A portrait of someone you admire

¶ … heard a bump on the staircase landing at 5:45 A.M, I knew it must be my mom leaving for work. As a nurse anesthetist in an understaffed hospital, she must work every day of the week. She wakes up at around 5:30 every morning to get ready for work, she is part of the first flight of nurses that actually get to the hospital. Early in the morning she gets ready for work, she not only gets ready for all of her things, but she also takes the time to leave us instructions for the rest of the day. "Go buy milk from the store," "don't forget you have an appointment in the afternoon," or even sometimes "buy pizza tonight and watch a movie." In this way she shows me she cares even when she is not around.

My mom is not just a nurse, she is a nurse anesthetist. This a special type of who have received specialized training to administer anesthesia. Since getting this certification, my mom has both increased her salary, but also increased her working hours. Most nurses have to work hard because of the limited number of trained nurses available at the hospital. However, my mom is in a special position, she is one of three nurse anesthetists at the entire hospital, which makes her services in particularly high demand. She must be on hand early in the morning regardless of the day, she works every weekend, in order to supervise and help surgeons as they begin the process of surgical operations. Every day her duties include round upon rounds of checking on patients and administering anethanasia. Her duties not only include checking on patients pre and post surgical operations, but she must also be on hand during actual surgeries. Her work day begins at 6 am every day, and oftentimes do not end until 9 or 10 in the evening. Even when she is home, my mom is never fully "off the job," since she is one of the rare anesthetists she often has to be on call if a major surgical operation occurs or some other form of major problem during the evening.

There are countless occasions in the middle of the night when I hear her footsteps rushing out of the house to go to the hospital for an emergency operation. On these occasions she has to rush to the hospital to help with emergency procedures and many times these operations will extend all the way into the night and clear into the morning. Then she has to begin another day of work with little or no sleep at all. On certain days of the week my mom has no evenings whatsoever, she has to spend the entire day at the hospital and sleep their in the evening in order to keep the nursing rounds. When I see her after these all night stays she appears to be worn out and near collapsing it almost breaks my heart that she has to work so hard for me. However, even in these moments she makes time for me, and she always has a smile for me when she sees me.

Despite all of the responsibilities of her job she still takes the time to worry about me. When she has a rare day off from work she spends that time with me. We go out to eat, we have fun and just relax, and she is always asking me about my grades and about every other aspect of my life. It seems as if even when she is at work she always has a tab on me, whether it is a short phone call when I get home, or a voice message telling me to do my homework. I have never felt that she is away because she is always in contact somehow. When I don't turn in homework on time or otherwise shirk my responsibilities my mom is the first person to call me to task. Sometimes she makes me go to the hospital with her and do my homework there so that she could supervise me while still on the job.

In these instances I truly see what she has to do. My mom has become a master of multi-tasking, she handles her rounds with efficiency and appears always happy and crisp to see a new patient. Everyone has nothing but nice to say about my mom and she is one of the most respected nurses within the hospital. When I see her work, I have a sense of pride in her accomplishments knowing that my mom has so much responsibility and respect. On the other hand, I also know that she is such a personable individual and a caring parent. The fact that she juggles all of her duties and yet when she is home she puts all of her efforts into caring for me.