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Mary Leonard, RN, OCN, never imagined she would fill the family nursing shoes.
As a teen, the nurse at H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute in Tampa was determined to walk a different path from the nursing careers taken by her mother and sister.
"I wanted to be different, so I became a banker," Leonard said.
Soon family life took priority and Leonard became a stay-at-home mom.
"When my daughters were small, I wanted to be there for them. I did medical transcription, sold Avon," she said. "By the time the girls were in high school, I knew it was time to go back to school for a second career."
Choosing Oncology
Work in a podiatry office led Leonard to choose nursing, but innate compassion directed her toward oncology.
"I know I am making a patient's day better, helping her get through what can be a horrible time in her life," said Leonard, who works on a hematology floor.
Leonard typically handles four patients, often very high-acuity. She appreciates the constant challenge of her clinical and critical-thinking skills, in an environment where "anything can happen, at any moment."
"One moment a patient is OK, the next he crashes," she said.
Although the frenetic pace of a hectic shift might make it hard to find time, she said, it's critical to care for patients' spiritual and emotional needs, too.
"You have to make time to nurse patients' emotional needs - not just physical problems," Leonard said. "There are certain patients you can make laugh; with others, you just and listen. You become a [source of] comfort to them. The job isn't about you."
Rewards & Heartache
While she finds rich rewards in her work, Leonard admitted the job sometimes brings emotional strain. There will be bad days, she said, and not all patients recover and go home.
"There are those days when I get home and wonder, 'What makes you think you can do this?'" she reflected. "Then I sit back and calm down. When I come back in to see the patient, and he or she is just so glad someone is there - I know why exactly why I do this."
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