Toronto nurse shows her fear in verse
COVID-19 poem, detailing health-care workers’ stress, is her response to others’ optimism
Rebecca Gonser can see the excitement of Ontario reopening outside the walls of the hospital where she works.
As the pandemic edition of the May long weekend arrives, many Ontarians are feeling relief as businesses and amenities begin to reopen. But inside one of Canada’s largest hospitals, where Gonser works as an advanced practice nurse for the acute care resource team, it still feels like there is “no end in sight.”
“The past two weeks have been the peak of COVID for me in terms of business, stress and the continued fear,” Gonser said. “Here we are in the hospital, preparing and worrying and still in the thick of this, and my friends and family are feeling like we’re in the clear.”
That disparity has been difficult to accept for the nurse, whose days at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto are long and intense. She’s tried many things to help cope over the last nine weeks; meditation, mental-health supports, playing piano. But this week, Gonser resorted to something she does when the emotions are running too high. She opened her laptop and started to write.
“Insurmountable, gut wrenching fear, fills myself and every one of my peers,” reads her poem. Gonser said it’s little things, like worrying about washing her hands after leaning against the nursing station, that fuel that fear. It also comes from the intense experiences, like seeing colleagues test positive for COVID-19, or one of her nurses hold an iPad for hours so an isolated patient can say their goodbyes.
The poem, which she dedicated to Nursing Week and shared on Facebook, struck a chord with many. “I couldn’t believe that it just kept getting shared and posted and commented on. There’s been so many messages, which is amazing because hopefully it has an impact, which is the intent. I think people need to have hope with some caution.”
The realization that Gonser was living a different life than many of her loved ones hit home after a weekly family trivia night on Zoom. Home is just outside of Stratford, Ont., where there have been no new cases of the virus in the region for 11 straight days. The Gonsers were celebrating news that the boat could be dropped in the water at their beloved family cottage, with (since-verified) rumours swirling that Premier Doug Ford would open up the marinas in time for Victoria Day weekend.
“My family was so positive, and I’m so excited for these small towns and areas because that is huge. But for Toronto and us at Sunnybrook, I’m not feeling that hope yet,” she said, while fighting through tears and joking that they have become “part of my routine throughout this pandemic.”
“While the rest of the world stops, ours feels like a race. Policies, and announcements at an unmanageable pace,” the poem says.
Gonser and her team of nurses are scrambling to get ready for what could happen next. She just spent parts of the last month hiring and orienting 60 new nurses to support the hospital’s COVID units. With a long weekend coinciding with the economy reopening, the hospital is bracing for another surge. As her saying goes, “We hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.”
“May long weekend is notoriously trauma season, and with Sunnybrook being the regional trauma centre, we normally see an influx” of patients, she said. “But having an entire unit of COVID ICU patients and an entire ward of COVID patients, we’re limited in resources.”
Gonser occasionally writes when she’s feeling emotional. Her ability to rhyme and write creatively comes from her grandfather, who leaves poems and puns on pieces of wood around the cottage. While she won’t be able to join him up north anytime soon, it is something to hope for.
“For each of us, hope and respite is what we seek, during this year’s pandemic-themed Nursing Week,” the poem’s final couplet reads.
Gonser said that closing line highlights her thoughts on what is usually her favourite week of the year.
“Usually Nursing Week fills me with this hope and this refound joy. It provides this new outlook on my profession and the role that I play,” she said. “In this nursing week, if I could wish for one thing, what would that be? Hope for this to be over.”