So Frustrating!!!

Well, after 6 days, my internet connection has finally been restored. For the 3rd time...we shall see how long it lasts this time.

I went swimming Tuesday night and for the first time in my life, I think I have swimmer's ear. I bought some "swim-ear" drops and can't use them (they made my ear burn and reduced me to tears). I've already tried home remedies like sleeping on that side with a heat pack under my ear....no relief. I may just be feeling whiny, but I can barely hear out of my left ear, and my balance sucks.

Work is still just as frustrating as ever. My captain is still a very annoying pain in my ass. Me and a friend put in paperwork to swap station assignments. No news on if or when the swap will be honored.

I've been considering a certain swap for a couple months now, but recently decided to act on my decision. When I first decided I wanted to work in public safety, I was unsure about going Fire/EMS or Police. During my car accident a few years ago, I dealt mainly with Fire/EMS due to my injuries. After the accident, I decided to go to the fire side...A choice I'm starting to regret.

I tried to step back and take an unbiased look at the pros and cons of each side...

Fire/EMS : Police

24 hours on, 48 hours off  :   4-10 hour days, 3 days off

Possibility of being sent anywhere county-wide at a moments notice  :  Always working at assigned precinct

Constant need to request training  : Training scheduled regularly

Training off-duty with no pay  :  In-service training on-duty with pay

Assigned from training directly into operations  :  Assigned into operations with an FTO for a few weeks

Fire Stations, Fire Marshall, Arson, TRT, K-9 S&R, Haz-Mat, Airport Crash, Forrestry, Bike Team, SWAT Medics (Medic only)  :  Uniform Patrol, Detective, Arson, SWAT, STAR Team, Motorcycle Patrol, Park Patrol, Bomb Squad, K-9, Air Support, Property/Evidence Unit, Major Crimes, Communications (911), Homeland Security, Code Enforcement, Animal Control

Limited personal protection (pocket knife, medical jump bags, tools from fire truck)  :  Greater level of protection (Bullet-proof vest, pocket knife, ASP baton, OC spray, Beretta 9mm, possible backup sidearm, tactital hand-to-hand training)

Usually welcomed by all in emergency situations  :  Welcomed by some in emergency situations

I'm sure I could continue my list, but I'm going to stop here. I'm not giving up on being a good Firefighter/EMT...I plan to work as a volunteer on some of my off-days to keep all of my certifications up. I'm just tired of spending day 1 at work, day 2 recovering/sleeping, and day 3 getting ready to do it all over again. 

Over & Out until then.....Be Safe

Idiot Alert!!!

Wow, I knew there were some weird people out there. I had the...pleasure(?)...of meeting one of these special people yesterday morning.

05:50... Respond to 789 Somewhere Rd, near the church, on a vehicle accident with injuries.

Approaching the intersection, there is a guy standing on the corner flagging us down. He said the accident was just down the side street on the left.

Pulling up to the scene, there is a single 4-door white vehicle sitting in the grass about 30 ft from the street. Both front doors are open and there are small star-patterned places in the front wind shield, one on each side. There was some blood in the driver's seat, but no one in or near the vehicle.

A few moments later, a male approaches us covered in blood. His nose appeared to be broken and by his stagger and smell, I believe he was also a bit drunk.

Insert PD here...

The guy claims he didn't remember anything, yet strangely was positive that he wasn't driving (remember, no blood in the car anywhere except the driver's seat?).

As we got the guy into the ambulance to check him out, a female walks up and said she was in the accident also. She was wearing a white shirt and white pants. One side of her body was covered in blood, turns out it was all from our driver. She had a small bump on her forehead but refused to let us check her over.

Insert PD Sergeant here....

Since the driver had some head/facial injuries and was not sure what happened during the accident, he needed to be placed on a backboard in case he had some form of spinal injuries. Due to the blood coming from his nose, he wasn't able to tolerate being on his back. We removed the backboard and pulled out the KED. Getting our driver strapped into the KED was not a problem. He was allowed to sit up so he was happy- he was properly immobilized so we were happy.

As my partners were starting an IV, getting the driver set up on O2 and taking another set of vitals, I went to talk to the Officer for a moment. We were just about ready to leave for the hospital and I needed to see if the Officer was going to give the guy's driver's license back or if he was going to have to meet us at the hospital.

At this time the driver starts yelling and screaming at my partner's inside the ambulance (we still had all the rear doors open). I looked at the Officer and made the joke to start shaking his OC so he could spray the guy.

The Officer and Sergeant got out of their cars and went over to the back of the ambulance just in time for the driver to pull the tape off the top of his head (where he was secured into the KED), jump up and start trying to swing at my partners.

He somehow came flying out of the ambulance backwards and both the Officer and Sergeant caught him mid-air and he landed facedown, still in the KED. When the guy first started going nuts, the Sarge called for 1 more unit, 3 or 4 showed up.

Moments after hitting the ground, the guy was under control thanks to police tactics and a wonderful thing known as handcuffs. The guy was placed on his stomach on the backboard and loaded into the ambulance. Still cuffed.

We started the transport and he was still screaming and trying to fight. That is, until I hit some construction and accidently jumped the rear of the ambulance nearly a foot off the ground. I found out the guy came almost 2 feet off the stretcher, and the stretcher even came off the ground. They said after his flight, he was quiet the rest of the ride to the hospital.

At the hospital, he wanted out of the handcuffs and claimed his arm was now broken. The Officer that met us at the hospital let the guy out of the cuffs after warning him against trying to fight. The Officer also wrote the guy 5 tickets and brought a blood-alcohol test kit to be sent off to the state lab.

After DECON, we went back to the station and were 2 1/2 hours late getting off work.

What a day!

Be safe and take care

1 MVC...uh...make that 3 cars

Well, my shift yesterday was somewhat dull. We ran 2 calls and were dispatched but immediatly cancelled on a 3rd. The rest of the shift was quiet...almost too quiet.

The first call was for a MVC on the expressway, motorcycle vs. truck. You get 1 guess as to who won. The truck was cruising with traffic around 65mph. From what I was able to gather onscene, he had to slam on the brakes and the motorcyclist behind him didn't even have a chance to slow down. The motorcycle hit the rear of the truck, launching the rider clear of the bike. He hit the concrete divide and came to rest 10 ft from the bike, his right femur and left humorus broken.

Without ever seeing any x-rays, the bike, or even the patient, I can safely say the helmet saved his life. The majority of the hard shell had scraped away during the accident, protecting the gentleman's skull from the impacts at the same time.

Due to the speeds involved, the fact that our gent was on a motorcycle, and the types of injuries sustained- we ran 10-18 (lights/sirens) to the trauma center.

The other call was a lady that tried to stop her car from rolling downhill. She forgot to put the vehicle in "park" and it somehow rolled over her leg. Her knee was a bit swollen, but she'll be fine.

Now....the main reason I'm writing this entry was a very interesting call...What makes it so interesting?

I was off-duty on my way home from the station when it happened.

It was raining lightly this morning. I had just passed our headquarters when the car ahead of me (about 100 yards thankfully) spun out on the wet road and hit the concrete median backwards. Normally, I would've called it in and kept rolling...But since I witnessed the accident, I decided to stop for a moment and make sure the driver was OK.

Oh....I made sure my car was a good distance past his vehicle in case someone didn't see it in time and hit his car. That way it wouldn't be shoved into my car, hopefully.

The driver was fine, his red Jaguar had moderate rear-end damage. His phone wouldn't connect so I called 911 for him to report the incident.

As I was talking to the dispatcher, a green car spun out and hit the metal guardrail on the opposite side of the expressway. The driver's side doors now smashed, the driver either froze or panicked, flooring the accellerator. Spinning the tires to gain traction, he took off headlong into oncoming traffic and smashed into a gold sedan head-on.

The dispatcher asked what happened (apparently I was yelling WHOA!!) and upgraded the call immediatly once I told her 2 more cars wrecked out.

Once the first police officer made it onscene, I told him that I'd witnessed the entire incident and that it was actually 2 different incidents. He checked on the driver of each vehicle then asked me what happened and which cars were which incident, etc...

About this time, the engine and ambulance arrived. Since I was still in uniform, they came straight to me at first. I told them I wasn't involved and then quickly told them what happened. As they went about checking on the patients, another officer and a Sergeant arrived. I again passed on what I'd seen. After the 3 PD guys joked about having a perfect witness, they took down my information and I was released to go my merry little way.

No one was really hurt from what I was able to gather. The lady in the gold car was choking from the airbag powder. She said her abdomen was hurting some from the seatbelt and her knee was hurting from where she hit it under the dash. The steering wheel was also bent and her sealbelt had locked the retentioner (a built-in feature that retracts the belt up to 6 inches, locking the belt in that position).

I was happy to head home, knowing that although I didn't save any lives, I had a feeling of satisfaction that comes from helping someone get through something difficult. It may sound stupid, but you'd just have to be there to understand it.

Take care and drive safely

good times

Wow, time flies when you're having fun. 

I have become very good friends with a cop from my county. He has even said he considers me as a little sister. He has tried to keep me occupied and keep my mind off the hazards my fiance is facing. I still can't watch the news, every day they talk about another guy from his brigade getting injured or killed. This guy, who I'll call Stumpy, has taken me to Six Flags with a couple other officers...We went to the shooting range together last week. We're going to try to go back to Six Flags again this week.

Work has been, well, work. I'm still stuck on the rescue every shift. Capt is still a big pain in the ass. He asked me a few shifts ago why I didn't try to get my learner's for the Engine. I told him I had no interest in driving a truck I wasn't ever on. He didn't really like it, but I'm not going to lie to him. Why should I get the permit when I hardly know how to operate off the back of the truck?

I've worked a few events on the bike team. We've had a lot of fun for the most part, except for when the Chief decided to come one day as the backup. The pucker factor went up considerably, the whole team was more uptight.

I finally got into and attended the interior search and rescue class at the state fire academy. I have so many bruises and blisters I look like I've been beaten. This morning, my knee was so swollen I could barely walk. I can deal with the blisters, given a big enough band-aid, but when my knee is the size of a grapefruit-I don't think I'd be of much help on the ambulance.

Even though it's been a few weeks since I turned 21, I have yet to try any beer or anything. I'm not really interested in anything like that.

Update on previous entry

Well, I finally managed to cross paths with the Dr. and one of the nurses (who I'm becoming fast friends with). The guy with the GSW to the head is not only still alive...He was extubated (breathing tube was removed) and is talking!!!! They're not sure how much his social skills will be intact, but he is alive and well. I guess that's all that really matters. He will not be a vegetable kept alive by machines for the rest of his days.

I'm going to go celebrate a job well done by me and my partners...

Take care,

PS...I turn 21 in 3 days...Sunday is the big day, and I can't wait!  :-D

Ups-N-Downs

Wow, I knew I'd been procrastinating, but I hadn't realized it'd been nearly a month since my last entry. A lot of things have happened lately, some good-some bad. I've been able to talk to my fiance online about 3 times a week, maybe once a week if I'm lucky on the phone. I've worked a couple events on the bike team and thoroughly enjoyed myself. Station life has once again become hectic. Me and Capt have continued to argue and he really does annoy me. As much as I'd like to ride the engine occasionally, it's nice to be away from him on the rescue. We also had another firemedic assigned to our station, he wasn't kidding when he warned that he was a jinx and a trauma magnet. Since his arrival, we've had a GSW to the head, severe MVC, and 2 different cardiac arrests that turned out to be dead upon our arrival.

The GSW to the head was interesting, PD said the kid was dead when we got there. Looking at the scene for a moment, I noticed the bullet hole in the window, blood and brain matter on the door, and the holes on either side of the kid's head leaking more blood and brain matter. Then the unimaginable happened...He took a breath....You guessed it, agonal respirations, he's not dead yet.

Here we go!

Running to the rescue, I grabbed the engine crew and told them to grab everything off the truck, monitor, suction kit, airway bag, C-collar, backboard, stretcher...everything, we were gonna have to work him.

Once we got the guy loaded, we quickly learned intubation was impossible-his teeth were clenched. Nasal intubation was also out of the question due to the fact that his brains were coming out his nose. The medic alternated between suctioning and using the BVM to help him breathe.

As we left the hospital to go finish DECON on the truck, the Doc was hopeful the kid would possibly pull through. Last I heard, he passed away.

I hope the detectives can bring this one to justice for the kid's family.

 

I'll write more later...One of the DOA's was very interesting, let's just say we had the Haldol drawn up and ready...

Be safe out there, and Happy Belated 4th of July!

PS...10 days until I turn 21!!!!!

Just a couple quick things

Things have been somewhat better lately. I finished my training and am now a certified EMS cyclist. I liked the bikes we use on the team so much I bought one for myself to use at home. I needed a new bike anyways, so why not train at home on the same bike I have at work?

I'm still stuck on the ambulance, but the current rumor is that that might change soon. Some people from my academy class are at stations that don't even have a rescue, others somehow manage to always be on the fire engine. The smart-guys running things have realized that's not really fair to everyone. Besides, 2 classes have come out since mine, they need to ride the rescue as well.

Quick prayer request: One of my really good friends from training went home from work a few days ago to find his home burnt down. He lost everything, he only has the clothes on his back and his kid. Weird to think a firefighter's house would burn down, but it has happened before. It's still unknown if it was accidental or arson, but if it's arson...I hope they catch the little bastard and throw the book at him/her.

I'm going to go on and wrap up this entry, I'm fading fast...I can hear my nice, comfy bed calling out to me.

Take Care