Rookie Jitters

What a year this has been. By far the most exciting and most fulfilling as far as meeting my career goals, yet this has also been THE MOST STRESSFUL year of my entire life!

This past Feburary I landed a volunteer position through a local EMS agency that truly helped me hit the ground running in the field of EMS. I saw some things and did some things, that helped prepare me for what lies ahead. This volunteer experience also helped me get into a paid postion through another local agency I've been wanting to work for.

I have just completed and been cleared of the field training process for this paid position. I never knew how hard this really is until now. Being a volunteer, I was prepared as far as knowing how to care for patients, what  I wasn't prepared for was the operational aspect of EMS, the radio communicating, the mapping of the entire large county we cover, the paper work and which paper needs to go where and how to fill them out properly so I don't lose my job, the knowledge I need for the drugs we carry,even at a basic level, learning and memorizing protocols and the bitter reality that most EMS professionals are not the saints I always thought they were. On paper reading this, it seems like it would be simple and that these are just little things I worry over but in real time and for me personally these are HUGE things that scare me to death. Who would have thought a healthcare career would cause so much physical and psychiatric stress on one body?

 I already have a history of panic attacks, nothing debilitating but they occur more often than they should. My panic attacks have increased since getting this job and more often then not I think about leaving and never looking back. I think about going back to "safe jobs" like retail or even waitressing again. But that's where the stress really kicks in. I have so many rooting for me now, those who truly look up to me and expect me to go all the way with this career move I've made. I have so much money, time and effort wrapped up in getting to this point and even have my husband excited that he can leave his job to go back to school and start his career. He's counting on me to be the bread-winner now so he can relax a little and focus on his goals. He worked his ass off so I could go to school and start my life, it's only fair we switch and I let him do the same.

I've felt like this before where I have questioned if this the right choice for me and if I can do this or not. I've thought about giving up before and going back to those safe jobs where the level of stress was non-existent compared to the anxiety I feel now. I think about what it is like to feel "burn out" and how the hell am I going to feel that already just starting out. I've questioned if I am strong enough to deal with this career and the personalities within it. From time to time I get angry with myself for ever starting to go down the path of EMS starting with the very first semester of EMT school. Would I have ever started it knowing what I know now, knowing how I currently feel and the restless anxiety that overrides logical thinking? I can't take a shower, watch a movie, play with my kids, or spend time with my family without stressing over my job. The stress is always there, always. I often wonder if this is just the "rookie jitters" and if it will ever get better as I grow and hopefully improve.

Now that I have cleared the field training, I have been hired on full-time. This says to outsiders "they obviously think you are ready or they wouldn't let you out on your own." To me this says, I have shit for confidence right now and wonder if I just slid past them, making it look like I'm ready. Tomorrow I start as a full-time paid employee. My first shift bid is starting off literally on my own doing transfers out of EMS 4. EMS 4 is not a position on an ambulance but a position we all get placed on, even paramedics, to handle psych transfers to surrounding area psych hospitals. Sounds like cake right? Maybe so, but I am worried about taking patients to far distances in which I have never been. Mapping, will be the death of me! Working EMS 4 I have no partner to help me, I will be on my own. I wish I would have started my first bid on the ambulance. I have already worked one day on the ambulance as the paramedic's partner and even that night before I was shitting bricks but everything turned out just fine. That seems to be the trend now, I panic uncontrollably and question my entire future and then the day comes and everything goes fine, I go home and think "what was I so worried about?"