Held a patient’s hand last night, told him he was safe now, & I’d meet him in my unit as he got there. He nodded, smiled, & patted my hand.

He had Nike’s, like my dad did, laying on the floor. I smiled, lined them up, and, took it as a sign to watch extra carefully over him.1/

I took my eyes off of him for a few minutes to attend to another critical patient elsewhere & when I held his hand again chaos had erupted around him. After I had told him he was safe.

& in between chest compressions I kept seeing his Nike’s haphazardly kicked across the floor.

I hope his daughter knows that someone else’s daughter saw her father as just that, someone’s dad who was scared, sick, hurting, and alone.

& if she wonders I squeezed his hand, told him I was so sorry,& I lined up his Nike’s, like my dad’s, one last time before I left his side

This pandemic is stretching me more than I thought possible & weve not even begun to see the thick of it.

As this scene becomes more regularly played out, may I never forget as a nurse what it felt like as a daughter to see my dad’s Nike’s lined up in the ICU room one last time