...I was brought here in A-Fib. I'd had trouble with it for two years. This episode was serious enough to require a cardiazem drip. About an hour after getting to the PCU, I started to feel very strange. I immediately called for the nurse but before she could get to me my heart stopped. I was technically dead for 8 seconds when I heard someone calling my name. Then I felt someone squeezing my hand and saying "come on Jenna honey, come on back, you can do it." Then my vision returned and I saw her bent over my bed holding my hand and gently stroking my hair. She explained that my heart had "paused" for eight seconds. During those seconds I had none of my senses except for the sense that I existed. She shut off the IV and calmly explained what was happening.

This had never happened to me before and I was terrified. I had just moved to FL and my mom was the only person I knew and she was at work. She told me not to worry and that she was not going anywhere. Over the course of an hour, my heart stopped three more times. By then it seemed like half the hospital staff was in my room, but she never let go of my hand. Once the episodes stopped everyone but Julie left my room. She brought in her computer and stayed three more hours with me knowing that I was still scared. She acted like doing all her charting in my room was completely normal. I commented how hot I was and how I wished I had brought my little fan. She left my room for a moment and came back with a little red fan. She told me it was her personal fan but that I could use it for however long I would be here, that turned out to be a week. One of my other nurses noticed the fan; I confirmed it was the nurse's. The other nurse told me that she never works without her fan because she becomes unbearably hot without it. She also told me that the nurse never lets anyone borrow the fan. This all may not sound like much, but to a lady far from home and scared of dying this was everything to me.

I was fortunate enough to get her as my nurse upon my most recent admission. It was easy to see how everyone liked her and how her willingness to work as a team with her co-workers really made this a pleasant experience. I told my other nurses how she was my hero. They all seemed to imply that was just a typical thing for her to do. I know that those four hours that she was with me in my room during my first admission here, the other nurses were happy to cover her other patients while she focused solely on me. I asked one of the nurses why they didn't seem bent out of shape having to do extra work. They told me that she was always offering to help them so they were happy to help her. To me she personifies the expression "teamwork."

I have now been admitted five times here and never once have I seen a staff member from any department that wasn't smiling and openly friendly. My nurse just seems to rub off on a lot of people. It's her caring attitude that generates the enthusiasm. Her upbeat and positive attitude not only reaffirmed my faith in nurses in FL-Celebration but also helped inspired the will to fight and the desire to live again.