How the Arts Help Us Hold Grief and Maintain Collective Care

Abstract

This first-person narrative illuminates how the author-a nurse, artist, and dancer-uses the arts and movement to help patients and clinicians process personal loss individually and collectively in the hospital setting. Through the arts, play, movement, and performance, the author raises awareness of and offers artistic practices to combat burnout, secondary traumatic stress, and moral injury. The author acknowledges that the stories of her patients have, in many ways, become her stories, and the reverse is true as well. These shared experiences remind us of the incredible impact that nurses have on patients-and patients, on nurses-every single day. Lastly, the author questions her understanding of resiliency and shares the ways the arts have helped her redefine its meaning.