I'm just sayin'

Sometimes I just don't get it. You know, the way people act. I'm surrounded everyday, by people that I don't understand. Parents that lie to their children ... promises that are broken ... hardworking people that are let go. Of all that, the hardest people to deal with are the ones that beat their children. I don't know what has been going on around here, but I have had so many abuse cases at work lately. Unfortunately, it's not just little minor injuries either. I'm talking about events that turn your stomach, that you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy. What possesses people to hurt their own children??? Or better yet, what would possess a woman to stay with a man who beats her child?? I have even had moms marry the man who abused their own children only to find out that the probable reason is because a wife is not require to testify against her husband ... and vice versa. And this isn't just a one time occurance, I've seen it numerous times.

Yesterday, I broke down in tears just looking at one of my patients and actually had to leave the room. That's never happened to me before. I didn't even have any idea what happened to them, other than it was suspected abuse. I can't even begin to describe the injuries because I don't think that I could even come up with the words. And it's so hard to leave all this at work. I laid in bed last night trying to figure out what type of trauma would cause the type of injury I had been looking at. And today, after they left the hospital, I couldn't help but wonder where they had gone. No way they were placed in a foster family that quick ... so I'm sure it was to an overcrowded shelter where there's not enough staff to provide adequate care.

A lot of this emotion, I know, comes from now being a mommy. I know that I can't save everyone and it's not my job to do so, but it's still so hard to just walk away at 430 and not care what happens to these kids. I'm praying desperately for a job change, and have been for a long time, but nothing has happened. I thought that things were being laid out for a job in Shreveport, but that appears to be falling apart. I just don't know how much more of this I can take. Days like today, make me want to count quarters in a toll booth.