Why NOT...

[MedicMeJJB]

My question to you MSdelta is ... how do you learn to seperate? Is this just something I am going to have to learn with time, or do you have any tips??

 

[MSDeltaFlt]

My question to you MSdelta is ... how do you learn to seperate? Is this just something I am going to have to learn with time, or do you have any tips??

The answer is "yes". It is something you'll have to learn how to do over time, however, there ways to go about doing it en lieu of "tips" per se.

Sympathy and empathy are not the same thing.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sympathy


Sympathy is a social affinity in which one person stands with another person, closely understanding his or her feelings. The word derives from the Greek συμπάθεια (sympatheia)[1], from συν (syn) "together" + πάθος (pathos), in this case "suffering" (from πάσχω - pascho, "to be affected by, to suffer"). It also can mean being affected by feelings or emotions. Thus the essence of sympathy is that one has a strong concern for the other person. Sympathy should not be confused with empathy.

Sympathy exists when the feelings or emotions of one person are deeply understood and even appreciated by another person.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empathy

Empathy is the capacity to recognize or understand another's state of mind or emotion. It is often characterized as the ability to "put oneself into another's shoes", or in some way experience the outlook or emotions of another being within oneself. Empathy does not necessarily imply compassion, or empathic concern because this capacity can be present in context of compassionate or cruel behavior.

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When you separate yourself, you will realize and appreciate the fact that someone is going through a tough time, even the lowest of their lows they have ever experienced, but you will not truely "understand" or "know" what they're going through; very few if anyone can. You would have to live their exact same life experiences and suffer the exact same tragedy they did in the exact same way. But your job requires for you to treat that pt and their loved ones with all of the respect they deserve without getting emotionally involved. Easier said than done sometimes, we've all experienced this at one time or another.

The way I do it is, when I'm working on the really bad pt's, I'm usually too busy concentrating on what I'm doing to get emotionally involved. I don't have time and my pt doesn't have time.

You know some people might say bad things happen. Some say "crap happens". Some will even go so far as to use profanity and say ":censored::censored::censored::censored: happens". Crap, :censored::censored::censored::censored:, the degree of it all doesn't really matter. It's all mute. The truth is "life happens". The good, the bad, and everything in between is going to happen because it does happen. Whether you deserve it or not doesn't matter.

"Deserves got nothin' to do with it". - Clint Eastwood from the movie Unforgiven.

That's the best way I know how to explain this. Hope it helps.