XML text nodes and nodeValue

so i have ignoreWhite set to true and am trying to get textual data out of an xml node. my node looks like so:

<description>this is a description</description>

so i navigated to the node with the following variable:

var descriptionNode:String = newsXML.firstChild.firstChild.childNodes*.childNodes[2];

and it gives me the output when i trace it with the node and the description in it. but i don’t need the node, i need the text only, so i tried to add a nodeValue at the end of that and it output as null. why am i brainfarting right now and can’t figure out how to output just the text and not the text AND the node?

any help is greatly appreciated.