As we each do our part to limit the impact of COVID-19, we are encouraged by those individuals fearlessly working on the front lines. The Lash Lounge Fishers – Downtown family is filled with incredible individuals giving their all to those in need. We want to share the stories of these local heroes to help brighten your day.
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Meet Caregiver, Vildana
Vildana’s smile lights a room. Our entire salon family knew her warm personality and positive attitude before the end of her first visit. She’s a joy to know and we love when she comes in for her fills.
News that we wouldn’t see Vildana for a while came before the official temporary closure of our salon due to the pandemic. As an intensive care bedside nurse, Vildana’s typical patients had breathing issues—some with tracheostomies and others on long-term ventilators due to lung conditions, substance overdose, or poor post-operative recovery. But now, they’d be coming to her from a different cause: COVID-19. She wanted us to know that her entire unit would now be focused on those patients’ unique needs.
We were worried for her—most people cannot imagine being put in such a position; yet Vildana has found a way to approach it with optimism and compassion.
“I love that I have the opportunity to bring some peace or perhaps ease at a time of immense ‘dis-ease’ in the lives of the patients and their families,” she said.
“I am proud to give treatments and the antibiotics or good quality CPR,” she noted, but “giving time and a listening ear, or maybe a bath, is where I feel the most warmth is my heart. That is the feeling I love the most about nursing.”
A decade of experience provides the clinical skills to handle challenging circumstances, but facing a pandemic is unprecedented for everyone. “The present time is especially confusing for medical professionals, and patients,” Vildana said. “There is so much we don’t know about COVID-19 and the information changes daily, effecting the way we give care.”
“Furthermore, these patients cannot have visitors,” Vildana said as she also explained how healthcare providers are advised to cluster care to conserve masks and gowns and goggles, limiting patients’ contact with others even more.
Witnessing the loneliness these patients are feeling, Vildana is doing all she can to make them feel less anxious and more hopeful. A hospital mask may hide her easy, genuine smile, but the brightness of her eyes conveys warmth and reassurance.
“I try to give the family as much time as they need—I can’t imagine how they feel not being able to visit their loved ones.”
She’s the kind of nurse who calls family members after her shift ends to go through the doctor’s notes with them. She worries about making sure the family can sleep at night.
Before she had to “adult,” she says her dream job had been skin care, to be an aesthetician. Life somehow led her into nursing. We’d say it is a perfect fit.
In her daily work, it’s the culmination of many little moments that are most fulfilling and keep her going. “Just a few days ago, I was doing chest compressions that I could tell were very high quality,” she said. The muscle memory of training kicks in during stressful times.
“I am proud that I am calm and methodical when I need to be able to give the patient the best chance of living.”
“I don’t want to take too much credit and make it sound too rosy. Truth be told, when I was first made aware that my next shift at work would include a unit of COVID patients, and with limited personal protective equipment, I was scared,” she admits.
While she is intently focused on providing top notch care for her patients, Vildana then leaves the hospital and heads home to her family. She was unnerved by the thought of making her family sick with what she may bring home, but throughout the last few weeks, she has gone through an array of emotions and feels positive and proud to serve.
Providing a listening ear and comforting care is what she loves about her career. And, her son is absolutely her greatest blessing and joy of her life. He’ll soon be three years old and as the pandemic begins to lighten, Vildana looks forward to spending quality time with him and her husband, and family.
“I am looking forward to being able to take my son to a playground. I am looking forward to seeing my mother and father in law,” she says. She’s loo
king forward to getting outdoors—hiking, jogging, and playing with the dogs. She’s even eager to plant plants that she jokes, “have a 50% chance of surviving under her care.” Quickly adding, “don’t worry my patients have much better odds!”
She’s missing the normalcy of simple chores like shopping for groceries.
At the end of all this, if she never hears the phrase “social distancing” again, it will be just fine with her. The public’s embrace of nurses and all healthcare and frontline workers has been heartwarming, but complicated.
“I look forward to being able to say out loud that, ‘I’m a nurse,’” she says, acknowledging the awkward mix of public gratitude and fear that has come with this pandemic.
“I feel like people respect what we are doing from a distance, but also treat us like we are for sure carrying COVID and are going to infect them even from 10 feet apart,” she says. “That has been difficult.”
For someone who gives so much to others, she admits, “Throughout the last few weeks, I have felt anger, fear and frustration. I have my emotional breakdowns the day after the critical moments and have felt some ugly feelings,” she says. “But, at the end of the day, the patients need me, my coworkers need me, the hospital needs me.”
We all need you, Vildana. Some need your care, and the rest of us need the comfort of knowing there are amazing people like you sacrificing so much—and with a deep sense of duty—to keep us all safe. Thank you. We applaud your courage as you walk into the unknown every time you go to work; how you are so selfless in caring for all the patients who are lucky enough to have you as their nurse. We thank you for all you do and the wonderful person you are. And we are honored to have you as part of The Lash Lounge Fishers – Downtown family. 💜
