Twelve hours and three code blues later

There’s something deeply humbling about catching your reflection after a shift and realizing you look like you’ve been personally wrestling with the healthcare system all day. Which, let’s be honest, I basically have.

Twelve hours and three code blues later

Today’s highlights included explaining to a patient why they can’t eat a cheeseburger immediately after gallbladder surgery (“But it’s just cheese!”), mediating a family argument about visiting hours that somehow turned into a debate about who makes the best potato salad, and discovering that my favorite pen had apparently decided to leak blue ink all over my scrub pocket at some point during the chaos.

Jake took one look at me walking through the door and immediately started the coffee maker without saying a word. This is why we work. He knows the universal truth: sometimes love is just caffeinated silence and not asking why there’s what appears to be pudding in my hair.

The dramatic collapse portion of my evening routine.

Tomorrow’s Thursday, which means it starts all over again. But tonight? Tonight is leftover pizza, terrible reality TV, and pretending I don’t have to be a functioning adult until 6am.