We get so wrapped up in the minutia, our everyday routine, our difficulties, disillusionment and simple exhaustion that the big picture is often overlooked.
The drunks that will freeze to death if we don’t peel them off the sidewalk.
We are all they have.
The little old ladies that drive us crazy at two in the morning with, “chest pressure.”
Imagine sitting, alone, with no hope of anybody coming over until the weekend, and that’s a long shot, and looking at the medic alert alarm that your family set up for you so they could sleep at night, and feeling something strange in the middle of your chest, and hoping that it goes away by morning, but honestly-how many more mornings can you expect at eighty-eight years old…
We’re all they have.
The guy at Dialysis whose blood pressure dropped dangerously low.
Three days a week for four hours he sits in that chair, bored, sleeping, annoyed and anxious. The lady at the center tells him his pressure is dangerously low. In his mind, that means many things. Possibly the end of the road. He waits there, and the people from the ambulance show up. He may or may not know them, but they treat him nice, and take care of him, and bring him to the ER, where more needles and things await.
We could be the highlight of his day.
The lady who cracked up her car and “wants to be checked.” You know, and I know that in all probability there is nothing wrong with her. But, and and it’s a big but, she doesn’t. We do this for a living, and see more in a day that she does in a decade.
She’s counting on us.
I’ve become so cynical that sometimes refer to patients as “Them,” and us as, well, “Us.”
A lot of people are counting on us. The people who call don’t care about our day, or our lousy pay, or excessive overtime, or the crummy truck and cranky partner. They care about one thing at that moment, and one thing only. They are worried about themselves. And when we are with them, that is all we should be concerned with as well.
Now and then I need to remind myself that without “Them,” there is no “Us.”
It really is all about “Them.”
Until it says “Jim’s Ambulance” or “Jim’s Fire Company” it is ALWAYS about them.
–Lt Jim Rosse
South Schodack Volunteer Fire Department
Castleton Volunteer Ambulance Service
Sometimes it is hard to remember it is their “emergency” and not ours.
Be Good,
Medic2RN
The bottom line is: “we just can’t do without you all”
This huge lifeline that brings comfort to us all when the ‘chips are down’
Several time the EMS managed to give me more precious time with my Man. I have much to thank them for.
Truth? honestly the truth in my point of view is that we both depend on each other. the guys that drive their motorcycles too fast. the drunk drivers. the people that eat too much fried chicken. the people that have mental breakdowns to points they injure themselves. im not trying to attack them or to say i wish there were more of them, simply stated, i love my job. the tone goes off and i am always ready. to help is our priority. life is our goal. without you, there is no us, and never would be, but without us sometimes there wont be a you. so thank you to all the instructors that put forth an effort to turn out new basics and medics, thank you to all the services that provide our tools and equipment to save lives, and thank you, to all of our patients. you may consider what happened an accident or a mistake, but think of it in terms as the day you helped us to help you.