The Advocate At The House

 At The House  

Sunday January 30th, 2022, around 130pm I found my mother in a chair laid back with agonal/gurgling respirations. I attempted to reposition her immediately and get a response from her. Unfortunately, I never could get her alert enough to talk to me. I called 9-1-1 and had them come emergency traffic to my home. This felt so weird to me I have only called 9-1-1 maybe two-three times in my life, but never for me or for my family. I was checking her oxygen saturation and it was 33 with a pulse of 122. I repositioned her again, at this point she was dead weight. Once I did this some vomit came out of her mouth. Instant panic thinking about aspiration with the gurgling sound and the vomit that came out of her mouth after repositioning. During this whole time her dog, Roxy a schnauzer was tore out the frame. Roxy knew something was wrong and she was not please. A brief time later EMS arrived (felt like an eternity at the time) out stepped my best friend who luckily was the paramedic on shift that day. Instant relief was felt when I saw her, her partner, and the supervisor walking toward me. I have been in EMS long enough you can read peoples reactions when they see something not good in front of them. I could tell they were at that “oh shit” moment, but it was ok I had faith in the three of them. I knew them and their skill set and understand what they were doing moving through the motions. They started with an oxygen mask and that was not going to touch it. Kristen knows most of her medical history, but I was telling her about other intricate details and that she was positive on an antigen test this week. Kristen asked for the Bi-pap, about this time she was breathing 30+ times a minute and miserable. With all four of us working together we were able to transfer her to the stair chair then to the stretcher. I took care of the dogs quickly and got myself situated to head to the hospital. They were still in the driveway, so a little worrisome thinking why are they still here? Are they about to RSI her? Eric the supervisor stepped off the truck, waived at me, and did his fun-loving smile he does which was relieving. Tyler stepped out the back and got in the front to take off emergency traffic to the hospital. Once again never been in the position like this to follow an ambulance to the hospital. Fortunately, I understood not to ride their butt or impede traffic and follow the speed limit, but what about those that feel they need to ride like a bat out of hell to get there with the ambulance? Driving on the way to the hospital was stressful, running through every scenario in my head. Goal was to make it to the hospital her alive and me alive.