For the past number of months, I have finally begun working within the field of EMS. It took 8 years from when I first began going down that pathway, and I think there was some idealizing that happened as a result. For 8 years, I was not working within the industry that I was hoping to work in. I mean, there were little connections. There was my 3 years doing volunteer fire. I took a trauma course one year because I needed continuing education credits. Whenever I could, I would volunteer as medical staff for camps, conferences, or sports events. Going to school finally in the summer of 2015, I excelled. At the top of my class.
But, honestly, none of that really prepared me for actually being on ambulance. There's nothing like showing up at the start of a shift and meeting the person who you will be spending almost every second of the next 12 hours with. You can't prepare for the sheer boredom of sitting, for who knows how long, before the exhilaration of the tones going off. There's no panic like the panic of seeing on the computer that you're going to a baby who can't breathe, or a motor vehicle collision involving a school bus, or a kid who won't stop seizing. Or maybe it reads that the caller has hiccups that won't stop, or they've got a broken toenail. And then you get there, and you're the guy. You're the one who's expected to know what to do, to be able to bring calm to the chaos. Then you get to the hospital, and then it's time to wait. Maybe you don't have to wait, or maybe you'll be waiting for the rest of your shift. Your patient gets in, rinse, and repeat.
Ever since classes ended, I've wondered if this is actually for me. As I work, before every shift, there has been a stressfulness that doesn't really go away. Every time the pager goes off, I face the feeling of inadequacy, of incompetency. I mess up lots...not usually big, but things like driving too hastily with my partner in the back, or not asking a question that seems so obvious afterwards, or giving a poor handover report to the nurse. I miss lots of IVs. I've worked a few jobs in my life, and in all of them I felt competent within the first few months. With EMS, I've been working on truck for 8 months now, and had a year of schooling before that. So I should be even more prepared for this, right? It doesn't feel that way.
But then, every now and again, something does go really well. I hit a tricky IV start. My partner tells me about how they felt when they started in EMS, and it sounds just like where I am. I perform well on a high acuity call. I bring calm to a situation just by showing up. I'm able to sleep before my shifts now without waking up several times in the night.
I start to wonder then. If the best things in life don't come easy, does it make sense to think that this job will? Maybe this discomfort is a global feeling...throughout EMS, and in many of the jobs out there like this, such as policing, medicine, and nursing. Which is super-funny, because if things don't work out here, those are totally the other paths that I'm looking down.
One thing that has helped immensely has been a shift in thinking. I tend towards perfectionism in every area of my life, which obviously includes my work. One of the ways that this manifests itself is by not wanting to do anything, if I'm not absolutely sure that it is the correct course of action. I don't like to stick my neck out there and make potentially incorrect decisions. Over the past month or so I've been actively trying to think more process-minded than perfectionist. The primary difference being this - when I'm operating with a perfectionist mindset, I need to do things right or else my value as a person is attacked. If I do something wrong, even a little bit, then I am a bad person. Process-mindedness allows me to do things wrong. It doesn't ask for things to be done wrong, but when things do go wrong, instead of creating a value judgment it asks the question, "Given the exact same scenario in the future, what would I do differently?" Not that I really expect to encounter the exact same thing ever again, but it helps to create a more robust decision-making framework.
Someday it may be that I'll have a high comfort level at work. I expect that then, when I do feel comfortable, that I will finally be able to make a good decision about whether I should continue on in EMS or not. Perhaps this is the ministry God would have for me in the long-term. I know for sure that it's where he has me now.
Well, that wasn't where I thought things would go, but I'm happy it did. And I'm glad you made it this far. I'd like to continue to chronicle this journey, and we'll see where it goes.
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