4. Building resilience

Tears

"Sometimes it can be quite trying… you can see things that are upsetting"

Red Lips

"Important to smile and make them feel you’re happy to see them"

Feathers

"You spend a lot of hours in a working place. So I think if you don’t take a bit of yourself with you other people are missing out and you’re missing out too."

Leaves

"Like the things you’ve learnt, and kind of as your knowledge grows into the tree and the leaves come down"

Silver Diamonds

"Reflective listening because a lot of the time when people are angry it’s because they don’t feel like they’re being listened to"

Text/Writing

"You’ve got to be professional even when you are trying to be cheerful and things like obviously for them it could be quite so you need to be professional"

Blue Beard

"When I first got a job working with people it was actually working with children. I wasn’t that old. And it was the first time I grew a beard to need to look older than them so to actually sort of look like I might know what I was doing"

Feathers and Leaf

"It’s a word a patient used about me yesterday, she said I was quite gentle which isn’t something I’d identify with but I thought I’d go with that"

Word: PRESENT

"If you’ve got a challenging situation in practice trying to keep yourself in the present like keep your head like focussed in what’s going on"

Word: POWER

"We have the power to like change someone’s day"

Word LOVE

"Try and talk with as much love and compassion as I can even if it’s a difficult situation"

Crossword / Puzzle

"All it represents, might be a little bit of a puzzle, I might not quite understand why they, the patients have done the things that they have done or whatever they present with us"

Question

"Do we have anything in common? That’s just to think about do I actually have anything in common with this patient or can I relate anything to make it sort of more person centred"

Reflective practice, good for all

"I’ve put on there that through reflective practice I can help you so you get that experience to help patients more. It’s not only good for you but it’s good for all as well."

Feathers Next to Eyes and Question Marks

"I’ve seen quite some upsetting and distressing scenarios during practice which has made me question not only myself but question my mentor and question other people around me."

Red Nose

"the red is for, I have like a real bad problems with like bad smells and I feel like in nursing you come across it quite often. So this is supposed to be me not breathing through my nose and breathing through my mouth and that sounds really bad but it is one of my coping mechanisms especially in the community and that works for me."

Button

"The button kind of represents when people kind of push your buttons whether that’s the staff or the patients and stuff, just trying to keep positive."

Feathers Over Eyes

"The feathers kind of represent in situations where I feel like oh I can’t really watch but I have to watch because I need to know what’s going on. This is kind of like I can half see through my eyes, and I kind of half can’t, you know, this kind of thing."

Button

"The button is sometimes I need to shut up"

Red Cracks

"Personal experiences. So sometimes my cracks are that, my cracks, I can relate to people sometimes. So I’ve been through quite a lot in my own like personal experience"

Green Cracks

"Sometimes I crack with like humour even though it sometimes might be inappropriate but that’s how I deal with it"

Traffic Light Tears

"Red, amber, green ‘cause it’s kind of like the severity of it and how you know how your emotions might be more contained than other times"

Word: PROMISES

"I put that because someone told me once – never make a patient a promise you can’t keep because you’ll just feel worse for it. So that’s something I try not to do now."

Words: DO NOT

"I hate being told what not to do with somebody. I think that’s a really, like don’t fill in that form, don’t tell them that, don’t do this."

Word: FACTORY

"On the ward it sometimes feels like a bit of a people factory and it’s lots of processes and we’re always taught to be quite patient centred but it’s sometimes really difficult to do that"

Word: TIME

"There never seems to be enough time to do everything you want to do. Working, family, the course is quite intensive, if people have got family it’s quite a bit of a, challenge a lot of the time"

Make Up

"When my hair is done and my make-up is nicely done it just makes me feel more prepared for challenging situations"