For most of my nursing career, I believed exhaustion was a logistics problem. If I could just plan better, manage my time more efficiently, or color-code my planner, surely I wouldn’t feel so drained. As an ICU nurse, I was highly capable. I could juggle multiple patients, sometimes while also being Charge Nurse, anticipate needs before alarms sounded, and stay calm in chaos.

I loved being a nurse. Not the Pinterest version of nursing but the real kind...The messy, meaningful, emotionally heavy kind. I loved my patients. I loved the sense of purpose. I loved knowing that what we do matters, especially on the days when no one else sees it.

Nurses don’t go home and magically turn into relaxed humans- We go home and replay conversations, worry about patients, mentally rewrite charting, and wonder why our nervous system thinks we’re still at work… even in sweatpants.