Integrity - Worth Fighting For

Reflections on COVID 19 - A nurses experience

Existential Crisis

When my career suddenly ended, I was tumbled around the wash cycle of uncertainty and financial crisis. Upside down, inside out and back the front, I found myself drowning in the murky waters of unknown territory.

Having been in the healthcare industry from the age of sixteen and having never been unemployed, my life felt unfamiliar and scary. There I was a professional, middle-aged woman, who had valuable transferable skills and knowledge, yet could not secure any job. Not for lack of trying mind you, although I had never physically completed a job application form in my entire life and had zero computer skills. So that was a learning curve in itself.

It was a very humbling experience joining the conga line of government handouts and having to navigate the online world of job searching. Not to mention the often-degrading attitudes of service employees who couldn’t care less that I didn’t grow up with a device in my hand.

Eventually, after nine long months, I was given a trial as a dish pig at the local watering hole. It was the most strenuous three hours of my life, and the busiest service of the year, being New Year’s Day. In all honesty, if I hadn’t already agreed to return for the dinner service, I may never have returned at all. But my determination prised my aching pretzel of a body off the lounge, and I continued to return, twice a day for the following year of arduous double shifts.

It was actually a welcome relief having no life-threatening responsibility. I enjoyed rocking out to my music while lifting mountains of plates, and sweating like a pig in food scraps. You may screw up your nose, but trust me, food scraps smell a whole lot better than human waste and manky wounds. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my career. It was varied, rewarding, fulfilling and humbling although after thirty four years, I was beginning to suffer from burnout even though a worked in private practice at that point and my job was predominantly administrative.

Eventually, I proved myself as a valuable kitchen hand, and over time, worked my way up the brigade, to become a proficient and passionate commercial cook, and have worked in busy commercial kitchens and on a remote cattle station up until the end of 2024. I finally reached my long term travel goal last year and it has been a wonderful blessing to be on this new and exciting adventure since.

COVID 19 turned out to be such a wonderful God job for me. All be it, quite harrowing, and life altering in many different ways, the universe actually did something for me that I was unable to do for myself at that time. I had known for a while that I was ready to move on in my career and my life, although I had never done anything different work wise. I literally had no idea how to change my circumstances. I had already intended my travel goal and was working at glacial speed towards that goal, dream and ambition. I had a mortgage, financial strain, a young adult dependant still at home, and plenty of complicated circumstances looming in the background.

I actually learnt so much about myself through that whole ordeal and I am eternally grateful to the universe for moving me through that time with integrity, courage and fortitude. It most certainly was not easy, and like every hardship and challenge I have faced in my little life, I have grown exponentially because of it. I am currently living the life I always dreamed of because I chose to face it and move through it, with trust, determination, resilience, and belief in my inner knowing. And of course my higher power, and the help and belief of my biggest human hero, my husband.

Integrity is always worth fighting for, because staying true to oneself is the cornerstone of authenticity. When acting in alignment with ones core values and belief’s, external and societal pressures such as bullying, harassment, stigma, alienation or forced conformity, can not penetrate your resolve. I believed in myself and trusted the universe to guide me to where I need to be. This whole experience has been the catalysts for great change and transformation in my life, and I’m sure glad I stood firm in my personal power and moved boldly forward towards my dreams!

The following is a poem I wrote about my experience.

Fallout

Healthcare my calling
Begun in youth
Strong patient advocate
Code of conduct upheld

Loyalty displayed
Bullied and dismayed
Sickness looming
Lockdowns booming
Boarder pass behind a mask
Interrogations a daily task

Contradictions, exemptions
Stomach churning
Headache burning
Against years of learning
My refusal yearning

Personal sovereignty a must
Self-responsibility I trust
Mandate enforced

Freedom to refuse
Crushed and bemused
Ethical dilemma
Squirming tremor
Courage to stand tall
Integrity above all

Termination imminent
Dismissed and ostracised
Disgraced and despised
Rotting waste, I could taste
and smell a sewer rat

Livelihood drowned
Still mortgage bound
Union hands tied
All help denied
Care swept aside

Self-advocacy applied
Australia in divide