The problem with going into the field of Police work, Fire prevention, Nursing or being a Doctor

Is that if you are in the Emergency room or working in an ICU or in an ambulance especially now there will be some form of PTSD you will be dealing with.

For example, my son's second wife became a nurse, then worked in a hospital emergency room when she graduated as a nurse and soon had a nervous breakdown and stayed a nurse but moved out of the hospital into a non-emergency nursing field.

Because many people cannot deal with meeting people and watching them die. For many people it doesn't matter whether they are relatives or old friends or not to watch someone die like that whether you have met them or not isn't something most people do well, especially in our culture that always separates people and children from death from birth to old age.

It's just something our culture does. It isn't this way in many or most places on earth by the way. It is only this way in the U.S. and partially this way in Europe too. But, most places death is all around and you face it everywhere you go.

For example, I saw dead and dying people on the streets almost anywhere I went in India in 1985 and 1986. Seeing dead or dying people was perfectly normal and an every day experience there but not here in the U.S.

But, there was something more reassuring being in India then because the nearness of death all the time somehow made people value every moment of life much more than here in the U.S.

What I'm saying here is rightly or wrongly we are not prepared for dealing with death here in the U.S. at all because of how we do things. But, even as a little child at least in the 1980s everyone dealt with death on an almost daily basis everywhere I went in India in 1985 and 1986.

And I think dealing with death every day is much more real and sane than what we do here in the U.S. when we try to hide death from adults and children.

Americans can be very unrealistic at times because of this culture we all live in.

The reason I wrote this article is that my wife just told me the story of an American Nurse who couldn't deal with all the deaths from coronavirus and killed herself.

I think it's important to realize what you can and can't deal with and to realize if you can't deal with seeing people die you should choose a profession you can physically and mentally and emotionally survive.

There is idealism and then there is reality and they are very very different.

So, be sure you can deal with the decisions in life you make or else you just won't be around anymore.

By God's Grace