Depressed and Uncertain

[jlsmc8]

I used to work CVICU at my local trauma 1 hospital but during the pandemic became pregnant. I had my daughter in November of 2020 with the intent on returning to the ICU but had a stroke two days after her and found out I have a non-treatable neurodegenerative condition and Crohn's disease all within a matter of weeks. I tried returning to work for two weeks in the ICU but was still having severe mind-numbing migraines since it had only been around 1 1/2 months since my stroke. I decided I needed to be somewhere else for my health and for my family. I switched to a Monday-Friday job at a GI clinic and things were great in the beginning. I have now been there for a little over a year and I am being worked into the ground. We have been down a clinic nurse since may, leaving all of us left to cover the slack. I am covering the most doctors at four. I am answering patient calls, calling labs, calling pathologies, getting PAs for medications, placing orders, among many other tasks. I have gotten to where I dread going in to work every day. Our practice sees over 28,000 patients and I just can't keep up. As a nurse, I feel like I am failing every patient that I can't get back to. I used to be able to call within 1-2 days and now sometimes it is taking me almost a week to get to patients. I feel like I'm failing. I miss feeling like I was actually helping patients when I was in the ICU. However, I'm scared to go back. It takes time away from family and I'm afraid that I couldn't do it due to my past stroke. I don't know that I ever felt as stressed as I do now in the ICU though.