I miss Joy in my life

No I am not depressed!

I just have a severe crick in my neck which is causing me some considerable irritation and discomfort and even after 6 years away from Sheffield, I still mourn that my good friend Joy Hutton is not still "on tap" to sooth my physical woes away.

Joy (and you can just see her in the above photo) can only be described as an "earth mother". She is an occupational therapist helper,who has worked on the Spinal Injury Unit in Sheffield for more decades than you could shake a stick at. A natural counsellor and intuitive therapist , her input with the psychologically bruised  spinally injured was invaluable and in many ways unseen, for she quietly went about her business of caring, supporting and enabling, without fanfare and without fuss.

Long standing staff, like myself that knew her well, also relied on her all encompassing motherly nature, and at the end of many a fraught shift, when I was shut away in my office with the heavy weight of 50 staff and their never ending parade of needs, wants and problems on my shoulders, she would come in, we would laugh a little, and she would massage all my tensions out of my neck and head.

It was a  kindness that went a long way, and I was not alone in receiving a little" hands-on" therapy around the unit that catered for 64 patients and had over 150 staff.

Other nurses, the consultant medics, even the unit psychologist would seek her out for "chat"....whille many of the most stressed professionals would disappear into the Snoezelen room  on my ward from time to time for an intensive shiatsu massage,amid the rejuvenating darkness, colours and light.

She always had time for everyone

In my mind , it is people like Joy that makes the nhs what it is.

She is not a pure academic, nor is she a high flying manager (I know we need both before you ask) she is a natural, warm and caring person who "knows" how to relate to big and little woes in someone's life, and enables you to do the same.

This skill is innate, and because it is, unfortunately it will never be properly recognised by the powers that be.

Nursing my sore neck today, not only reminds me of how much I miss her healing hands, it also serves as a reminder of just how much I miss her warmth and friendship both on a personal level and a professional one.

All of us need a little appropriate mothering from time to time, bad neck or not!

The internet is a marvellous tool when reminiscing isn't it?
When I was searching for a photo of Joy, I found this old photo taken from the back of the "original" Spinal Injury Unit in Sheffield, when it was located on the outskirts of the city at Lodge Moor.
The photo depicts a patient being airlifted in, which happened occasionally, and it reminded me of jokes we senior staff used to play on student nurses if they were gullible and mild enough not to twig.
Before the helicopter arrived we would ask the student to "don" one of the old nurses capes, but told her to make sure that the bright red lining was on the outside (yes nurses still wore capes in the late 1980s!)
The bright red cape, would, we told them be more easily seen from the air!
Then the poor girl would be given two table tennis bats from occupational therapy and would be instructed to stand on the field borders..."directing" the pilots to a safe landing!
Most students twigged the joke before the hysterical pilots could give it away...but I always remember one girl from Chapel-en-le-Frith....giving it her all, as the ward staff rolled away on the grass behind her...

Thus is the humour on a rehab ward

Happy Days!

http://www.sheffield-steelers.co.uk/about-the-spinal-injuries-unit.html