weirdest day of my life

FYI: I don’t go back and edit these because frankly I am sick of editing papers so I just type and whatever comes out comes out. Do not judge me on my spelling, grammar or anything else ok?

So I know I usually don’t post in the middle of my work week, let alone after my first shift of the week. Well, lucky you, I brought my laptop to work today because if you haven’t forgotten I am also taking 4 online classes while I am here. I am taking an advanced writing class, so in between playing Paramedic, I have to write papers! Let me first start out by saying that I am lucky to be alive!! (don’t worry Grandma Harris I promise I am OK J ) It is 6:27 in the morning and I am anxiously awaiting 8 o’clock when I get to go home. I switched my sleeping schedule around this week because I am sick of being awake in the middle of the nights on my days off. Well, the only problem is that I have get back on this weird schedule while on my work days. I got up this morning and headed over to the library so that I could take my medical terminology midterm. After that, I went home and tried to force myself to go to sleep so that I could stay up tonight for work. I woke up at about 1 pm STARVING!!! I ate some lucky charms and went back to bed. When I awoke a few hours later, I got ready and headed off. Little did I know that the WEIRDEST day of my entire EMS carrier thus far was ahead of me.

My first call was to a very very drunk/drugged lady who had gotten hit in the face by someone. She had a definite broken nose. She was super wacked out and a tad bit hysterical. I always love those calls J Next, we had a typical constipated teenager in extreme pain. That was uneventful. On our way to our next post we end up traveling down the highway at about 70 mph. There I am minding my own business staring out the back windows and all of the sudden the ambulance SLAMS on its breaks and we swerve to the right (my left because I am riding backwards) My diet coke goes flying and all I do is hold on for dear life. All I can hear is Drew scream from the front, “HOLY @#$#@ WE ALMOST HIT HORSES” I then look out the back and see 3, count them 1, 2, 3 Clydesdale horses RUNNING at full speed down the INTERSTATE!!!!

After my heart stopped beating out of my chest, we get called to a rollover. The rollover was pretty epic but the lady thankfully did not get hurt. She was reaching for her cell phone out of her back pocket, slammed the side rail, flipped her truck and slid! Seriously lady? Sign Oprah’s no phone zone pledge and this wouldn’t have happened. After we got all the paperwork done on her we started heading towards our next post. All of the sudden the brakes SLAM again and we swerve. I was like, “seriously guys that is not funny.” I thought they were playing a joke on me. After all, I am the bud of all jokes around here. Drew then yelled “Are @#%## kidding me? He is driving on the wrong side of the road.” Apparently this car was traveling in our lane coming right for us!!! We flipped a u-turn and followed this guy and alarmed the police. We followed him until police arrived, just waiting for him to wreck his car. At one point he was doing over 100 mph. Sure enough, he hit 2 poles!!! I never thought I would follow a car and wait for it to crash in order to help them. The officer came and put him in handcuffs as we looked at the insane mess he made. After this call we were all wondering who was trying to kill us. I mean come on almost 2 near death head on collisions in 1 night? We ended up at a gas station and there were 3 cops their drinking coffee and chatting It up. We stayed there for awhile until we got a call. The officers jokingly said, “Well maybe we will see you there.” Little did they know…..THEY WOULD.

Our call came out as a fall and then an unconscious. We arrived on scene to an older house. When we walked in all I could think about was the awful smell. I don’t know what that smell was but it stunk. Our patient was in the bathroom between the toilet and the wall. Our patient was also almost 400 pounds. 380 to be exact! Only 55 years old. Well we thought it was a fall but guess what, he wasn’t breathing and he didn’t have a pulse. Do you know what that means? FULL ARREST!!! My first one mind you. Well I knew that I would be of no help in trying to get this man out from behind the toilet to a place that we could work a code. I walked out and Drew was sitting in the living room writing down this guy’s medications. We had another Paramedic on our truck instead of an EMT so he was in the bathroom. I walk out with the monitor and calmly said, “it’s a full arrest.” Drew totally thought I was kidding. I WASN’T. As the firemen tried to get him out, I was in the living room making space to bring him to. I got out all of the intubation stuff and got the patched ready so that if we needed to we could shock him. After 10 minutes we finally got that guy out and onto the floor with the help of what we call a mega mover! It is a tarp that moves fat people. So we start working him and I tubed him! J That’s 2 tubes so far!!! Fire was doing chest compressions and Drew was pushing drugs. He was a lot harder to intubate then my little old lady. 1 he had teeth 2 he was huge with a huge neck 3 we were all on the floor. We worked him for 20 minutes because that is what we have to do. His heart rhythm showed PEA this means pulseless electrical activity. Basically, the electricity to the heart is working but the muscle is not contracting. We called the doctor and he let us call the code. We cleaned up all our stuff and went out to the ambulance to regroup and restock everything. We decided to stick around to help the funeral home get him out of the house. When we went back inside I saw the sickest thing in front of me. (MOM, don’t read this) The cockroaches were already on this guy!!!!! Like in his mouth. IT WAS SICK! I still feel like I have bugs all over me. EWWWWWW

We talked about the call afterwards and I felt really good about it. I had so many questions after because I had never worked a code before. I got them all answered. It is now 7 and we get cleared to go home in 15 minutes. We get cleared 45 minutes before our end of shift so we can get fuel and stuff. Hopefully I won’t get a call in the next 15 minutes. Today was a day that I will never forget. As strange as this day was I LOVED EVERY MINUTE OF IT!!!!!!