Wound Care Nurse Quotes

What was she thinking?” muttered Alexander, closing his eyes and imagining his Tania. “She was determined. It was like some kind of a personal crusade with her,” Ina said. “She gave the doctor a liter of blood for you—” “Where did she get it from?” “Herself, of course.” Ina smiled. “Lucky for you, Major, our Nurse Metanova is a universal donor.” Of course she is, thought Alexander, keeping his eyes tightly shut. Ina continued. “The doctor told her she couldn’t give any more, and she said a liter wasn’t enough, and he said, ‘Yes, but you don’t have more to give,’ and she said, ‘I’ll make more,’ and he said, ‘No,’ and she said, ‘Yes,’ and in four hours, she gave him another half-liter of blood.” Alexander lay on his stomach and listened intently while Ina wrapped fresh gauze on his wound. He was barely breathing. “The doctor told her, ‘Tania, you’re wasting your time. Look at his burn. It’s going to get infected.’ There wasn’t enough penicillin to give to you, especially since your blood count was so low.” Alexander heard Ina chuckle in disbelief. “So I’m making my rounds late that night, and who do I find next to your bed? Tatiana. She’s sitting with a syringe in her arm, hooked up to a catheter, and I watch her, and I swear to God, you won’t believe it when I tell you, Major, but I see that the catheter is attached to the entry drip in your IV.” Ina’s eyes bulged. “I watch her draining blood from the radial artery in her arm into your IV. I ran in and said, ‘Are you crazy? Are you out of your mind? You’re siphoning blood from yourself into him?’ She said to me in her calm, I-won’t-stand-for-any-argument voice, ‘Ina, if I don’t, he will die.’ I yelled at her. I said, ‘There are thirty soldiers in the critical wing who need sutures and bandages and their wounds cleaned. Why don’t you take care of them and let God take care of the dead?’ And she said, ‘He’s not dead. He is still alive, and while he is alive, he is mine.’ Can you believe it, Major? But that’s what she said. ‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ I said to her. ‘Fine, die yourself. I don’t care.’ But the next morning I went to complain to Dr. Sayers that she wasn’t following procedure, told him what she had done, and he ran to yell at her.” Ina lowered her voice to a sibilant, incredulous whisper. “We found her unconscious on the floor by your bed. She was in a dead faint, but you had taken a turn for the better. All your vital signs were up. And Tatiana got up from the floor, white as death itself, and said to the doctor coldly, ‘Maybe now you can give him the penicillin he needs?’ I could see the doctor was stunned. But he did. Gave you penicillin and more plasma and extra morphine. Then he operated on you, to get bits of the shell fragment out of you, and saved your kidney. And stitched you. And all that time she never left his side, or yours. He told her your bandages needed to be changed every three hours to help with drainage, to prevent infection. We had only two nurses in the terminal wing, me and her. I had to take care of all the other patients, while all she did was take care of you. For fifteen days and nights she unwrapped you and cleaned you and changed your dressings. Every three hours. She was a ghost by the end. But you made it. That’s when we moved you to critical care. I said to her, ‘Tania, this man ought to marry you for what you did for him,’ and she said, ‘You think so?’ ” Ina tutted again. Paused. “Are you all right, Major? Why are you crying?

They all looked up sharply as the door to the back opened. Blue and Maura stepped into the waiting room as a nurse began to shuffle behind the counter. All attention immediately shifted to Blue. She had two visible stiches in her right eyebrow, pinning together the cleaned-up edges of a gouge that continued down her cheek. Faint scratches on either side of the deepest wound told the story of fingers clawing into her skin. Her right eye was squinted mostly shut, but at least it was still there. Adam could tell that she was hurting. He knew he cared about her because his stomach was tingling uncomfortably just looking at her wound, the suggestion of violence scratching through him like fingers on a chalkboard. Noah had done that. Adam curled his own hand into a fist, remembering what it had felt like for it to move on its own accord. Gansey was right: Any of them could have died tonight. It was time to stop playing around. For a strange second, none of them spoke. Finally, Ronan said, “Jesus God, Sargent. Do you have stitches on your face? Bad. Ass. Put it here, you asshole.” With some relief, Blue lifted her fist and bumped it against his.

The very fact that they were naturally caring and loving would be the milestone that weighed them down. The formula is perfect. The nurse becomes willing to sacrifice herself in the patient. But the patient isn’t suffering from an external illness, he’s suffering from self-inflicted wounds. The nurse wants to prevent him from this pain. The patient wants her to feel the pain, too.

The wounded surgeon plies the steel That questions the distempered part; Beneath the bleeding hands we feel The sharp compassion of the healer’s art Resolving the enigma of the fever chart. Our only health is the disease If we obey the dying nurse Whose constant care is not to please But remind of our, and Adam’s curse, And that, to be restored, our sickness must grow worse. The whole earth is our hospital Endowed by the ruined millionaire

I knew getting high wasn’t a long-term solution. But God, it’s so easy. It’s just so easy. But of course, it’s not easy at all, either. Because one minute you’re just trying to nurse a wound. And the next, you’re desperately trying to hide the fact that you’re now a jury-rigged, taped-up, shortcutted mess of a person and the wound you were nursing has become an abscess. But I was skinny and pretty so who cared, right?

But of course, it’s not easy at all, either. Because one minute you’re just trying to nurse a wound. And the next, you’re desperately trying to hide the fact that you’re not a jury-rigged, taped-up, short-cutted mess of a person and the wound you were nursing had become an abscess. But I was skinny and pretty so who cared, right?

I found the head nurse and asked her, and she said Dan has been flown back to America on account of they can take better care of him there. I asked her if he is okay, and she said, 'Yeah, if you can call two punctured lungs, a severed intestine, spinal separation, a missing foot, a truncated leg, and third degree burns over half the body okay, then he is just fine. I thanked her, and went on my way.

The wounded surgeon plies the steel That questions the distempered part; Beneath the bleeding hands we feel The sharp compassion of the healer’s art Resolving the enigma of the fever chart. Our only health is the disease If we obey the dying nurse Whose constant care is not to please But remind of our, and Adam’s curse, And that, to be restored, our sickness must grow worse. The whole earth is our hospital Endowed by the ruined millionaire

I have decided to bless everyone who curses me. I have determined to hold no grudges, nurse no wounds, nurture no disappointments, and hang on to no resentments. I will process my anger and pain at all costs, and I will forgive my enemies.

Heart; I named my lass sweetly; She danced to the mundane tunes of daftness; By nature she was midsummer madness; Or rather a reckless, careless, devil-may-care colleen. I pampered all her hefty desires; Brain; my friend said treat her with caution; For she is a child; doesn’t ruminate her action; You are mother, with deep devotion. And one fine day came the tempest darling; She named him love, besotted and infatuated; Enchanted by his charms, smelled the roses; Failed to see the thorns that pricked. And drip-drip-drip, the blood it dripped; When her beloved tossed and crushed her core; She knew not how to stand up straight; I opened my eyes and the driblets fell. Don’t nurse her; said my friend; my brain; For she is a demented lass not worth the pain; She will go away when her wounds are dried; To her unmoved brutal hero, Love. A mother cannot be unmoved, I cried; For all this time, I held her high; I knocked at your door, you flinty villain; Not to hear, all that you said. Call me a demon or a dragon; For all I will say is don’t nurse the brat; Let her bleed and cry for some more time; She will get up; for she is your child. All he said was unerred truth; She bled and nursed her own wounds; She drove me to her hero’s place; And said, “This is where my poem stays.

I displayed from my earliest years the greatest sensibility of disposition. I cannot say with what passion I loved every thing even the inanimate objects that surrounded me. I believe that I bore an individual attachment to every tree in our park; every animal that inhabited it knew me and I loved them. Their occasional deaths filled my infant heart with anguish. I cannot number the birds that I have saved during the long and severe winters of that climate; or the hares and rabbits that I have defended from the attacks of our dogs, or have nursed when accidentally wounded.

In the morning, real nurses taught us the rudiments of anatomy and instructed us in the preparation of dressings and bandages. But then in the afternoon, representatives of the Frauenschaft, the women’s auxiliary of the Nazi Party, came to instruct us in our real mission: to boost the morale of the wounded and spread the propaganda of German invincibility. “You must make sure that every single soldier in your care knows that, despite the cowardly British air attack last May, the Cologne cathedral is still standing,” said the sturdy, uniformed instructor. “You must also tell everyone that there has been no bombing in the Rhineland. Am I clear?” “Yes, ma’am,” we all said. In fact, the Rhineland was being crushed by Allied air attacks.

IV.The wounded surgeon plies the steelThat questions the distempered part;Beneath the bleeding hands we feelThe sharp compassion of the healer's artResolving the enigma of the fever chart.Our only health is the diseaseIf we obey the dying nurseWhose constant care is not to pleaseBut to remind of our, and Adam's curse,And that, to be restored, our sickness must grow worse.The whole earth is our hospitalEndowed by the ruined millionaire,Wherein, if we do well, we shallDie of the absolute paternal careThat will not leave us, but prevents us everywhere.The chill ascends from feet to knees,The fever sings in mental wires.If to be warmed, then I must freezeAnd quake in frigid purgatorial firesOf which the flame is roses, and the smoke is briars.The dripping blood our only drink,The bloody flesh our only food:In spite of which we like to thinkThat we are sound, substantial flesh and bloodAgain, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.

They all looked up sharply as the door to the back opened. Blue and Maura stepped into the waiting room as a nurse began to shuffle behind the counter. All attention immediately shifted to Blue. She had two visible stitches in her right eyebrow, pinning together the cleaned-up edges of a gouge that continued down her cheek. Faint scratches on either side of the deepest wound told the story of fingers clawing into her skin. Her right eye was squinted mostly shut, but at least it was still there. Adam could tell she was hurting. He knew he cared about her because his stomach was tingling uncomfortably just looking at her wound, the suggestion of violence scratching through him like fingers on a chalkboard. Noah had done that. Adam curled his own hand into a fist, remembering what it had felt like for it to move on its own accord. Gansey was right: Any of them could have died tonight. It was time to stop playing around. For a strange second, none of them spoke. Finally, Ronan said, "Jesus God, Sargent. Do you have stitched on your face? Bad. Ass. Put it here, you asshole." With some relief, Blue lifted her fist and bumped it against his.

Hunter filled the opening in the privacy curtains. He wore green scrubs like the doctors and nurses who had scraped me off the pavement. For a split second I mistook him for an adorable doctor who looked a lot like Hunter. I knew it was Hunter when he gaped at me with a mixture of outrage and horror, his face pale, and demanded, “What did you do?” “Crossed the street,” I said. “Badly.” Wincing, I eased up from the gurney, putting my weight on my hand and my good hip. Only a few minutes had passed since they had brought me in, ascertained I wasn’t dying, and dumped me here. I still felt very shaky from the shock of being hit. But I didn’t want to face Hunter lying down. In two steps he bent over me and wrapped his arms around me. He was careful not to press on my hospital gown low against my back where the road rash was, but his touch on my shoulders radiated pain to the raw parts. I winced again. “Oh, God. I’m sorry.” He let me go but hovered over me, placing his big hands on my shoulder blades. He was so close that the air felt hot between us. “What did you hurt?” “This is just where I skidded across the road.” I gestured behind my back and then flinched at the sting in my skin as I moved my arm. “How far down does it go?” My back felt cold as he lifted on flap of my paper gown and looked. I kept my head down, my red cheeks hidden. He was peering at my back where my skin was missing. What could be sexier? Even if the circumstances had been happier, I was wearing no makeup and I was sure my hair was matted from my scarf. There was no reason for my blood to heat as if we were on a date instead of a gurney. But my body did not listen to logic when it came to Hunter. He was no examining my wound. He was captivated by the sight of my lovely and unblemished bottom. I was a novelist. I could dream, couldn’t I? Lightly I asked, “Are you asking whether I have gravel embedded in my ass? By the grace of God, no.” Hunter let my gown go and stood up “The doc said the car hit your hip,” he insisted. “Is it broken?” I rolled on my side to face him. “It really hurts,” I said. “If it were broken, I think it would hurt worse.” He nodded. “When I broke my ribs, I couldn’t breathe.” “That’s because your ribs punctured your lung.” He pointed at me. “True.” Then he cocked his head to one side, blond hair falling into his eyes. “I’m surprised you remember that.

These seasons of suffering have a way of exposing the deepest parts of ourselves and reminding us that we’re not the people we thought we were. People in the valley have been broken open. They have been reminded that they are not just the parts of themselves that they put on display. There is another layer to them they have been neglecting, a substrate where the dark wounds, and most powerful yearnings live. Some shrivel in the face of this kind of suffering. They seem to get more afraid and more resentful. They shrink away from their inner depths in fear. Their lives become smaller and lonelier. We all know old people who nurse eternal grievances. They don’t get the respect they deserve. They live their lives as an endless tantrum about some wrong done to them long ago. But for others, this valley is the making of them. The season of suffering interrupts the superficial flow of everyday life. They see deeper into themselves and realize that down in the substrate, flowing from all the tender places, there is a fundamental ability to care, a yearning to transcend the self and care for others. And when they have encountered this yearning, they are ready to become a whole person.

Eight Bells: Robert J. Kane ‘55D died June 3, 2017, in Palm Harbor, Florida. He came to MMA by way of Boston College. Bob or “Killer,” as he was affectionately known, was an independent and eccentric soul, enjoying the freedom of life. After a career at sea as an Officer in the U.S. Navy and in the Merchant Marine he retired to an adventurous single life living with his two dogs in a mobile home, which had originally been a “Yellow School Bus.” He loved watching the races at Daytona, Florida, telling stories about his interesting deeds about flying groceries to exotic Caribbean Islands, and misdeeds with mysterious ladies he had known. For years he spent his summers touring Canada and his winters appreciating the more temperate weather at Fort De Soto in St. Petersburg, Florida…. Enjoying life in the shadow of the Sunshine Bridge, Bob had an artistic flare, a positive attitude and a quick sense of humor. Not having a family, few people were aware that he became crippled by a hip replacement operation gone bad at the Bay Pines VA Hospital. His condition became so bad that he could hardly get around, but he remained in good spirits until he suffered a totally debilitating stroke. For the past 6 years Bob spent his time at various Florida Assisted Living Facilities, Nursing Homes and Palliative Care Hospitals. His end came when he finally wound up as a terminal patient at the Hospice Facility in Palm Harbor, Florida. Bob was 86 years old when he passed. He will be missed….

Fifteen years ago, Israeli scientists published a study in which engineers observed patient care in ICUs for twenty-four-hour stretches. They found that the average patient required 178 individual actions per day, ranging from administering a drug to suctioning the lungs, and every one of them posed risks. Remarkably, the nurses and doctors were observed to make an error in just 1 percent of these actions—but that still amounted to an average of two errors a day with every patient. Intensive care succeeds only when we hold the odds of doing harm low enough for the odds of doing good to prevail. This is hard. There are dangers simply in lying unconscious in bed for a few days. Muscles atrophy. Bones lose mass. Pressure ulcers form. Veins begin to clot. You have to stretch and exercise patients’ flaccid limbs daily to avoid contractures; you have to give subcutaneous injections of blood thinners at least twice a day, turn patients in bed every few hours, bathe them and change their sheets without knocking out a tube or a line, brush their teeth twice a day to avoid pneumonia from bacterial buildup in their mouths. Add a ventilator, dialysis, and the care of open wounds, and the difficulties only accumulate.

They all looked up sharply as the door to the back opened. Blue and Maura stepped into the waiting room as a nurse began to shuffle behind the counter. All attention immediately shifted to Blue. She had two visible stitches in her right eyebrow, pinning together the cleaned-up edges of a gouge that continued down her cheek. Faint scratches on either side of the deepest wound told the story of fingers clawing into her skin. Her right eye was squinted mostly shut, but at least it was still there. Adam could tell she was hurting. He knew he cared about her because his stomach was tingling uncomfortably just looking at her wound, the suggestion of violence scratching through him like fingers on a chalkboard. Noah had done that. Adam curled his own hand into a fist, remembering what it had felt like for it to move on its own accord. Gansey was right: Any of them could have died tonight. It was time to stop playing around. For a strange second, none of them spoke. Finally, Ronan said, "Jesus God, Sargent. Do you have stitches on your face? Bad. Ass. Put it here, you asshole." With some relief, Blue lifted her fist and bumped it against his.

They all looked up sharply as the door to the back opened. Blue and Maura stepped into the waiting room as a nurse began to shuffle behind the counter. All attention immediately shifted to Blue. She had two visible stitches in her right eyebrow, pinning together the cleaned-up edges of a gouge that continued down her cheek. Faint scratches on either side of the deepest wound told the story of fingers clawing into her skin. Her right eye was squinted mostly shut, but at least it was still there. Adam could tell she was hurting. He knew he cared about her because his stomach was tingling uncomfortably just looking at her wound, the suggestion of violence scratching through him like fingers on a chalkboard. Noah had done that. Adam curled his own hand into a fist, remembering what it had felt like for it to move on its own accord. Gansey was right: Any of them could have died tonight. It was time to stop playing around. For a strange second, none of them spoke. Finally, Ronan said, "Jesus God, Sargent. Do you have stitches on your face? Bad. Ass. Put it here, you asshole." With some relief, Blue lifted her fist and bumped it against his.

While further exploring the first floor of the hospital, the friends discovered a dusty room filled with old photographs and crumbling letters; the room was labeled “Archives”. One picture caught their attention — a group of children in tattered school uniforms, their faces frozen in time. The letters spoke of longing and loneliness, and the pain of separation. “These kids do not look like they were at this school according to their own will. They look very sad, almost disturbed.” Emily said as she looked around, cautious of what may be in the basement of this place. Continuing on the main floor, a second room also had file cabinets in it but had no name on the door. Inside the room was an article from the Mountainside times of a time when the hospital had its own tale of tragedy and despair. During the war, the medical facility had been overwhelmed with wounded soldiers, and the staff struggled to provide adequate care. Rumors circulated of a nurse who, unable to cope with the constant death and suffering, succumbed to madness, killing 3 interns and one patient before being shot. It went on to say that since this incident, patients reported she still wandered the desolate corridors, her soft footsteps and distant sobs haunting those who dared to stay overnight. The war department cited an increase in transfer requests out of the hospital citing the interactions with “the inhabitants” that haunt the place. As the friends explored the hospital's abandoned wards and empty rooms, they could almost feel the weight of the past pressing down on them the whole time. Shadows danced along the peeling wallpaper, and the air was filled with an otherworldly chill and the dampness of a bog. Every creak and groan of the building seemed to whisper the stories of those who had lived and died within its walls. Its decrepit walls and shattered windows bathed in the ghostly light of the full moon.

Alex, are you okay?” Brittany asks, looking totally concerned. Should I tell her I was spacing out while thinking about us having sex? Mrs. P. walks up the aisle with a stern look on her face. “This is a library, you two. Keep it down.” But then she notices the small line of blood snaking down my arm and staining my sleeve. “Brittany, help him to the nurse. Alex, next time come to school with that thing bandaged.” “Don’t I get sympathy, Mrs. P.? I’m bleedin’ to death.” “Do something to help mankind or the planet, Alex. Then you’ll get my sympathy. People who get into knife fights don’t earn anything from me except disgust. Now go get cleaned up.” Brittany lifts my books off my lap and says in a shaky voice, “Come on.” “I can hold the books,” I tell her as I follow her out of the library. I’m pressing my sleeve against the wound, hoping to stop more blood from leaking out. She’s walking ahead of me. If I tell her I need help walking because I feel faint, will she believe me and come to my rescue? Maybe I should stumble…although knowing her she wouldn’t care. Right before we reach the nurse’s office, she turns around. Her hands are shaking. “I’m so sorry, Alex. I di--didn’t m--mean--” She’s freaking out. If she cries, I won’t know what to do. I’m not used to crying chicks. I don’t think Carmen cried once during our entire relationship. In fact, I’m not sure Carmen has tear ducts.

Ow! Son of a—” Before she could complete the expletive, Baird was there, staring at her with concern. “What happened? Are you hurt?” he demanded even as he scanned the area with those inhumanly golden eyes, obviously searching for a threat. “I’m fine. I just…” Liv gestured to her wounded foot with irritation. “I dropped my orange juice when those goons came to get me and I stepped on a shard of glass.” His face fell. “You were hurt all this time and I didn’t notice?” “I didn’t notice half the time myself,” Liv assured him. “I had, uh, other things on my mind.” Like finding out exactly what I was getting myself into with you. “I’ve stopped bleeding so I guess I forgot until I stepped on it out here.” “You’re bleeding?” He looked even more alarmed. Getting down on one knee he gestured her forward. “Let me see.” “No, honestly, it’s all right.” Liv felt both annoyed and shy. Why was he making such a big deal out of this? She’d seen people with foreign objects imbedded in their bodies every day of the week as a nursing student in the Tampa General ER. Didn’t they ever step on sharp things where he came from? “Olivia, come here.” His voice was a low growl—not menacing so much as stern. To her intense irritation, Liv found herself obeying him. “It’s just a piece of glass,” she protested even as she allowed him to settle her on his knee and lift her foot. “If you’ll just give me a first aid kit I can take care of it myself.” “No you won’t.” He examined the heel of her foot with care as though assessing a grave and dangerous injury. “Wait until we get up to the ship and let Sylvan look at it. He’s a medic.” “And I’m a nurse,” Liv protested, feeling even more irritated. “I can handle myself, thank you.” “Even a small injury like this can get infected and it’s hard to work on yourself.” The growl had come back to his voice again and his eyes flashed from dark amber to pale gold in a second. “You need a medic and that’s what you’ll get, Lilenta.” “My

I love you, Harper.” His hands reached up but he only cupped her hips, letting her continue on her journey. She pressed a kiss to the scar across his right deltoid, an old injury from one of his first deployments, then his left collarbone, broken on a training trip to California. Then, moving carefully, she pressed kisses to the new scar still healing on his chest. That one had been too close to taking his life. Thank goodness he had been able to receive medical care as quickly as he did. Cat moved down Harper’s muscled abs and the slim line of black hair there. “I think everything about you is beautiful.” He puffed out a little laugh but she looked up at him with reproach. “I do. Your body is superb, even wounded. It always has been. That’s why I always have to beat the nurses off you.” She flashed him a grin. “Your mind is devious and brilliant, but I love that. The loyalty to your family and your men is humbling.” She stroked a finger over the tattoo that echoed those sentiments on his right pectoral. “Your unfailing courage in the face of everything that has happened is astounding. I know whatever we have to face you will conquer with that same indomitable, dogged, Navy SEAL will. And your heart,” she moved back up his chest to press a kiss to his sternum, “your heart is more loving and willing to try than I ever could have hoped. We’re going to put our family back together,” she promised. Harper stared up at her for several long seconds before he closed his eyes, but not before she’d seen the shine of moisture in their depths. He pulled her down on top of him, burying his face into her neck. “You are every bit the woman you’ve always been, calm and understanding, willing to put up with my shit. And I have to tell you. All of those things you see in me? I wouldn’t be any of them without you. And I mean that. You’ve supported me through everything. You flew across the country to be at my bedside even though you didn’t know the kind of reaction you’d receive. It amazes me that you would take that chance. But I’m so glad you did. I love you, Catherine Marie Preston. I always have.” She flashed a smile at the use of her full name. “And I love you, Harper Broderick Preston. I always will.” They

I mourned now because when she had been alive I had not understood her. To the end, she frustrated my understanding, defied it with her own silences, her suppressions and elisions. Not about her past in the camps, per se. I was careful not to probe too hard into her tour through the bowels of hell, respecting her silence on the subject. No, what I blamed her for was another kind of silence. What I could not abide was her unwillingness to condemn the very system that had destroyed our family. Her refusal to impugn the evil that had deprived me of a father and left me motherless in those years when a boy most needs a mother's love. I am not a crybaby. I am not one to nurse old wounds. Others suffered more, God knows. I t would have been enough for me if she had said, just one time, Yes, what they did to you, to me, to our family - that was unforgivable. But she did not say those words, and her muteness - her apologism for the system that she insisted - to me! - 'would always take care of the children' - became a second, no less painful, abandonment. In the sixties and seventies, when I was compulsively reading samizdat, I wanted her to be as cynical and disillusioned as I was. I wanted her to be angry for the miseries that she had endured: the murder of her husband, the forcible separation from her child, seven years of bondage and humiliation and hunger. That all this failed to enrage her infuriated me all the more. For it left me to carry the anger for both of us.

You have to take better care of yourself, Miss Darling.” The doctor calls for a nurse to change my bandages, and his eyes pinch as he works himself into a lecture. “With your history of injuries, you need to make health and nutrition a priority if you’re ever going to resolve your late awakening and hit fertility.” Right. Because my main concern after a gunshot wound should be opening the gates to my baby factory.

The war was, very obviously, beginning to turn against Germany as the French soldiers gained ground and started to push the retreating Nazi troops in our direction. The news was that if things got worse, the German Army would be pushed over the Vosges Mountains and back into Alsace-Lorraine. We were issued instructions from the local Nazi administration to be prepared to help these retreating soldiers and were expected to billet, feed and, if necessary, nurse those wounded back to health. “Oh my,” I thought. We had so little but it was still more than we had in Mannheim. One village woman told us, “They are our soldiers and we can jolly well care for them.” Adolph agreed with this and told me that it would be my duty to look after any German soldier that was quartered under his roof. I thought that I fully understood what he meant by this! Since I was using the entire upstairs portion of the house, I would have to make room. Looking forward to helping them, I told the girls that we were to be kind to whoever came to us. “Imagine if it was your father.” It seemed the least we could do, and I hoped that I wasn’t expected to go beyond this. Instead of improving, things just got worse. To everyone’s astonishment the school was ordered closed and we were told to attend a meeting in the Village Center. Outside of the center, amidst much commotion, a uniformed Gestapo officer standing on the back of an open truck announced that German troops would be entering our village. Soon Military vehicles and German troops seemed to be everywhere. The Allied invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, marked a critical turning point in the European theater of World War II and we were beginning to feel the effects.

The tea was brought. Mumbling her thanks, she took the cup in her hands, not bothering with the saucer. She drank it all without tasting it. “What are you using to dress the wound?” West asked, looking over the collection of bottles on the table. “Glycerin and disinfecting drops, and a layer of oiled muslin.” “And you’re keeping him packed with ice.” “Yes, and trying to make him take a sip of water at least once every hour. But he won’t . . .” Garrett paused as a swoosh went through her head. She closed her eyes—a mistake—the entire room seemed to tilt. “What is it?” she heard West ask. His voice seemed to come from very far away. “Dizzy,” she mumbled. “Need more tea, or . . .” Her lashes fluttered upward, and she had to fight to keep her eyes open. West was in front of her, easing the china cup from her lax fingers before it could drop. His assessing gaze ran over her, and it was then that she realized what he’d done. “What was in my tea?” she asked in a panic, trying to rise from her chair. “What did you put in it?” The room revolved. She felt his arms close around her. “Nothing but a pinch of valerian,” West said calmly. “Which wouldn’t have had nearly this much of an effect if you weren’t ready to drop from exhaustion.” “I’m going to kill you,” she cried. “Yes, but to do that you’ll have to have a nice little rest first, won’t you?” Garrett tried to strike him with her fist, but he ducked easily beneath her flailing arm, and picked her up as her knees buckled. “Let go! I have to take care of him—he needs me—” “I can manage the basics of nursing him while you sleep.” “No, you can’t,” Garrett said weakly, and was horrified to hear a sob breaking from her throat. “Your patients all have four legs. H-he only has two.” “Which means he’ll be half the trouble,” West said reasonably. Garrett writhed with helpless rage. Ethan was on his deathbed, and this man was making light of the situation. He contained her struggles with maddening ease. As West carried her along the hallway, Garrett desperately tried to stop crying. Her eyes were on fire. Her head throbbed and ached, and it had become so heavy that she had to rest it on his shoulder. “There, now,” she heard him murmur. “It’s only for a few hours. When you awaken, you’ll have any revenge you want.” “Going to dissect you,” she sobbed, “into a million pieces—” “Yes,” West soothed, “just think about which instrument you’ll start with. Perhaps that two-sided scalpel with the funny handle.” He brought her into a pretty bedroom with flowered paper on the walls. “Martha,” he called. “Both of you. Come see to Dr. Gibson.

On Bataan, for example, the nurses had cared for enemy wounded and had learned a valuable lesson of war: suffering knows no uniform.

We flew into the small airfield in Monrovia where we were met by Jimmy, Captain Duffy’s assistant. It didn’t take long, driving on the back streets to get to the city hospital. Jimmy carefully avoided many of the potholes that pockmarked the wet streets but without seatbelts it was a bumpy ride that I wouldn’t want to repeat! One German and two Liberian doctors along with some orderlies shared the responsibilities of running the hospital. A few local nurses and attendants completed the staff. These few people were all they had to do everything, and I guess the hospital was lucky to have them. One of the attendants wearing a bloodstained shirt accompanied us on our way to the morgue. As he opened the large swinging door I was hit by an unmistakable sweet pungent odor of death that nearly caused me to throw up right there on the spot. Not having as much as a handkerchief to keep out the smell, I simply covered my nose and mouth with my hand and followed the attendant into the metal building. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust from the still bright afternoon sun to the dark interior of the shed, but as they did, I witnessed a sight I can never forget. In the heat of this building were a few bloated, decaying naked cadavers lying on planks, with hundreds of flies swarming around them. If they didn’t have sheets for the living, it couldn’t be expected that there would be any for the dead. Turning on the single lightbulb hanging over a stainless-steel tray table with a corpse on it, allowed us to see the room better. The naked body directly in front of me, with its mutilated head propped up by a block of wood, was startling and is still vivid to this day. Although a part of his skull was crushed in, I could see where crabs had been eating the side of his face. Despite this mutilation I could instantly tell that it was Olaf. His ashen face had a stubble growth on it and the grey, gaping, bloodless wound on his forehead showed that he had either been in a terrible accident or murdered! There was no doubt as to what had happened to Olaf and I knew that it wasn’t an accident. Murder was commonplace in Liberia, especially in Monrovia.