Jodi Olson, RN

There are some things you just can’t prepare for. You can have all the right staff, you can have all the right things, but you don’t know what those patients are going to bring through the door. We had all these plans coming into the pandemic, and some just got thrown right out the window. And some were like, ‘Okay, we need to do this right now.’

So I think it’s just having the right team there to identify what the problems are. There’s so much that goes into it and I think we did the best we could. I don’t know how you can prepare for a pandemic, honestly – you just need to all be on the same page and make sure that you’re taking care of your patients the best way that you can. That’s the biggest thing.

In nursing, there are times when it’s really, really tough. Then there are those moments where people are thankful for your care and so appreciative of the knowledge you have. Those are the glimmers of hope and that’s why I’m doing what I’m doing. It’s not going to be perfect 100% of the time, but nothing is. There’s no profession that’s rainbows and butterflies all the time.