full circle

Back when I was in my senior year of nursing school, a group of about twenty of us piled into a couple vans and drove from Pennsylvania to Kentucky for a missions conference at one of the biggest churches in the country. In a huge hall filled with representatives from missions all over the world, one booth stood out to me.

They were an organization that sent hospital ships around the world, providing healthcare to the poorest of the poor. Hope and healing, they said, we're about hope and healing. It sounded perfect, and, starry-eyed student that I was, I told them of my plans to graduate and start working in the neonatal ICU (NICU) with the itty bitty premature babies. The girl behind the table paused. Well, you can do that, but just realize that you might not end up with the best set of skills, since we don't really care for that population on the ship.

I was a little upset to hear that, because I thought Mercy Ships sounded perfect for me. I pushed them to the back of my mind, added their brochure to my stack and headed home. When I came close to graduation, I applied for a bunch of NICU jobs, even flying to Florida to meet with a potential boss. All the interviews went really well, all the managers said they would love to hire me. And none of them offered me a job.

I was, somewhat understandably, confused. I had done well at school, graduated near the top of my class, and had excellent recommendations and several women telling me that they wanted to hire me, for crying out loud. What was the problem? It'll perhaps be a little glimpse into just how perfect I am for ICU nursing (the part where it requires us all to be a little OCD) when I reveal to you that it was only April, a whole month away from even graduating, when I started to panic about my impending joblessness. So what did I do?

Fallback plan. I had been working at a hospital all throughout college summers, making some money as a nurse's aide in the pediatric ICU (PICU). They had already as much as told me they'd give me a job, so I tucked my tail between my legs and called Linda, the manager. My interview consisted mainly of catching up with my old bosses, discussing my recent trip to Zambia and chatting about what my orientation would entail. I was in. And the very first day that I stepped foot on that unit as a brand-new RN, I knew that I was exactly where I should be.

I spent an incredibly intense year getting my feet under me in that place, learning the ropes, gaining confidence and dealing with my first deaths. And then, just as I started to get comfortable, it happened. That quiet feeling that there was something different I should be doing, something more. I pulled out my stack of missions brochures, and the one for Mercy Ships caught my eye. They said NICU wasn't the best, but what about PICU? Maybe God had different plans for me all along.

I called the HR office in Texas, found out that I could apply after a year and a half of experience and come to the ship after two. Two years and a month after starting what I thought was my dream job, I quit it and hopped on a plane to come here, to what I've realized is probably a little closer to my dreams than I ever imagined.

A friend I graduated nursing school with, Sarah, emailed me the other day. Guess where I am? The conference in Louisville! I told her she had to go to the booth for me. I wouldn't know the people, but I wanted her to just go and tell them thank you on my behalf for being there, because who knows who might get to live their dreams as a result. She quickly wrote back.

So I went by the Mercy Ships booth and you were on the display ... I let out a small scream, then quickly composed myself.

I, on the other hand, am having a harder time with the self composure. I just keep smiling like a fool whenever I think about it. Because my life, it seems, has come full circle. And I never knew how right that could feel.