posted on 28 Apr 2019

The Language of Kindness: A Nurses Story by Christie Watson

I wouldn’t normally pick up a book with the word nurses in the title, but I was in a bookshop and it was the usual buy one get the second half-price scenario and I can’t resist a second book thinking I’m getting a bargain.  I picked this one up and immediately turned to the short reviews on the back which I don’t normally do as I don’t want my reading to be coloured by what others think. Anyway, on this occasion the reviews were good and not necessarily from nurses so I decided to give it a go and I’m happy to say it did not disappoint, I couldn’t put it down.

Christie has a breadth of experience in working with all ages and specialisms, but her primary focus has been on younger hospital-based patients as she is a Children’s nurse. I was a nurse a decade before Christie and I then become a health visitor and although not working on a traditional ward my specialism was children, so we have similar paths.

I loved the mix of nursing skills including the requirement of compassion when interacting with patients their relatives and her nursing, medical and hospital colleagues. I really enjoyed her detailed medical explanations of certain conditions and the superior knowledge of experienced nurses which resulted in both positive and sad outcomes. Her chapter about the death of her father resonated with me as we have both experienced the death of a father from Dementia, and I admired the way she described her grief and how this impacted on her return to work after this life event.

Christie pulls no punches and you must be prepared for quite a few ‘lumps in the throat’ and ’tears in the eye’ moments. She also makes the occasional comment about issues impacting on the NHS including funding and I would have thought it odd if she didn’t. The first thing I did when I finished it was to email everyone in my nurse’s reunion group to urge them to read but I also think that it would be an excellent read for non-nurses and the key word as expressed in the title is ‘kindness’

Julia Neall

April 2019