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Subject:Tech writing and Stress From:Lynda Shindley <bentley -at- WINTERNET -dot- COM> Date:Tue, 12 Dec 1995 07:44:54 -0600
This if for Rick Lippincott: (Sorry, I do not have your email adress at hand
.)
Before I returned to college, in a mid-life that included a husband (EE) and
two rebellious teenagers, I was a surgical nurse. That was stressful.
Getting called out in the middle of a frigid Iowa winter night for a
ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm or C-section for a fetal distress
premature infant is no picnic. Even routine cases can be a nightmare. But,
because this is a technical writer's list, so I will move on to the proper
topic.
I became a technical writer to get away from some of the stress, and
incorporate my previous education and experience, and new education, into a
medical writing profession. I was a user of medical instrument manuals. You
have no idea how many times some of the manuals seemed to skip steps. The
writers assumed we knew more than they wrote about. I have seen surgeons
kick over a stand that held the manual!
Now I deal with stressful situations, but the level is minimized compared to
that of trying to be part of a life-saving team. Perhaps I just learned more
patience in my previous career, and that is why technical writing makes a
great second career. We writers really need patience!
Lynda Shindley (Not Henrik Lyder)
bentley -at- winternet -dot- com or shind001 -at- maroon -dot- tc -dot- umn -dot- edu
Chaska, MN (It's even colder than Iowa!)
