo pants. For me, white coats were never associated with nursing, save those in advanced practice. I was repulsed by the white uniform mandated by my nursing school, having spent multiple years in the dark blues and boots of the EMS world. But many things are different here in Kenya and the dress code is but one of them. I knew this going into my first day in Casualty (aka the
ER). However, I did not regard it as such an important factor. I did resist the urge to dress as I would at home and donned a collared button up shirt, feeling like I was going for a job interview and not preparing to care for any number of calamities that may occur. Not too casual for casualty, in other words. I quickly found that this was not enough as no one seemed to question why exactly I was there, a complete stranger from a strange land, barely even able to communicate in English at times (our English(es) are somewhat different). They wanted to know, "Where is your white coat?" Though said in jest, it served to further highlight the fact that I am not from 'round here. Thankfully, the welcome I received from the staff overcame their perception of my uniform deficiencies.
My second day in casualty I was expecting the fun that would be poked in this arena. I was not prepared to so readily adopt, even mentally the code of conduct in this arena. Every morning begins with the nursing report from night shift, a hymn sung and a devotional read. This particular reading was from the gospel of John, the scene in which Jesus stooped to wash his disciples' feet. The portion of this story that stood out to me this day was John's words about Jesus from verse 1. "...Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end."
A couple of hours later found us at the bedside of a young woman who was hypotensive and semi conscious from ongoing vaginal bleeding. Though no one knew the story when I inquired, her clothes, legs and feet were caked in mud. As resuscitation was being initiated, the nurse with whom I was working said, "She must be cleaned." He exited the curtained area around the bed and returned with a bucket of water and cloth rags. (The same we had used to clean beds earlier, just with clean water.) Though contrary to my instinct for a person with low blood pressure, we sat her up and swung her legs out over the bedside, positioning them over the makeshift wash basin.
As we knelt to scrub her feet free of the caked on mud I was immediately taken back to the story of Jesus with his disciples. The Lord of glory, found in human flesh stooped to wash sinful men's feet. He did it not out of duty or obligation but out of love. "He loved them to the end." I was reminded of the realization that I experienced towards the end of my time in the ER before departing to prepare for our move to Kenya. Over 17 years in emergency medicine my care for patients and interaction with staff had often become transactional, born of my job description and not of my love for serving people who are made in the image of God. This was not across the board, but frequent enough for me to take note. It was as if my heart had become as crusted as this woman's feet, in need of a thorough washing with the water of God's grace to remind me why I am in this profession. The eternal Son of God became a human (and remains human) forever sealing the worth of mankind in the Creator's eyes. In their suffering and sickness people are worth the work, worth the grace, worth getting dirty.
As I knelt beside my new colleague, dress shirt sleeves rolled to the elbows, flecks of dirt and drops of muddy water dotted the green fabric. And I found myself thinking, "I wish I had a white coat."
Comments