Music for a Nurse

This is the essay I had to write for my nursing application. It was an impromptu thing, so I wasn't able to save it so this is what I can remember off the top of my head.


Two days before I turned fifteen, my older brother Andrew was diagnosed with bone cancer in his left leg. Over night, my life changed from one of getting good grades, practicing my violin and developing my then awkward social skills to understanding what it meant to have a port accessed, the purpose of EMLA cream and the foreign names of chemotherapy. I also learned what it meant to be loved unconditionally by strangers, many of them nurses, who instilled in me a burning desire to become like them and love those who are suffering. My brother's cancer has shaped my future to plan to become a nurse.

When I first met Diane, (whom my family affectionately refers to as 'Nurse Diane') I was less than welcoming. She was Andrew's home health nurse and when she first came all I saw was needles and pain and a trespasser in my safe home. Had I known then that she would become so dear to me I would have been much more gracious. Diane was responsible for the physical wellbeing of my brother in between hospital stays, measuring blood counts and such as you would expect a nurse to do. What was so remarkable about Diane was that she also cared for the rest of our emotional wellbeing. When I mentioned I liked the way she smelled, she brought me a bottle of her lotion. She remembered our birthdays and always spent a moment with each of us during her visits. I plan to be the kind of nurse that she is, healing all the pain of the whole family, not just the physical pain of my patient.

Another nurse that has greatly influenced me was Andi. Andi was the first nurse Andrew had and was responsible for teaching us what to expect from the painful and frightening events in the future. She explained the procedures honestly, but was also kind and gentle and inspired hope. Andi has since become a good friend of mine and is never too busy to answer my questions and fears about becoming a nurse myself, regardless of the fact that I was never her patient.

Unfortunately, not all of the medical staff we met during Andrew's cancer were extraordinary. Those who were impatient, unkind or unfeeling left just as many scars as the surgeons did. I promised myself that I would never threaten my patients with more pain, as Andrew once experienced. I will exercise patience and wisdom when it comes to enforcing "have-to" treatments, never acting before clearing explaining the procedure to help eliminate fear. I plan to be an equal with those in my care, not a superior and not an imposer. I will never do anything to cause more harm than good to those I am trying to heal.

Although the year Andrew fought cancer was one of the most difficult and scary times of my life, I am grateful for the nurses and other medical staff I met and the experiences I had that have shaped my future. Because of that hard time, I have empathy and understanding for those going through similar things. My life was changed by those who touched it, and I plan to pay it forward by becoming the kind of nurse who is also your friend.