The Comfort Garden: Tales from the Trauma Unit

by Laurie Barkin

The Comfort Tales from the Trauma Unit is Laurie Barkin's account of the five years she worked as a psychiatric nurse on the surgical/trauma unit at San Francisco General Hospital. Told against the backdrop of patients who survived motor vehicle accidents, falls, fires, fists, bullets, and knives, The Comfort Garden is a metaphor for the emotional support caregivers need. The story illuminates the issues of compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma that may develop in caregivers when exposure to tragedy becomes routine. The Comfort Garden is about the plight of people who have survived staggering trauma long enough to get to a hospital. The real-life stories unfold to highlight the astonishing impact of trauma on patients, family members, friends, and the caregivers who treat them. The narrative is from her perspective and in her voice as a psychiatric nurse who works with those who have sustained unimaginable injuries. The context for the experiences is a high-powered urban trauma unit that serves the breadth of humanity. The stories are exemplars of compassion in dealing with misery, courage in the face of grief, and of human determination holding hands with fateful destiny. The reader is invited in as a participant in the stories. The writing skillfully draws you to the bedside, has you sit with the rawness of the experience of loved ones, and provides a chance to listen in on the conversations about life and death that are common to the way of life on a trauma unit. The reader has the opportunity to understand the complex and challenging experiences of all patients, nurses, surgeons, social workers, physical therapists, and others. Each participant provides texture to the fabric of the trauma unit experience. This book is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the intricate and sometimes cruel challenges of trauma and the path to healing. Ms. Barkin's work makes a great contribution to the heart of understanding the experience of both the healer and the healed. Her writing comes from a place where there are no veneers to hide the stark reality of situations, which she so artfully describes. One cannot walk away from this book without being transformed by its content. As the providers from the trauma unit often say, and as she has been able to richly articulate, "It is as real as it gets..." Geoffry Phillips McEnany, PhD, APRN, BC Professor of Nursing, University of Massachusetts, Lowell Psychiatric/Mental Health Clinical Nurse Specialist in Boston.The Comfort Garden will appeal to healthcare professionals, firefighters, police, war veterans, social workers, journalists, students, teachers, public defenders, judges, and anyone whose life is touched by trauma."The Comfort Garden reveals the real world of human-to-human caring at its highest level." -- Jean Watson, RN, PhD, author of Human Caring A Theory of Nursing"Laurie is that rare health professional with a gift for narrative and a story to tell. This is an important book for any health care worker, but especially for those of us who consider ourselves traumatic stress specialists. It reinforces the values and the spirit that brought us into the field. It reminds us of the obstacles we face every human cruelty, social injustice, dwindling resources. Read this. You'll be better for it." -- Frank M Ochberg MD, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Michigan State University"In an age when hospitals have been turning to quicker-acting medications, faster discharges, and fewer deep and meaningful conversations with patients, Laurie Barkin takes the opposite position. She urges us to make the time to use our knowledge of psychodynamic psychotherapy to help traumatized people early in the course of their distress.

Genres: Nursing, Medicine, Medical, Mental Health, Health Care

388 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 1, 2011

Reviews

[Lisa Huggins · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been a Registered Nurse for 42 years. I have spent most of my career in acute care, adult ICUs, and Emergency Rooms. I don’t think I have ever read something that could so accurately reflect my thoughts and feelings while caring for critically ill and injured patients. Laurie unabashedly addresses all the emotions that we as nurses hold inside and minimize for the sake of just carrying on. She tells her stories of working as a psychiatric nurse practitioner in the eighties at San Francisco General Hospital at the height of the AIDS epidemic. She puts into words how it is to absorb trauma, live with survivors’ guilt, be bullied, deal with the demoralization of managed care (or mismanaged care, as she calls it), hear, see, and do unbelievable things and feel right at home and safe until everything starts to crumble.
Her writing style will make you feel like you are in her house sitting on the sofa or in the corner of the unit break room crying your eyes out. You will get to know her family, her friends, her trusted colleagues, and not so trusted ones. You will feel like you are at work one minute and home cooking dinner the next while still reliving the events of the day. By the end of the book, you will see her as a friend, a counselor, and most of all someone who “gets it”.

[Lila · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very insightful and well-written. Laurie Barkin is a psychiatric nurse at San Francisco General Hospital, and shares her stories working with trauma patients. She weaves in her own story along the way-how her career has changed her, the difficulties of managed care, and the gaping lack of support for healthcare professionals like herself, who spend their days listening to heart wrenching and terrifying stories. Really opened my eyes to the extent that trauma impacts a person, sometimes for a lifetime, as well as those who care for them.

[Judit Gueta · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not what I expected but it gave me a lot of insight.

[Jeffrey Roth · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Comfort Garden is a compelling, true narrative of a psychiatric nurse on a trauma unit, who realizes her work is causing adverse affects on her life. All caregivers in the helping professions exposed to tragic events should be aware of the risk for "vicarious trauma" and take steps to prevent or mitigate it. Laurie Barkin's sensitive, disturbing portrayal has done a service by highlighting the importance of addressing the emotional needs of caregivers.

[Josephine Ensign · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an important book in the small but growing category of nurses writing about the intersection of their work and their personal lives. I appreciated Barkin's use of the of her interaction with the hospital's comfort garden where she worked as a trauma mental health nurse—as an extended metaphor for self-care and healing in her own life. My favorite chapters came at the end of the book: "Who will take care of the caregivers?" and "If I am not a nurse, who am I?"

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

A memoir from the POV of a psych. nurse who comes under managed care. Raises important questions about how those who deal with trauma deal (or don't deal) with the horror of trauma. A good first person account, but not a lot of reflection on the issues of race and class that contribute to the experience of trauma.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well written personal account of dealing with the effects of absorbing trauma through your work. There was something about reading another clinician's story that felt both familiar and validating. A strong reminder that we must care for ourselves in order to care for others.