The Joy of Being Scared.

I work night shift in a Level 1 trauma center/emergency department.  I love my job.  I love my coworkers.  This is a job where it is not uncommon to hear, “Will you come help me get clean up this patient?” and you never really know what bodily fluid or massive wound/injury is needing cleaned.  This is an environment where we help one another without hesitation.  We work side by side coding patients and saving lives.  We work together to restrain violent patients.  We give each other reassuring looks before we walk into a dying patient’s room.  We see a lot of crazy stuff and do not think much about how it may affect us.  After all, it is what we do.  But to manage the stress, we are a crew that finds time for playfulness and laughing at what others might find inappropriate. 

Saturday night, I was walking around the hallway at work when a coworker jumped out and scared me.  I jumped and nearly wet my pants.  Now, this is not the first time this coworker has successfully scared the crap out of me.  Not the first time I have jumped and let out a scream.  You would think I would be more prepared, but she spaces it out with enough time in that one is never expecting it.  She has hidden behind curtains, crept up on me in our stock room, and every time I jump, we both laugh, and a smile stays with me for several minutes.

Now pranking someone at work is a regular part of our environment and most nights I do not turn a prank into a life-changing, philosophical moment.  Work hard, play hard are our cultural norms.  But this night, something clicked on a deeper level that I was not expecting.  For a moment, I was caught by the surprise and felt the fullness of the fear.  A surge of adrenaline accompanied the startled response.  My emotions and my response were unrestrained and completely free.  The unrestrained expression triggered deeper thoughts.

When it comes to emotions, I am a bit of a dummy.  I have difficulty identifying what I am feeling, and when I do allow myself to experience emotion, it is typically restrained and controlled.  This stoicism and emotional restraint is what allows me to walk into a trauma and stay calm.  I am grateful for this gift of emotional control, but it is a double-edged sword.  The restraint keeps me from feeling positive things like love, happiness, and joy.  Emotions are a bundled package – avoid or limit experiencing the negative emotions like rage, shame, fear and the positive are equally not experienced. 

Historically I have avoiding feelings out of a sense of dread that if I open the floodgates of feeling I will be overwhelmed with their intensity.  Keep the gates closed and the dread is avoided.  Unfortunately, this also keeps me from my greatest desires which is to feel love, closeness, and intimacy with others around me.  Saturday night, my fear reaction bypassed the flood gates and I experienced that moment without restraint . . . and I loved it.  I loved the emotions surging through my body; loved the freedom I experienced as I felt without the chains of restraint.

Glimpses of this freedom carried over into Mass on Sunday.  As we sang the Gloria, I felt tears well up as I connected with God’s story of salvation.  The freedom continued as I hugged my children and tears welled up again as I became moved by the amount of love I have for them.  I can still feel the restraint creep in – for me, the tears well and I cut short the feeling before they have a chance to roll down my cheek. I sense this is about to change.

Thanks to my special coworker who is the master at scaring me, I am eager to risk feeling overwhelmed by the fullness of all emotions.  I am ready to loosen the chains that hold me back from my emotional life.  I am ready to dive into the messiness of connection with others – to be empathic and open to others.  I am more available to practice the ministry of presence.