All Superheros Have A Kryptonite

 I take 9-1-1 calls so yes, I am calm and jump into action when there is an emergency, whether on the phone or in person.  I've drove down the street watching a woman get beat by her man and I had no regard for my own safety and jumped out my car to help her.  I was able to get her to my car and took her to the police station as she bled all over my seat.  I've seen a woman on the freeway about to jump over the ledge and I pulled over and talked to her until the police arrived and took over.  I am cool, calm and give all the necessary information needed that many times my callers fail to give me when it's their emergency.   

Typically when you talk to me through my headset it's quite possibly the worst day of your life. You absolutely never know how you will react when you're in the middle of an emergency yourself.  You may say you got it under control.  But you won't know until it actually happens to you. 

Ask the trauma nurse who had to watch their child have a seizure while on the phone with me.  The nurse could not stop screaming in panic to give me the address needed to send help.   Eventually I was able to calm the nurse just enough for me to hear "I am a trauma nurse, but I need your help,  tell me what to do!" 

Ask the doctor who was calling for his friend while at a medical convention.  The friend went unconscious and needed CPR and there I was giving a medical doctor life saving instructions. 

Ask me operator 43...when I saw my co-worker drive away and get t-boned by a bus, I called my job in a shear panic. 

"Help! Help! Get the paramedics and ambulance here now! Send them to our job!"

"Who's job?"

"Our job!  HURRY NOW! WE NEED HELP!"

Yeah that didn't go over well.  I was no help at all and hung up on the dispatcher due to my own frustration.  

Ask me operator 43 about the time law enforcement sent me a call and before they could say anything I heard this little girls voice say "Hello"  I froze and didn't want to look at the screen displaying the info from the caller because I knew the voice.  I called her name and she replied "Yes".  Like a deer in headlights I stared at the phone screen and confirmed what I already knew.  It was my niece calling me.  Although she was six years old I taught her well enough that she knew you only call 9-1-1 for an emergency.  So if she was calling...then it absolutely had to be a real emergency.  When I realized what was happening I never even asked her what was wrong and I just sent help.  I sat on the phone with her as I cried watching and waiting for the units to make it to her.  I never did what I was supposed to do as operator 43.  In that moment, hearing her voice was my kryptonite.  All my superhero powers were gone. 

Good news, although it was a real emergency everything went well but later I was in for a doozy.  My niece's mom called me and said you really scared her when she called you.  I felt bad, because when I needed to be a superhero I failed her miserably. 

The next day I took pizza to her class. She introduced me, "this is my auntie,
she's a 9-1-1 operator!"  The kids looked up to me oohed and ahh'd because I was in my uniform and I'm sure she told her class how she had to call 9-1-1 the day before.  She then said, "9-1-1 operators are supposed to be calm but she wasn't yesterday when I called her."  I guess it's true as the saying goes "kids say the darnedest things". 

Just days before writing this entry, I got a call from law enforcement, they said they needed a medical response and wanted our units to stage.  To stage means the situation is too dangerous and the Fire Department units need to wait until law enforcement handles the danger before treating the patients inside.  These calls are typically gunshots, stabbings, or victims of an assault.  The Fire Department  do not come with weapons so law enforcement does their job first. 

The address law enforcement gave me was the same exact address as my niece's house.  I froze just like the day I got the call from my niece twelve years ago.  43, ARE YOU THERE?  oh yes yes, I repeat back the address...west twenty first street and she says no 43, east twenty fourth street.  I thought I heard 21st street.  Which at the time my brain was zeroed in on thinking what was going on there at my niece's house again years later, that my brain never rationalized her address is WEST, and my department doesn't even handle the west side of the city. 

If a person I know is calling 9-1-1, it's a horrible feeling and I react differently with them versus a stranger.  On the phone before they even tell me what is wrong, I  know the caller through my headset possibly is having the worst day of their life.