Bridging the Gap

When I was a trauma social worker in the Emergency Department, my life was dictated by chaos. I never knew what was coming in the door, or more appropriately, by helicopter. I can honestly say that was the best job I've ever had. Sure, it took a toll on me, but I loved being in the thick of the action. My friends appropriately call me an adrenaline junkie. Even when I was on vacation I took my pager and was once called back home early due to a LifeFlight helicopter tragedy. It was a hard life, but it is an honored place to be when you were part of the team to help restore order in chaos.

My family lived on the LifeFlight path. A couple of times, early on in my career, my mother would call me to tell me she was outside and knew a helicopter was on its way. Of course I knew this because my pager would alert me, but I found it rather comforting to know they were keeping tabs on me. They knew how bad of a day I had before I even came through the door. Ironic that now she is a volunteer adjunct chaplain in the same hospital. When I was living in New Orleans my grandmother would let me know when a hurricane was forming. This was actually more helpful as I tended to never watch the news while I was in grad school.

I guess with this type of family communication, it was no surprise to get voice mails from both my mom and J's dad last night about the bridge collapse. We immediately turned on the TV to see some of the updates. J went to U of MN for medical school and we had traveled the bridge frequently. In many ways we hold that city very close to our hearts as a lot of our courtship took place in the twin cities. I seriously wouldn't mind moving there as it is one of the most beautiful places on earth.

I immediately went to the thought of wondering how many of our friends were working in Hennepin County Medical Center and were called to the code disaster. Most of J's colleagues went categorical internal medicine which meant they would also be new attendings and staff...aka, they would be in charge and couldn't hide behind the title of resident, intern or student.

My second thought was if the fates had placed us there for residency and I was working there as a trauma social worker, both J and I would be in the ED awaiting the ambulances and walking wounded. The thought that we would have been on the bridge is a place I could not go in my head and have passed it off as improbable as J typically doesn't get off of work until at least 7:00 on a good day. There would be no way he would have been on the bridge at 6:05.

I had done a ton of mock code disasters in SLC and loved figuring out how to link the mock families with the nameless actor/kids rolling through the door. I hate to admit how much I wished I was in the middle of 9/11, Katrina, and now the bridge disaster. It sounds absolutely sick, I know. I was proud when my critical incident teams were put on alert to go back to NYC and NOLA. What was even more amazing is that the hospital administration was extremely supportive of us going. I never made it to either place, but we were the first on scene to help the evacuees from Katrina who ended up in Utah.

While I've been taking a different course in my professional path recently, I can honestly say that disasters like this make me long for where I was. This is not to say I don't love what I'm doing now. I do. Its a different pace. Its a lot more slow than living by the chirp of a pager. As I watched J head off to his night on call to the ICU hell, I felt a pang of jealousy. Off he went in his scrubs and multiple pagers (his pager, the code pager, the on call phone, his phone) and I began to work on a corporate training I'm doing next week. In my pajamas. With the dog curled up doing doggy dreams and barking/running. Drinking coffee. Watching the sun rise. Its a different pace.