Not Alone: Support for Nurses

Those moments. They flare up after a totally draining shift where no one appreciated your wholehearted effort, or when a nursing course exerts unmanageable stress, or when you realize a professional goal has moved beyond your reach—those moments when you as a nurse or student can feel so alone and unsupported. 

Yes, we have colleagues, fellow students, nurse friends. But we often still experience disconnection. We can be 4 million strong as a profession, yet be emotionally and spiritual isolated, marooned in a personal desert and thirsty for understanding and camaraderie.

But God doesn’t leave us there. He’s spoken clearly to us:  “Just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other” (Romans 12:4-5, NLT). 

God is reminding us how much we need connection. When we find ourselves separated, lonely, and isolated, we don’t feel energized enough to complete the next shift or conquer the next class or lead the next meeting with confidence. Moral injury, burnout, and compassion fatigue stain our experiences. And if not us, we see these symptoms in our peers and colleagues. 

Despite how you and I may feel, we are not alone. Within the body of Christ, we have support. There is hope. There is purpose!

I encourage, even entreat you, to burrow into the Bible for God’s Word and perspective on the body of Christ—where you and I belong and what that means. You will find hope and purpose, for yourself and for those you work with and serve.

Christy Secor, DNP, RN, CDWF, is NCF’s Professional Ministries Director

For National Nurses Week, NCF’s gift to nurses is a new Bible study on this very topic. Four Million Reasons to Celebrate can be downloaded for free from the NCF website. 

Are you looking for Christian community that enriches your nursing practice? Join NCF and receive uplifting content and fellowship with other nurses who are pursuing Jesus. During May, NCF membership is discounted by 25% for practicing and retired nurses.