BEST.WEEK.EVER

Over this past week in Cherokee, I have been overwhelmed with the amount of generosity I have received by the wonderful people who live here. Starting with the hospital, the staff was so willing to sacrifice their time to share their experiences and knowledge with us nursing students. In addition to the nurses, other important members of the healthcare staff willingly sacrificed time out of their busy schedules to spend large amounts of time with us sharing their stories and answering all of our questions throughout the week. To top it all off, at the end of the week we were presented with handmade gifts as a token of appreciation and respect by the same members of the healthcare staff. Outside of the healthcare setting, I was fortunate enough to have an additional experience with generosity displayed by a local tribe member. During this past week, we were fortunate enough to attend a local Baptist church service. At the conclusion of the service, I was talking out of the building and an elderly gentleman stopped me and asked for my attention. It was during that time that he presented me with two audio CDs, one filled with tracks recorded by their church and one recorded by a local radio disc jokey who shares their sermon over the radio. He suggested that we play these CDs over the intercom system within our hospital to provide patients with a calming atmosphere within the hospital. This display of generosity was unlike any other I have experienced and I consider myself truly lucky to have encountered this gentleman.

While observing the Cherokee culture, I have gained information that could potentially improve the lives of my future patients. Because nurses are exposed to so many different types of cultures, I want to become as culturally competent as possible in order to provide the best care to whomever I care for in the future. This past week within Cherokee has taught me how to respectfully care for future patients who share the same Indian cultural as some of the patients I observed while in Cherokee.

In regards to establishing a healthier lifestyle for patients within Cherokee, the first step has to be providing the population with more education. This education can include pieces of information pertaining to health conditions, how to care for oneself/family, and drug and alcohol education. I think that in order for the education to make a difference in the community, this education should be provided to the people of this community starting at a young age. Slowly exposing children to the potentially scary facts about drug and alcohol abuse may encourage these children to stay away from drugs and alcohol. Instilling this education into the community has such a high importance due to the high instance of drug overdose within the community. According to a local Cherokee nurse, there have been over one hundred overdoses reported to the hospital within the last month.

I am typically not a person who reaches outside of my comfort zone due to the fact that it takes a large amount of different situations to actually cause me to become uncomfortable. However, this week I did experience a small amount of time outside my comfort zone. I am used to being able to appropriately communicate with people within my community without worrying about offending them in any way. That being said, this week I was subject to learning a new culture and a new form of communication different than my own. I was forced to be made aware of how culturally different communication is within the Cherokee community. Learning a new culture’s body language and eye contact preferences was something that I had not previously been exposed to, but quickly adapted to prevent disrespecting any members of the community.

           

Looking back on my blog from the first day of this travel course, I’m feeling pretty naïve. The education I was provided with during my high school education basically did not give me any accurate information about the Cherokee culture whatsoever. I was so closed minded to think that Indians still lived in teepees and drew paint on their face before going out to kill food for the day. After concluding this trip, I am proud to say that I have eliminated all stereotypes that were previously established about Cherokee Indians. I feel slightly ashamed to have had such ignorant thoughts prior to this course. I had an absolutely amazing week in Cherokee learning about their culture and would high recommend a journey to Cherokee, North Carolina to anyone looking to go on an adventure while learning tons of information along the way!