In 2009, a made for TV movie entitled, The Courageous Heart of Irina Sendler, told the story of a Polish nurse who on the pretense of giving typhus shots and working with the ill in the Warsaw Ghetto, smuggled out nearly 2,500 Jewish children and infants, provided them with false papers and foster homes that ultimately saved them from the German death camps. This was truly courageous.
In nursing the words “courage” and “courageous” are used typically when describing people like Irena, who in dire situations go above and beyond.

We believe that ALL nurses are courageous. Unfortunately, courage has come to be recognized only in time of great peril to ourselves. But what about the courage needed to comfort a sick or dying person?  Or the courage to remain calm in life or death situations? Or the courage needed to question a doctor’s recommendation? Or the courage to accept that there is nothing more to be done, that you cannot save everyone under your care?
The original definition of the word “courage” comes from the French word courage, meaning “heart and spirit.” Living and working with a courageous heart is an aspiration, an intention, a way to be with ourselves and with the world. A courageous heart comes from somewhere deep within, calling us to be our best selves.
Nurses work with a courageous heart – a heart that everyday faces the heartbreak of illness and death. Nurses who work with childhood cancer patients rely on their courage as they work to make their young patients comfortable, knowing that sadly, many may not live to see adulthood. Nurses, whose hearts draw them to volunteer at Camp Ronald McDonald Camp and other childhood disease camps, rely on courage to bring an atmosphere of normalcy, joy and happiness to their campers.
Nurse volunteers with ReSurge International who work on young children with debilitating burn injuries or severe cleft palates rely on their courageous hearts to do what they can in the time they have to mend and improve lives.  It is those same courageous hearts that give them the strength to leave at the end of their visit, only to return to their work, knowing that there are so many children in need of  care.
Hemingway said that “Courage is grace under pressure.” Courage may not always be graceful, but it does let us see a part of us that, without the act of confronting fears, we might not have otherwise seen or known. When you act from your heart and allow your passion for what you do to guide you, you are displaying your true essence. And nurses do just that every day.
Imagine the courageous heart that motivates a nurse to use her vacation to go to Haiti to help in a medical clinic, to work with the poorest of the poor, to show them love and kindness. That is courage, and it exemplifies the courageous heart found in nurses everywhere.
We salute the courageous heart of nursing, the courage nurses have that leads them to face the best and worst situations with professionalism and compassion.
~Michael and Frida Donner