January light

between the storms. It’s there.

Can you see it?

The View from the Bedside

Part II of III - A factual companion to Pray You Have a Professional at Your Bedside

From the rooms where rules of law are written to the rooms where lives are held in balance, every decision makes a difference.

Every word drafted and every line written far from the bedside still lands at the bedside, and the distance between the two is only an illusion. 

When decisions made in a conference room reach the patient’s room, policy stops being abstract.

When language becomes structure and structure becomes consequence, The View from the Bedside reflects on how words that may be written into policy shape what care becomes possible, who provides it, and who receives it.

The View follows Pray in purpose and tone, both expanding and defining. Seen through this writer’s personal lens of nursing experience, it examines how federal loan-limit language shapes the work of care within nursing and across the wider care economy. Part research, part story, all heart.

Author’s Note, Context, Who Governs Nursing, Lack of Access, The Ripple Effect for Nursing, The Wider Impact, What Pray Was Really About, In Closing, Afterword, Call to Action: What We Can Do, But Wait - There’s More, Disclaimer, References 

Author’s Note

The View from the Bedside is based on language presented in the U.S. Department of Education’s (ED) Reimagining and Improving Student Education (RISE) Negotiated Rulemaking, Discussion Paper and Proposed Regulatory Text: Loan Limit Provisions and Definitions sessions. (1) These sessions examined proposed updates to graduate and professional loan-limit provisions, including a definition of “professional degree” for federal borrowing purposes and an accompanying list of qualifying disciplines.

The list did not include nursing.

This omission carries potential implications for graduate nursing education, workforce sustainability, and the wider care economy. This article presents data and context showing how administrative language and funding decisions influence access to advanced education.

The ED has also issued a Myth vs. Fact: The Definition of Professional Degrees press release (14), outlining how the ED defines “professional degree”, an internal definition for loan-limit purposes, and they clarify it is “not a value judgment about the importance of programs”.

The View builds on Pray You Have a Professional at Your Bedside, which demonstrated how policy language influences both access to funding and professional perception, returning to that same language, no longer as literary device but as documentation, to examine how words in federal regulation become structure, shaping both opportunity and perception within the care professions.

Context

The ED’s proposed regulatory language, discussed during the RISE sessions, outlines which programs would be eligible for higher loan limits, and nursing was not among them.

The omission of nurses from higher loan limits has prompted the American Nurses Association (ANA) to call on the ED to revise the definition to include nursing.

The ANA has issued two formal statements and a petition urging the ED to include nursing in its definition of “professional degree.” (2)(2a)

A link to the petition can be found in the Call to Action section below.

Who Governs Nursing

• American Nurses Association (ANA) — Defines professional standards, ethics, and scope of practice. (3)

• National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) — Oversees licensure and NCLEX testing standards. (4)

• State Boards of Nursing — Regulate practice, ensure public safety, and uphold accountability.

Nursing already fulfills the core hallmarks of a profession: an evidence base, ethical code, licensure, continuing education, and accountability.

Lack of Access

The ED’s proposed regulatory language would cap federal loan limits for graduate nursing students because nursing was not included in the definition of professional degrees. (1)

While some claim this could push institutions to lower tuition, history and economic data suggest otherwise. Tuition typically does not decrease when borrowing access is reduced. Instead, the financial barrier shifts to the student. Individuals with greater financial resources can continue, while those with fewer means face additional barriers to advancement.

This effectively limits who can choose nursing at higher levels, restricting advanced education to those who can pay out of pocket or access private loans. It may narrow opportunity without lowering cost.

The issue is not excess; it is access to funding. The result is foreseeable: fewer nurses from working-class and underrepresented backgrounds will be able to pursue advanced practice, research, or leadership roles. Fewer teachers to train the next generation. Fewer clinicians to care for underserved communities.

Limiting access to federal funding for advanced education in the caring professions does not strengthen the system. It constrains it.

The loan limits also disproportionately affect nontraditional and second-career nurses, those who return to school after years in the workforce, often already carrying prior education debt, yet seeking to advance into leadership and advanced practice roles.

At first glance, the $100,000 aggregate (lifetime) loan cap for graduate nursing degrees might appear reasonable. Several datasets are being referenced in current discussions about the graduate loan limits, including both federal sources like the College Scorecard (CS) and profession specific surveys such as those conducted by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN). Both sets of figures report median student debt, a midpoint rather than a range, but the difference lies in scope and context.

Federal figures drawn from the ED’s CS report median federal loan debt and earnings for graduates by field of study. The CS includes only federal loans, excludes private loans, and does not distinguish tuition from other education-related expenses. These medians offer a narrow, dated view, typically two or three years old, capturing early-career outcomes across all disciplines rather than current realities within the profession. In contrast, the AACN data arise from within nursing education itself, and reports program-level anticipated debt in nursing, does not break out federal versus private borrowing, and does not distinguish tuition from other education-related expenses. However, the most recent AACN report, published in 2023 and based on 2016 survey data, is also dated and likely underestimates current borrowing needs once modern tuition, living costs, and inflation are taken into account. Both datasets, while useful for broad comparison, obscure the full range of actual borrowing burdens faced by graduate nursing students.

Median debt reported by AACN shows anticipated borrowing upon completion ranging between $40,000 and $54,999. (5) The $100,000 lifetime cap loses perspective once real-world borrowing patterns and the erosion of value over time are considered. Additionally, median debt captures only a midpoint, not the upper limits that many borrowers face and that distinction matters.

The truth is, no one actually knows the current cost of becoming an advanced practice nurse. The data that should inform these decisions are outdated, incomplete, and disconnected from today’s reality. Behind every median is a range of real people whose costs and sacrifices exceed the statistic, a truth that policy cannot afford to overlook.

Nationally, Americans now owe roughly $1.6 trillion in student loans, a 42 percent increase over the past decade according to the Pew Research Center (PRC). (6) PRC also reports that debt levels vary widely by education level, with advanced-degree holders typically carrying the largest balances. As inflation and tuition rise, even a cap that looks adequate quickly becomes restrictive.

According to the federal National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses (NSSRN), based on data from 2022, approximately 45% of RNs used federally assisted student loans to finance their initial nursing education, and about 51% borrowed funds for either their initial or an additional nursing degree, (7) confirming that nursing education depends substantially on access to federal lending. Excluding nursing from a professional-degree classification and access to higher federal funding would push many future nurses toward private loans or self-payment. For those already carrying undergraduate or prior-career debt, it often means an impossible choice between withdrawing, assuming higher-interest private loans, or abandoning advancement altogether.

It is also telling who stands behind nurses in this moment. The very organizations whose data often inform public discussion of nursing education costs, such as the AACN, are among those who support the ANA petition, alongside the NCSBN, the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP), and more than twenty other national specialty organizations. Their inclusion signals alignment with the ANA’s position that excluding nursing from the professional degree classification is a policy oversight with serious workforce implications. So while some may point to AACN’s debt data as context for how much nurses borrow, AACN itself, through its support in this coalition, has made clear that nursing should have been explicitly included.

The unity across academic, regulatory, and professional nursing leadership makes one point unmistakable. This is not an argument about numbers. It is about what kind of access a nation chooses to grant to the people who keep its health systems running.

And nursing is not alone.

The omission affects other care-centered and service-based professions that have long been undervalued, social work, education, counseling, and public health.

These are the fields that hold communities together, often staffed by people from underrepresented backgrounds, and they are also being told, through policy, that their expertise is less worthy of investment.

When graduate programs for these groups are also left out of professional classifications, the message echoes through hospitals, clinics, classrooms, and communities.

It implies that the work of care is somehow less deserving of investment or opportunity for advancement.

This is not just a nursing issue.

It is a care economy issue.

If we limit the ability of every degree built around caring and service to grow, we erode the care infrastructure that holds our communities together.

The Ripple Effect for Nursing

If adopted, this omission would be a structural decision with far-reaching consequences. It would affect Advanced Practice Registered Nurses (APRNs), Nurse Practitioners (NPs), Clinical Nurse Specialists (CNSs), Nurse Anesthetists (CRNAs), and Nurse Midwives (CNMs), all of whom require graduate or doctoral education to practice fully.

It would also affect MSN-, DNP-, and PhD-prepared nurses, the very educators and researchers responsible for educating the next generation. Without equitable funding for advanced education, who will teach the next generation?

The message this omission sends to the public is equally troubling.

When policy separates professional from non-professional, it risks shaping perception, and perception drives trust.

Will patients come to believe that nurse-led care is somehow less professional than physician-led care?

That kind of erosion starts quietly, through language and legislation, before it ever shows up at the bedside.

And when the language that shapes policy diminishes a profession, it adds weight to a system already strained by burnout and moral injury. The result is not abstract. It is another layer of depletion in a workforce already operating under sustained pressure.

Nurse attrition is not hypothetical.

Up to one-third of newly licensed registered nurses leave the profession within their first two years of practice. (8)

During the pandemic and its aftermath, approximately 138,000 nurses exited the workforce, and nearly 40% report they intend to leave or retire by 2029. (9)

In addition, more than 60% of nurses report symptoms of burnout, citing chronic understaffing, moral injury, and emotional exhaustion as key reasons for considering departure. (10)

Attrition further weakens an already overextended system, one that could deteriorate even more if current administrative definitions move forward unchanged. With the population aging and what researchers colloquially call the “silver tsunami” now unfolding, the need for care will only intensify.

The Wider Impact

Based on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) nurses make up the largest category of healthcare providers in the American healthcare system, totaling approximately 4.4 million.

According to the BLS (2024), the U.S. nursing workforce includes approximately 3,391,000 registered nurses (RNs), (11) 651,400 licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses (LPNs/LVNs), (11a), and 382,700 advanced practice registered nurses (APRNs), (11b) including nurse practitioners, nurse anesthetists, and nurse midwives. 

Employment of RNs is projected to grow 5%, (11), LPNs/LVNs by 3%, (11a) and APRNs by a striking 40%, (11b) (11c) from 2024 to 2034, underscoring a rapidly expanding need for highly educated nursing professionals. While all projections carry a margin of uncertainty, the direction of growth remains clear and significant. This dramatic projected growth reflects BLS modeling based on an aging population, rising chronic illness, and worsening provider shortages, clear indicators of the nation’s dependence on an adequately educated and supported nursing workforce. (12)(12a)

The BLS statistics and projections are not partisan; they are a mirror that reflects the truth of our nation’s need for nurses. If we meet that truth with both compassion and competence, not policy alone, we might just build a healthcare system that can finally hold us all. If policies built on the ED’s loan-limit language discussed in the RISE sessions inadvertently sideline the nation’s largest body of caregivers under the banner of fiscal reform, they risk the stability of healthcare itself.

Some have argued, this policy affects only a small fraction of nurses.

But even a small percentage of a workforce this large is no small matter.

These are not marginal numbers. They are the backbone of the nation’s clinical education, leadership, and advanced care capacity.

And this doesn’t end with nursing.

Nonphysician providers that include both nurse practitioners and physician assistants now deliver roughly a quarter of all U.S. healthcare visits. (13)(13a) Physician assistants, like nurses, are also not included in the ED’s definition of a professional degree, despite their comparable graduate-level entry requirements. This exclusion means both professions, core to expanding access to primary and specialty care, would be restricted from the higher federal loan limits available to other advanced clinical fields.

This impact is not minimal.

It is systemic.

And every person who serves within the care economy deserves to be seen, supported, and valued accordingly.

What Pray Was Really About

Pray You Have a Professional at Your Bedside wasn’t about semantics, or was it?

Economics and language feed each other, one shaping the other in an endless loop.

Like the ouroboros, the argument turns back on itself, a system feeding on its own language while insisting it’s only about economics.

When policy defines who is “professional,” it’s both a financial and a linguistic act.

Language shapes perception, and perception drives policy. Each reinforces the other, a feedback loop that decides who gets funded, who gets to advance, and who remains on the margins.

The heart of Pray was rooted in my own experience as a nurse, the commitment and the continual work of advancing while giving care within systems that are often understaffed and overextended.

In combining both policy language and lived experience, the telling of the tale got tangled up in the prose. I intentionally left off “degree” to highlight the ambiguity of language and how a single word can define access in policy yet reflect integrity in practice. The omission was purposeful, a way to show how meaning itself can shape perception, and the responses that followed reminded me just how powerful language can be. The View from the Bedside was born the same day Pray was posted and unfolded over the ten days that followed, written between inpatient shifts through the holiday.

I know that what I write carries interpretation, my opinion, but it is informed in fact, research, and lived reality.

I try to be responsible with that balance.

For those of us who live inside these systems, the line between economic policy and human consequence is not theoretical; it is raw, everyday experience.

It is recognition.

And the impact is real. It is the nurse studying to advance their practice between back-to-back shifts, reviewing index cards in the car or grocery line because you’re never really done learning. It is schools forced to turn away qualified students for lack of faculty. And it is the patients waiting for beds because of a lack of staff.

It is knowing the system is already strained, and that decisions like this one deepen the fracture lines. Ultimately, those fractures reach the bedside, affecting patient care and safety.

In Closing

I write because facts alone rarely move hearts.

Data tells us what is happening. Words remind us why it matters.

This moment isn’t only about policy.

It’s about what we value, who we choose to invest in, and what kind of care system we believe in.

Everything I have written here comes not from certainty, but from concern. I truly hope I am wrong about what this proposal could mean. Nothing would bring me greater relief than to see nursing and every other care profession fully recognized and supported.

We choose nursing because it is rooted in care, in presence, in humanity, in the kind of healing that asks for more than science alone. To limit how far that calling can grow is to misunderstand what nursing is made of.

Afterword

On November 24, 2025, the ED released Myth vs. Fact: The Definition of Professional Degrees, in which the ED addressed public concern over the new classification of professional degrees and federal loan limits. (14)

To treat language as merely administrative and “not a value judgment” is to disregard its potential cascading impact across the workforce. Language shapes legitimacy, and policy determines who has financial access to progress through graduate study. Nurses deserve neither semantic downgrades nor financial ceilings disguised as neutrality.

Even if the ED’s intent was purely administrative, impact and perception are inseparable. Bureaucratic neutrality does not erase the message received on the ground.

The logic may hold that nurses were never professional by definition, but the optics tell another story. During the pandemic, a nation that once called us “heroes” (15) and “professionals” (16) and told us they would never forget how we showed up, now calls us something less. For those who did show up in our nation’s time of need, the shift is not simply bureaucratic.

And whatever happened to “we are all in this together”? (15) It seems words are conveniently used when needed and disposed of when they no longer serve.

To all who have carried the work of care, nurses, social workers, teachers, counselors, therapists, public health professionals, and countless others who show up when needed this moment includes all of us. None of us have forgotten. May the nation remember as well. 

Nurses will continue to show up, as they always have, but they do not stand alone. Every profession rooted in service carries the same fatigue, the same devotion, and the same quiet question echoing beneath the noise: what becomes of a country that depends on care yet hesitates to value it?

We start by refusing silence. We start by naming what has been minimized.

We start by taking action together.

Call to Action: What We Can Do

This isn’t just about awareness, it’s about agency.

And anyone can take action in shaping policy that affects the future of care.

1. Sign the American Nurses Association Petition

The American Nurses Association (ANA) has formally petitioned the Department of Education to include nursing in the list of professional degrees eligible for higher loan limits.

Add your name in solidarity with nurses nationwide who are calling for equitable access to federal graduate lending. Sign the petition and support funding for higher education for nurses.

→ ANA Nursing IS a Professional Degree: Petition to the U.S. Department of Education

2. Contact Your Representatives in Congress

Write, call, or email your representatives and senators.

Tell them the loan and degree policy decisions affect not only nurses, but also social workers, teachers, therapists, and public health professionals, the backbone of our care system.

Ask them to advocate for equitable loan access for all caregiving professions.

→ Find your House member: https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative

→ Contact your Senators: https://www.senate.gov/senators/senators-contact.htm

But Wait - There’s More

Because beyond the data and debate, care starts with the self, in the body, the breath, and the steady work of becoming whole again, not as the absence of illness or pain but the presence of balance and well-being.

In that remembering, in knowing what it means to belong to our own wholeness, prevention, connection, and presence become the real practice of healing.

It grows from the self, flows through what we do, and extends outward into community, nature, and the wider world.

In the end, we are all in this together, learning how to care for one another and for the world that holds us.

Part III of III - An integrative companion to Pray and The View, But Wait - There’s More, to be continued.

Disclaimer

The views expressed here are my own and do not represent any organization, institution or employer. 

Beth Pearson King, BSN, RN

References

1. U.S. Department of Education. (2025, September 29 – October 3). Reimagining and Improving Student Education (RISE) Negotiated Rulemaking: Discussion Paper and Proposed Regulatory Text — Loan Limit Provisions and Definitions, Session 1. https://www.ed.gov/media/document/rise-discussion-paper-loan-limits-685102-685200-685201-685203-september-29-pm-version-112442.pdf

2. American Nurses Association. (2025, November 10). Statement on Proposed Federal Loan Policy Changes. https://www.nursingworld.org/news/news-releases/2025/statement-from-the-american-nurses-association-on-proposed-federal-loan-policy-changes/ (2a.) American Nurses Association.(2025, November 26). Department of Education’s Loan Proposal Puts Nursing Workforce and Patient Care at Risk. https://www.nursingworld.org/news/news-releases/2025/department-of-educations-loan-proposal-puts-nursing-workforce-and-patient-care-at-risk/

3. American Nurses Association. Nursing Scope and Standards of Practice. https://www.nursingworld.org/practice-policy/scope-of-practice/

4. National Council of State Boards of Nursing. Nursing Regulation. https://www.ncsbn.org/nursing-regulation.page

5. American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN). (2023). Student Debt Report. https://www.aacnnursing.org/Portals/42/Policy/PDF/Debt_Report.pdf

6. Pew Research Center. (2024, September 18). 5 Facts About Student Loans. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/09/18/facts-about-student-loans/

7. Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). (2022). National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses: Education and Training Report. https://bhw.hrsa.gov/sites/default/files/bureau-health-workforce/data-research/nssrn-education-training-report.pdf

8. Tate, S. (2024). Registered Nurses Leaving the Profession in the First Two Years. OJIN: The Online Journal of Issues in Nursing, 29(2). https://ojin.nursingworld.org/table-of-contents/volume-29-2024/number-2-may-2024/registered-nursing-leaving-the-profession

9. National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN). (2024). 2024 National Nursing Workforce Study. https://www.ncsbn.org/news/ncsbn-research-highlights-small-steps-toward-nursing-workforce-recovery-burnout-and-staffing-challenges-persist

10. American Nurses Association (ANA). (2024). Workplace Well-Being Report: What Is Nurse Burnout and How to Prevent It. https://www.nursingworld.org/content-hub/resources/workplace/what-is-nurse-burnout-how-to-prevent-it

11. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2025). Occupational Outlook Handbook: Registered Nurses. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/registered-nurses.htm (11a.) Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2025). Occupational Outlook Handbook: Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/licensed-practical-and-licensed-vocational-nurses.htm (11b.) Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2025). Occupational Outlook Handbook: Nurse Anesthetists, Nurse Midwives, and Nurse Practitioners. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/nurse-anesthetists-nurse-midwives-and-nurse-practitioners.htm (11c.) Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2025). Occupational Outlook Handbook: Fastest Growing Occupations, 2024–34. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/fastest-growing.htm

12. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2025, August 28). Employment Projections — 2024–2034. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/ecopro.pdf (12a.) Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2025). Employment Projections Methods Overview. https://www.bls.gov/emp/documentation/projections-methods.htm

13. Harvard Medicine News. (2023, September 14). A Fourth of U.S. Health Visits Now Delivered by Non-Physicians.https://hms.harvard.edu/news/fourth-us-health-visits-now-delivered-non-physicians (13a.) Patel, S. Y., Auerbach, D., Huskamp, H. A., Frakt, A., Neprash, H., Barnett, M. L., Smith, L. B., & Mehrotra, A. (2023). Provision of evaluation and management visits by nurse practitioners and physician assistants in the USA from 2013 to 2019: cross-sectional time-series study. BMJ, 382:e073933. https://www.bmj.com/content/382/bmj-2022-073933

14. U.S. Department of Education. (2025, November 24). Myth vs. Fact: The Definition of Professional Degrees. https://www.ed.gov/about/news/press-release/myth-vs-fact-definition-of-professional-degrees

15. Trump, D. J. (2020, March 18). Remarks by President Trump, Vice President Pence, and Members of the Coronavirus Task Force in Press Briefing. The White House Archives. https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-vice-president-pence-members-coronavirus-task-force-press-briefing-5/

16. Trump, D. J. (2020, May 6). Remarks by President Trump at Signing of a Proclamation in Honor of National Nurses Day. The White House Archives. https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-signing-proclamation-honor-national-nurses-day/
    

    Photograph: Only emptiness without the presence, compassion, and care of a nurse. (Stock photo)
    
    
    
    

Pray You Have a Professional at Your Bedside

Five years later…
Here we are,
from “heroes” to “non-professionals.”

How utterly, offensively small.
How insulting to every nurse ever.
How undeserved for the people who have carried so much.

Let’s be clear.
This isn’t about semantics.
It’s about economics.

It’s about reducing access to education and calling it reform, while the real price is paid in human exhaustion. And let’s be honest about equity. The fields being excluded from the classification of “professional”, nursing, social work, teaching, and so many more, are historically filled by women. The professions included are often led by men. The work of care has always been essential, yet too often undervalued because it is seen as service instead of expertise.

This is not partisan.
It is historical.
And we can do better.

Meanwhile, the nursing shortage grows.

And the proposed classification of “professional”, excluding nurses, makes advanced education for them harder to afford. It limits opportunity when we should be building it.

Nurse practitioners and physician assistants now deliver one in every four healthcare visits in the United States. For many conditions, they provide nearly half of all care.

Only about ten percent of registered nurses advance to APRN level roles. Ten percent, the small group trained for advanced practice, education, and leadership.

We cannot afford to weaken that pipeline when the need for care is immense.

We should be doing everything within our power to help that number grow.

Where will this path lead the American healthcare system?

For without nurses, there is no system.

Nurses make up the largest percentage of healthcare workers in the United States.

But be not confused.

What can never be taken away is the professionalism that lives inside this work.

The kind not printed on a degree, not doled out by a politician, but earned in every heartbeat and breath given.

In every moment of presence.

In the accountability when there is no margin for error.

In the compassion under pressure when someone’s life is both beginning and ending, and in all the difficult moments in between. So no, you cannot classify this away.

You cannot spreadsheet reduce the soul out of nursing.

You cannot legislate the sacred work of standing between chaos and calm and choosing compassion.

Regardless of politics, background, or belief, you cannot live your life without, at some point, needing a nurse.

And when that day comes,

when you or someone you love is in need,

pray you have a professional at your bedside.

And remember this.

We are all aboard the same sinking ship of the American healthcare system.

Panic will not keep it afloat, nor the politicians making deals behind closed doors.

But prevention can certainly help.

The best thing you can do for yourself, and for those you love, is to take care of your own health.

Eat real food.
Sleep well.
Move your body.
Breathe deeply.
Get outside.

Go find a tree and lean against it for a while. Let it remind you that steadiness still exists.

Show gratitude, kindness and love.

Lifestyle medicine is not a trend. It is what will help save us. It is what will lighten the load for those who keep showing up for you and your family, the nurses, the aides, the healers, the quiet hands holding the line.

If we want a sustainable future where equitable healthcare for all is possible, it begins with presence, participation, personal responsibility, and prevention from all.

Because the best medicine has always been found in the simple act of caring for yourself, for each other, for the world we share.

You can also do one more simple thing.

Sign the petition supporting funding for higher education for the nurses, for the ones who keep showing up.

Because when the need arises,
and make no mistake, it will,
it will not be a politician, policy, or profit that is there by your side, holding your hand.

It will be a nurse.

It will be a professional at your bedside.

Signed with gratitude and appreciation,

A nurse still contemplating her own advanced degree.
A nurse who entered the profession as a professional on an emergency license in 2020.
A nurse who is exhausted but keeps showing up.

A human that is profoundly pained and utterly disgusted.

Beth

https://ana.quorum.us/campaign/professionaldegreepetition/

Photograph: Only emptiness without the presence, compassion, and care of a nurse. (Stock photo)

A Grounding for Tender Hearts in Loud Times

Not everyone feels at home in this season.

Some move through the holidays carrying secrets.

Quiet truths that joy does not arrive on command,
that belonging is never guaranteed,
and that the world’s scripts were perhaps never written with them in mind.

For anyone who lives with that truth,
there is a place for you in the stillness of the natural world.

Take a breath that belongs only to you,
a breath that fills you,
and let your body remember the earth’s steady rhythm beneath all the glitter and noise.

So much of this time has become performance,
lights of every color, everywhere, and rehearsed cheer filling every room,
with the wider unrest around us only adding that much more to the noise.

Rituals polished until the quiet parts disappear.

There is no requirement to follow any of it.
There is no need to pretend the celebration fits.

Honoring the turning of the seasons
can be simple and real:
a candle lit like a small hearth flame,
a moment spent where bare branches etch the sky,
a cup warming tired hands.

And if you find yourself in solitude, let yourself sit in it.
If grief follows, allow it and let it rest, a reminder of all that has been carried.
If other tender things rise, let them have their place without apology.

There is no being outside the sacred.
There is simply finding it from within.

Photograph: Winter's sun brings hope, North Nottingham, NH

What the Season Teaches

Change moves through like wind in a forest, touching what it passes, felt before it is understood.

Branches bend, old bark loosens, and what once felt certain begins to waver.

The full moon lifts over bare crowns, silvering what has been stripped away.

In her light, the forest stands both empty and alive. Roots hold fast while limbs reach for what is next.

Nothing resists the turning. Even what breaks becomes part of the soil that will feed new growth.

There is wisdom in trees that do not hurry their becoming.

They let go when it is time.

They rest in the quiet work of roots.

They trust the sun will return.

Some seasons unmake us so completely that we forget we are still growing.

But the forest remembers.

Every fall of leaf, every pulse beneath the ground, they are a promise. Change is not the end, only the movement toward becoming whole.

Photograph: Watchers at the edge, Lebanon, NH

The Gold of August

August in New England begins in a blaze.

The sun burns hot, heavy with the weight of summer. Fields buzz with crickets, the air thick with warmth, and the days stretch wide, steeped in fullness.

Yet even here, where summer holds fast, change edges in. By the month’s end, the light softens and slants, shadows lengthen, and the nights whisper of coolness to come. Goldenrod flames across meadows and along roadsides, not as a midsummer fire but as a herald, bright and certain, that autumn is on its way.

In New England, August is both abundance and foretelling: the bold blaze of high summer and the first brush of fall carried together. To notice it is to hold both truths in the same breath, and to let the season’s turning remind us that change begins quietly, beautifully, before it fully arrives.

Photograph: Late August backyard goldenrod, Enfield, NH

The Art of the Pivot

Birthday plans: solo kayak to an island, camp under the stars.

Reality: thunder, lightning, smoke, and mud.

The trip had been planned for months. Gear stacked and ready, the kayak waiting. Moving with the current and sleeping waterside was meant to be the celebration itself.

The pivot became staying home. A deep breath, then another, and the choice to let it be enough. Drumming in the backyard, dancing barefoot, curling up with the cats.

The disappointment was real, and so was the loss. Yet in its place came a different kind of joy.

It was a minor loss in the scope of the world, yet even these small disruptions matter. They give the nervous system a chance to practice letting go, to notice what is steady, and to find joy in another form.

At work, the pivots come fast. A patient crisis, a staff shortage, more orders added. Patients feel it, staff feel it, families feel it. Everyone is touched as the energy shifts. The rhythm is relentless, like a dance that never ends: a quick change in plans, a step back to adjust, a turn to meet the next demand while trying not to lose footing.

What makes the dance hardest is not only the movement but the constant emotional recalibration it requires. Sometimes the pivot calls for celebration, a breakthrough, a breath of relief, a hand held in gratitude. Sometimes it asks for grief, a loss, a silence, a letting go. And sometimes both arrive in the same breath, the nurse moving from one room to the next, carrying joy and sorrow side by side.

The way through is the same: pause, breathe, and ground into what is steady before taking the next step forward. These moments build not only steadiness but meaning, the reminder that presence and care carry weight even when the day does not go to plan.

The way forward is found in the pivot, and the path becomes clear in the moment we turn.

Photograph 1: Dreams of kayak camping past, Connecticut River, VT

Photograph 2: Birthday brunch celebration in the backyard, Enfield, NH

Photograph 3: The path forward, Walpole, NH

Nourish your Wild with Nature

What is Forest Bathing?

The term Shinrin-yoku means “forest bathing” or “taking in the forest atmosphere.” It was introduced by Japan’s Ministry of Forestry in the early 1980s as a public health practice to promote wellness. The idea was simple: time in the forest could help people feel better.

Forest bathing is not hiking or exercise, but something slower and more intentional. It is a form of mindfulness practiced with the natural world. It invites a different pace, one that allows the body to settle and the senses to awaken. By walking slowly, noticing without rushing, and tuning in to sight, sound, scent, touch, and taste, the nervous system begins to soften. In the presence of trees, regulation returns, without effort.

In a world that moves fast and demands more, forest bathing offers a rare invitation to come back to yourself, one quiet moment at a time.

Research has shown forest bathing: lowers cortisol and blood pressure, improves mood, sleep, and focus, strengthens immunity through phytoncides, the natural oils released by trees, and supports the nervous system’s shift from stress to regulation.

But the roots of this practice are much older.

Across cultures, people have always turned to the forest to think, to feel, to heal. 

More Than Wellness: A Practice of Belonging

Forest bathing is not just about calming the body though.

It is about relationship, being in connection with the land and with the quiet intelligence of nature. This is not about escape. It is about return. A remembering. When people learn how to be with nature, they remember not only how to care for themselves but how to care for the world around them.

Nature Is Nearer Than You Think

You don’t need the forest or a perfect trail to begin.

Nature is wherever life is.

A tree in a courtyard.

A plant on a windowsill.

A breeze through a half-open door.

A patch of sky above the roof.

A birdsong in the early morning.

Wherever there is life, there is the possibility of reconnection.

Let the breath slow.
Let the body be still.
Let the living world, wherever you find it, begin its quiet work.

Some of the Science

In 2025, a comprehensive literature review explored over 30 studies and affirmed forest bathing’s ability to support cardiovascular health, sleep, and nervous system regulation. Read the full review →

A global overview in 2024 found consistent reports of lowered blood pressure, reduced stress hormones, and improved well-being across diverse forest immersion experiences. See the overview →

Another 2024 study documented meaningful drops in blood pressure among older adults following nature-based sessions. Explore the study →

References

Li, Q. (2025). Preventive effects of forest bathing (Shinrin-Yoku) on cardiovascular diseases: A literature review. Forests, 16(2), 310. https://www.mdpi.com/1999-4907/16/2/310

Denche‑Zamorano, Á., Tapia‑Serrano, M. Á., Villafaina, S., Sánchez‑Miguel, P. A., & García‑Hermoso, A. (2024). Global review of literature on forest bathing: A bibliometric analysis and emerging themes. ResearchGate. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/381879883_Global_Review_of_Literature_on_Forest_Bathing

Garibay‑Chávez, M. G., Curiel‑Ballesteros, A., García de Alba‑García, J., Borja‑Arreola, M., Moreno‑Ramírez, D., & Santos‑Zamora, E. (2024). Effects of forest bathing on blood pressure and heart rate in older adults in Mexico. Forests, 15(7), 1254. https://www.mdpi.com/1999-4907/15/7/1254

Photograph 1: Coastal Maine forest path, Cutler, ME

Photograph 2: Forest love, Enfield, NH

Photograph 3: Early morning light on the farm, Claremont, NH

Even in Grief, Green Things Grow

Grief is not linear.
It doesn’t wear a watch.
It doesn’t know what month it is, what year or even if time has passed.

It arrives uninvited,
stays too long,
leaves without warning, then returns
when your hands are full.

It waits in the body, in the throat, the spine, the belly.

It’s not always visible,
but it is always present.
It’s not a story with an ending.
It is something we carry.

The forest does not grieve.
Not like we do.

But it understands loss.

It knows what to do
when a branch breaks off a tree or its crown is sheared by the wind.
Energy is rerouted.

Life does not pause, it is redirected.

The tree does not stop growing.
It thickens the bark around the break.
It reaches toward the sun, the light.

What’s lost becomes memory of the whole.

A single tree falls, the forest feels it, 
roots brace, systems strain. Together.

Loss in the forest becomes nourishment.
The dead become a place for growth.

Nurse logs lie soft and split, their bodies a place for seeds to sprout and grow roots.
They cradle life in their decay,
offering shelter, nutrients, and quiet direction toward the light.

Some seeds only open after fire.
They’re designed that way,
sealed tight.
Until the heat of destruction cracks them
open.

It sounds violent,
but it’s not.
It’s precise.
It’s ancient.
It’s the forest’s way of saying:
this pain is not the end.

It is a beginning,
ash, soot, and all.

You, too, may have parts that only grow
after the break, after the burning.

The growing stretches us,
sometimes to the edge.
It makes you real.

The forest never rushes you.

It doesn’t say,
“You’re still sad?”
It says,
“Sit.”
“Breathe.”
“Listen.”

You can lean against a hemlock
and feel something older than language.

The stillness that says:

You don’t have to move yet.
You don’t have to fix this.
You don’t have to explain.

In that space,

in the care of the nurse log,
in the quiet after the fire,
in the filtered light shining through the canopy,

something begins again.

It is life.

Even in grief,
green things grow.

Photograph 1: New life grows alongside old, Sierra Mountains, CA

Photograph 2: Fresh spring growth, Arrowhead Recreation Area, Claremont, NH

Coming Home with Nature: Where We Belong, Now More Than Ever

In a world of constant notifications and glowing screens, it’s easy to forget that we are nature. We are not separate from the forests, rivers, mountains and ocean, or the quiet turning of the seasons, we are a living part of them. Yet many of us have drifted far from this truth, and it’s costing us more than we realize.

Today, anxiety, burnout, and loneliness are rising, even as we remain “connected” through devices. We scroll for comfort, swipe for hope, and often feel more disconnected from ourselves and each other. Meanwhile, just outside, a quiet world waits to welcome us back.

Coming home with nature isn’t about escape; it’s about returning to the rhythm of life. The forest doesn’t rush. The river doesn’t apologize for its flow. Mountains stand steady. The ocean moves endlessly. Animals do not question whether they belong. With nature, we remember our breath, our bodies, and the simple fact that we are alive. We belong. Research shows that time with nature can ease anxiety, lower blood pressure, and improve mood and focus. Even a few moments of mindful presence with nature can guide our nervous systems from chronic stress back into restoration.

Beyond the data, there is a deeper reason why coming home with nature matters now more than ever. The crises we face, climate change, social division, and mental health challenges are symptoms of a broken relationship with the Earth and with each other. Nature invites us to slow down, to listen, to notice, and to care. When we spend time with nature, we often rediscover a sense of stewardship and connection that can guide the way we live and the choices we make.

Coming home with nature is not a luxury. It is how we remember who we are, how we heal, and how we learn to live in right relationship with ourselves, each other, and the living world. In the forest, we find belonging. By the water, we find reflection. Beneath the sky, we find hope. Nature is everywhere, open to everyone, every day.

If you are feeling disconnected, tired, or uncertain, step outside. Let the breeze touch your skin. Listen for birdsong. Feel the ground beneath your feet, in your heart, wherever you feel it. You don’t need to go far. Even indoors, you can pause and turn toward nature outside your window, watch the clouds drift, notice the trees swaying, or feel the light on your skin. Or you can simply be with nature in your mind, imagining a place that brings you peace. These small moments of connection remind us that nature is here, inviting us back into relationship, wherever we are. Begin with a single breath, a moment of noticing, and allow yourself to remember:

You are nature. And it’s time to come home.

Photograph: Backyard forest path, Enfield, NH