Internship nr. 2.

Hey there!

Let's talk about health care and being a nurse (student) again! 

The world of health care holds a very wide variety of health care settings. Just take a look at hospitals, mental health care, home care or care for people with a disability of any sorts. These are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to different health care settings. Health care is all around you and as a nurse you have to be able to work in every type of health care setting.

Being able to work in any let alone every type of health care setting comes down to a decent and broad education. During the nursing course I'm currently taking we have to go on, relatively, a lot of internships. During our first year we had one internship of 10 weeks and now in my second year we have to go on a 15 week internship. From the third year on you're a non stop intern in 3 to 4 different health care settings. 

At the moment I'm in my 2nd year and past the halfway point of my 2nd internship. During this year's internship I'm working with people with all kinds of disabilities. I work in two different houses that are connected to each other on the inside, this way it's easy to move from one house to the other when extra help is needed. In both houses there is room for 7 people with a disability and at the moment that's also the number of inhabitants we actually have. One of the houses inhabits only men whilst in the other is 'filled' with women. The men and women don't really interact with each other though. 

In the "men" house, the men have a moderate to a severe mental retardation whilst the woman have a severe to a profound mental retardation. Switching between the houses and the sort of care they need was something I found pretty difficult in the beginning, now I know the amount and sort of care every individual needs and I'm able to offer that help. 

During the 11 weeks I've been on this internship I have often been told that working with people with a disability acquires a special skill set or that it is one of the more difficult fields of health care. On some level this may be true. For example you need to know that with all the things they are unable to do there are so many things they're still able to do and they will still enjoy. Then you might also want to realise that despite a physical disability or a different intellectual level they are still people like you and me and no different from you and me they want to go outside, go to work and socialise.

Compared to my previous internship in a home for the elderly, I much prefer this internship. Now please get me right, I do respect elders, I respect them very much but they were just much less interesting or willing to socialise or go do things than the people I get to work with on this internship. I absolutely love this internship and everyday I leave feeling satisfied with the work I've done and the smiles I've seen. This internship is basically like running a family with over-sized kids and it gives you a lot of joy to see them being proud of something they did at work or something they've achieved whilst doing sports or at work. 

To people who work in health care and are looking for a new challenge I would definitely recommend working with disabled people. Or if you are looking for a place to volunteer I would definitely recommend this field of health care as well. 

Lots of love,
ThatDutchGirl96