America Welcomed Me, Now I Fight COVID as a Registered Nurse
This piece was originally published by Bucks County Courier Times.
When I was 18 and fled the civil war in my native Liberia, I had no idea the resilience I built would prepare me to one day become a registered nurse fighting COVID-19.
This work is how I give back to the country that welcomed me as a refugee two decades ago, and it reminds me that no matter how different we may look from one another, we share powerful human bonds. When I left Liberia, I left behind my mother and my siblings. There was no time to say goodbye. That abrupt, traumatic separation is why I now feel so deeply for my patients in Jefferson Health’s intensive care unit. Almost every bed holds someone battling COVID-19 — parents and children who cannot have family by their side. Many have died. Out of love for my patients, I always stay with them in their final moments. Sometimes I hold a phone to their ears so they can hear the voices of their loved ones saying goodbye. When that’s not possible, I hold their hand and silently grieve.
This kind of personalized care and empathy is absolutely essential, especially now. As a nation, we are facing personal and collective traumas. We must nurture one another and show kindness, if we hope to heal. I know this, because it’s exactly how I healed from my own trauma. I was three months into my first semester of college, working hard and dreaming about a bright future, when the civil war broke out. I witnessed unspeakable violence and walked a harrowing 200 miles on foot to Sierra Leone. Despite this trauma, the generosity and welcome embrace I received in America proved that new beginnings are possible.
Thanks to this country’s refugee resettlement program and the crucial support I received during my first months/years here, my husband and I have stable, meaningful jobs — me as a nurse and him as a senior systems analyst — and we’re raising our children in a safe neighborhood. We are not alone in our contributions. Refugees start businesses at higher rates than other immigrants, according to New American Economy. We are crucial to the country’s food supply chain. And more than 161,000 of us work in health care.
The labor crisis within nursing is particularly alarming. Nursing is one of the country’s fastest growing fields; by 2022, we’ll need 1.1 million new nurses to fill vacancies, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the American Nurses Association. Patients need — and will continue to need — nurses and health care workers, no matter where they were born.
Given this, the xenophobia coming from our president is alarming. In addition to drastically dismantling the refugee resettlement program, Trump has stoked racial and religious animus toward immigrants and refugees from across the globe. All of this makes it so much harder for families like my own to give back to our new country, invest culturally and economically in our communities and become the Americans we yearn to be.
This Saturday, as we honor refugees on World Refugee Day, let’s remember that our contributions are only made possible by policies that welcome us in and help us build our lives. This country gains from our contributions, whether we are launching innovative businesses or showing love and care to sick patients. As much as we need America, America needs us.
Saymu Sackor is a registered nurse at Jefferson Health. She lives in Levittown.
Photo by Hush Naidoo Jade Photography on Upsplash