Florence Nightingale and Covid 19 – May 2020

We have been battling with the Covid virus over the last week or so. My HWH, who works for the NHS has had it the worst. It has felt like a battle for life. I called 999 on one occasion, having first phoned 111…never done that before. It cut deep watching him so ill and being able to do nothing other than try to keep him as comfortable as possible…..and pray. We have been held up by the power of prayer of a faithful army of family and friends. This is an illness for which there is no modern day cure. As a nurse who trained many years ago my mind went back to the principles of nursing care as laid down by Florence Nightingale. It seemed to be where we were at again. I wonder if she prayed for her patients as she walked through the wards at night? I’m fairly sure she would have done.

I have not had it as badly as my HWH but there have been days when I’ve struggled to get out of bed. The children have had milder symptoms; not quite out of the woods yet, but nearly. They have been amazing; working together as a team, many of the normal niggles put on hold. The older three took over the kitchen, and our wonderful local community are keeping us fed with a steady supply of meals and shopping. I am so grateful. Our normal rhythm of learning has stopped, and will be put on hold for some while yet. Our kids have learnt many things during this time; deep life and faith lessons which are more important than test driven facts. But, Dancing Toes was keen to write her blog post and Florence’s life seemed an appropriate topic. She did the research and we watched a film together. It’s taken me a while to be up to posting it, but here’s to Florence; a heroine worth getting acquainted with.

Florence Nightingale was a famous nurse, in the Crimean war. In those days hospitals were unhygienic and dark and girls didn’t work there, lucky them. The hospital that Florence worked at was built on a sewer and one day they found a dead horse in the water supply. Another lady called Mary Seacole was a nurse but instead of being in a hospital she worked on the battlefield.

In Victorian times they didn’t have proper medicine. Florence made her nurses clean the hospital from top to bottom when they didn’t have any thing else to do. Water and nutritional food was also important and they needed clean bedding and bandages.

Florence was a kind, brave and interesting lady. You can find lots more about her, like she had a sister who loved parties and making herself look pretty. Her parents were quite rich. Florence was a  Christian and thats’s what made her want to become a nurse.