First Aid

Shortly after realizing that the boys and I could go on this trip I also realized that we'd be in all sorts of weird and wonderful places that may present us with excellent opportunities to injure ourselves. Not the plan, but you never know. I initially also wasn't sure about our ready access to health care. If you read the page Travel By Map (look to your right) you may wonder at that statement given that, for the most part, we are in major urban areas. When thinking about the trip initially though, we were also considering doing things like wwooofing, spending more time in rural areas, and what not. And who knows, we may still do so. It's kinda fluid right now. But not having ready access to healthcare, either due to geographical or potential communication barriers, seemed like a good reason to get some skills and become as self-sufficient as we reasonably could expect.

My thought then was that it would be good for the boys and I to do a bit of first aid training. It in no way makes up for good medical care (as it kinda assumes good medical care is on the way), but in terms of providing some solid basic knowledge and skills to address immediate needs, and perhaps be self-sufficient on various little stuff, it's top notch.  St. John's Ambulance offer such courses, and after having nearly made a horrible blunder by booking the training during the Mother's Day weekend (which I resolved without anyone finding out about might I add), Noah, Jake and I took the  course this past weekend and are now fully certified Emergency and Standard First Aid, CPR-C and AED responders.

Two full days, a classroom full of great people from all walks of life, a fantastic course director, and enough triangular bandages to make Boris Karloff proud. Truly, something I would recommend for everyone. It certainly wasn't what I was expecting - though what I had been expecting was likely a tad daft and unnrealistic. I was expecting the "here's how to make someone better - you may not look like George Clooney but you played a doctor on tv once too", while what they really teach is "here's how to make someone okay until EMS shows up". Different focus. And the right one. It's what we all have the capacity to learn and to do. It's not rocket science, and it is (thankfully) not brain surgery. It's a lot of common sense guided by solid basic training.

We learned about assessing the scene, and the individual(s). How to deal with wounds, how to deal with fractures, shock, embedded objects, eye injuries, burns, and that general purpose stuff that seems to happen a lot when you're tired and want a bagel for breakfast. It was good. Really good.

I hope to never have to use this new knowledge, but I know I'll be back in three years to re-certify. I also know that I now feel more comfortable about our well being this coming year, and I believe it's added to all of our confidence, as we're just a little bit better prepared for whatever may come along.