Last week of ground school is over!!! Part 1

The last week was rigorous. The last day was positively nerve-wracking.

So, I learned that people throwing up blood is worse in an aircraft so I have to vent the stomach. While trying to understand this concept, I was warned about drinking carbonated beverages before flying. It all has to do with gas laws, you see. As you gain altitude, gas expands. So, well, you figure it out.

Then we went on to talk about the pregnant women emergencies and I wanted to throw up. I can’t turf them people to someone else anymore. I can’t even run away. Well, I could, but then it would be a long ways down to the ground. My active imagination started creating images of me in the claustrophobic confines of an aircraft with a screaming or bleeding out or freaking out or all of the above pregnant woman practically laying on my lap (air ambulances are not very big, alright?). As the instructor (who was droning on about fetal heart tones and decelerations or something) attempted to describe what the squiggly lines meant on the screen (what are those things?), the terrible images started building up in horrific colors and shapes in my mind. Wait! What do I do with that? Is there a plug for it? No, don’t push!!! Stop that!

Somebody tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I was ok. I swallowed my heart that leapt out of my chest. I was thirsty all of a sudden. Apparently, my mouth hung open for a while. I looked at the squiggly lines on the screen and I said, quite happy with myself, “Hey! We shock that!” with relief that, man, at least I knew something. One of my colleagues gently told me that the squiggly lines were from a fetal heart monitor and it depicted the baby’s changing heart rate. It was the instructor’s turn to have her mouth hung open. I think I saw a fly go in. For the rest of the lecture, I pretended that I was invisible.

So, in the event that we survive a crash, we learned what we could do to stay alive and hopefully be rescued. I got a list of survival type stuff that I should carry on my person at all times. Of course, I was disturbed when I was told that I should wear clothing that is flame-retardant, just in case. Ok. I can see that. Crash. Fire. Flame-retardant clothing. Helpful. If we land on water, do I need waterproof clothes, too? Do I wear both types of clothing at the same time or do I learn to change at lightning speed, just in case? My shoes are going to be ruined, I know it.

Then we had a Jeopardy-type game on endocrine, cardiac, and neuro emergencies. It took three days for my brain to recover from that. It was out of sheer will that my eyeballs didn’t pop out from the increased intracranial pressure. But darned it all, I got the hyperglycemic hyperosmolar non-ketotic coma question right! That used up all the sugar in my brain shortly after. I asked if we could break for lunch. It was 9 am. I pretended that something was awfully wrong with my watch. Darned cheap thing. It dies all the time.

Of course, there are those people who have these huge bulging arteries in their chests or abdomen (doctors call them aneurysms). We will be taking many of those patients from Point A to Point B and hope against hope that there will be no turbulence or the balloon bursts and we’ve got a patient who’s DRT (that means dead right there for you laypeople).

Somebody remind me why I want this job and why they gave it to me.

Anyway, here are more pictures. Have an awesome day!!!

Ground School: Survival School and Meet N Greet: http://good-times.webshots.com/album/562352585jdbXPd?vhost=good-times

Ground School 2: http://good-times.webshots.com/album/562351815tndhmJ?vhost=good-times