As a first year student nurse I have almost completed year one of three, including essays, assignments, exams and OSCE’s as well as 480 hours of placement.

It has been an extremely challenging year at times, I honestly believe that if anyone says they honestly finished their nursing degree without crying, they’re lying.

I have celebrated with patient’s and their families when they have received good news, but also cried with families when they have had to come to terms with bad news.

I have found that looking after a dying patient is actually a privilege. Being able to make  someone comfortable in their last days is incredibly rewarding, especially when as a student you have the chance to spend more time with the patient and their family.

I had the opportunity to take one of my patient’s off the ward with his wife and daughter into our “Time Garden” which is a beautiful garden that was especially built for terminally ill patients. It was especially rewarding because the wife of the patient told me that they spent many of their married life in their own beautiful garden and had so many happy memories with their children and grandchildren. For him to breathe fresh air after months on the ward, to smell the beautiful flowers and see the lovely waterfall, made all the difference in the world to that family. I stayed in the garden with them and showed them where they could make hot drinks etc. They also brought a CD with his favourite music, which played along whilst the sun was shining down on them all.  I left them to spend time together as a family, laughing and crying to some of their favourite memories. After a while, my patients daughter came and sat with me, she was crying, and she gave me a massive hug and said to me this, is quite possibly thee nicest thing anyone has done for them since her dad had been in hospital. I know that’s not true, the whole hospital will have had an impact on his care throughout his time in hospital, but at that time, she was just so grateful knowing that his passing was imminent that such a small kind gesture had made such an impact on not only her father, but her whole family.

Although it’s incredibly sad that he was terminally unwell, and I had spent that entire week getting to know him and his family, I didn’t expect to become so fond of them all. I said goodbye at the end of my shift and he gently held my hand before I left. He looked me in the eyes, smiling and said “Thank you, Natasha”. I left that shift  crying and smiling that much, people were looking at me funny. I left that shift having made a difference. I will never forget the time I spent with this patient and his family, he sadly passed days later. I am so thankful I had the opportunity to meet him, his family and see him enjoy himself in his last days, something we all take for granted. I learnt that in our last moments, people wish they had spent more time with the people they love, not their things. That you had worried less, and forgiven more.

I have had an incredible journey throughout my first year, and despite all of the long unpaid hours, and money troubles  that particular day has stayed with me & reminded me just why I want to enter a profession that gives you so much back, even through the smallest of gestures. I don’t wake up on a Monday dreading to go to work like many of my friends, I also don’t get to go out partying like other university students, because I don’t have the money nor the time because I am either on placement or writing another essay. Despite all of this, I still I look forward to it, because it’s a job like no other, sometimes being able to leave work knowing that they may forget your name, but they will never forget what you did for them is the best feeling in the world.