The Language of Kindness: A Nurse's Stories of Life, Death and Hope

A moving, lyrical, beautifully written portrait of a nurse and the lives she has touched.

Christie Watson spent twenty years working as a nurse, and in this intimate, poignant and remarkably powerful book, she opens the doors of the hospital and shares its secrets. She takes us by her side down hospital corridors to visit the wards and the patients who are unforgettable. In the neonatal unit, premature babies fight for their lives, hovering at the very edge of survival, like tiny Emmanuel wrapped up in a sandwich bag. In the cancer wards, the nurses administer chemotherapy and, long after the medicine stops working, something more important--which Watson recognizes when her own father is dying of cancer. In the mental health unit, Derek attempts to take his life. In the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, Charlotte loses her legs following meningitis, and the nurses wash the hair of a little girl to remove the smell of smoke from a house fire. The emergency room is overcrowded as ever, with waves of alcohol and drug addicted patients, as well as patients like Betty, suffering chest pain, frail and alone. The stories of the geriatric ward--Gladys and older patients like her--show the plight of the most vulnerable members of our society.

In the smallest of actions, the most undervalued of professions provides the most vital care and kindness. All of us will touch illness in our lifetime, and we will all depend upon the support and dignity that nurses offer us in our most vulnerable moments; yet these women and men who form the vanguard of our health service remain largely behind the scenes and publicly unsung. Through the stories in this book comes an understanding of what we must value most dearly--the urgency of care and compassion.

In this age of fear, hate and division, Christie Watson, an award-winning novelist as well as a nurse, has written a book that reminds us of all that we share, and of what it is to be human.