Iowa Specialty Hospital

Amy's Reflections

February 1, 2021

Well, we lost one of the baby hedgehogs last week. It had stopped growing and had some kind of growth on its face which upon research is pretty common as they are prone to tumors in their mouth and throat. Andrew was heartbroken, but the other hedgehog seems to be growing and doing fine. I have to say this experience brought to light how our emotions can dictate our response in the moment.  While deciding how best to take care of this little peanut, we quickly flipped to looking for someone or something to blame. Interestingly enough the blame was placed on me for separating it from its mother too soon. Never mind the facts; the other baby was doing just fine and continuing to grow and  we waited until the last possible day of the recommended timeframe to remove them from the momma. I was pretty mad in the moment, but looking back with clarity I can see everyone’s emotions were pretty high. 

This happens often at work as well. Our emotions run high and we lose sight of the facts and let those emotions overtake our common sense. When we let our emotions control the situation we quickly shift to finger-pointing and blame when often it isn’t who, but what, that caused the situation. I often talk to our most frustrated patients and always approach each of those conversations with what process failed that allowed this to happen. I always thank them for letting us know what went wrong as we can’t fix what we don’t know about. We have amazing employees working in our system with big, caring hearts that are here for the right reasons. Sometimes we need to take few deep breaths and remind ourselves of that before we go charging head first into an argument that no one can win. This week I challenge you to take a deep breath, feel your emotions, and maybe hold off on any discussion until you are in control of those emotions. With all the chaos in the world, let’s allow clearer heads to prevail. 
 

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