About Me...
I've been in nursing for over 22 years (18 years in E.R. after a stint in
ICU). I got into the whole thing by accident, actually. I was young
mountaineer back in the '70's who joined a mountain search and rescue
team, but you had to become an EMT in 6 months, or you were out. I
wasn't too keen on the EMT thing, but to my surprise, in the midst of
training, I found that I had a flair for it!
One thing led to another, and I eventually became a paramedic in Santa
Barbara County, CA, working in a busy city station for 4 years. After I got
married in 1980, we decided we wanted to be able to live and work in the
country somewhere in a really rural part of the country. Paramedics didn't
make enough money out there in the sticks, so I decided to go to nursing
school -- I had met some really cool E.R. nurses in Santa Barbara who
convinced me that nursing was a profession I could sink my EMS teeth into)
So we moved up to Eureka CA, and I went to nursing school, graduating in
1986.
Moved to Scott Valley in northern-most California, and worked at Fairchild
Medical Center in Yreka for the next 18 years ( 4 years ICU, the rest E.R.)
with a great bunch of people who will always be a part of my extended
family. Re-married in 2000 whereby I became an instant
step-dad/granddad!!! A few years later we decided to move up to
Washington (that's where the grand kids were). I took a travelling nurse job
at Providence Hospital in Everett WA, where I worked in the busiest E.R. in
Washington with a really fantastic group of nurses and docs who treated me
like one of the gang , and made the transition from rural to urban E.R.
relatively painless. Thanks guys!!
We really wanted to live in the Bellingham area. I lucked out again, because
right when the travellling nurse job ended, I got a position in the ER at St.
Joseph Hospital, a Level III trauma center. It's a 27 bed E.R., and the
nurses and docs here are really great -- great at what they do, and cool and
wacky in the finest E.R. tradition . They've made me feel welcome and part
of the team as we "save lives, stamp out disease and vermin, wherever we
may find it"...another words, treat 'em, street 'em, or admit 'em! You know
the drill!
But the years were beginning to take a toll on my bod, mostly the aches and
pains we all get from pounding the concrete floors on busy shifts for too
many years. I loved the work, but I could see that some day, I'd have to
find something else in nursing to do. Long story short...I got a great job
working at North Cascade Cardiology in the electrophysiology section of the
practice. I still do triage, still start IV's, and once got to defib a guy who
went into V-tach in our lobby, but it's M-F, 8-5, weekends and holidays off.
I'm happy here.
My wife and I are now living in Ferndale, a stone's throw from the Canadian
border, in a great little house on the beach which looks at snowy Mt Baker to
the east, and the San Juan Islands to the west. We feel really lucky to be
here.
It's been almost 30 years since I first stepped into that EMT-I classroom.
Like you, I've got a lot of memories and stories, the kind that we all share in
our common bond in emergency services. I'm still writing music, but I've
started writing a novel now, once that combines a lot of those memories and
stories with the story of my own step-son, critically injured in May 2006,
which for the first time put me on the wrong side of the guerney...an event
that changed all of our lives. I hope I can do the story justice...
You can contact me at: info@ernursehumor.com And please, if you enjoyed
this music, tell your colleagues about it!!!!! I think that word-of-mouth and
networking on the internet are the only ways nurses will get to hear this stuff;
I'll need all the help I can get!
ICU). I got into the whole thing by accident, actually. I was young
mountaineer back in the '70's who joined a mountain search and rescue
team, but you had to become an EMT in 6 months, or you were out. I
wasn't too keen on the EMT thing, but to my surprise, in the midst of
training, I found that I had a flair for it!
One thing led to another, and I eventually became a paramedic in Santa
Barbara County, CA, working in a busy city station for 4 years. After I got
married in 1980, we decided we wanted to be able to live and work in the
country somewhere in a really rural part of the country. Paramedics didn't
make enough money out there in the sticks, so I decided to go to nursing
school -- I had met some really cool E.R. nurses in Santa Barbara who
convinced me that nursing was a profession I could sink my EMS teeth into)
So we moved up to Eureka CA, and I went to nursing school, graduating in
1986.
Moved to Scott Valley in northern-most California, and worked at Fairchild
Medical Center in Yreka for the next 18 years ( 4 years ICU, the rest E.R.)
with a great bunch of people who will always be a part of my extended
family. Re-married in 2000 whereby I became an instant
step-dad/granddad!!! A few years later we decided to move up to
Washington (that's where the grand kids were). I took a travelling nurse job
at Providence Hospital in Everett WA, where I worked in the busiest E.R. in
Washington with a really fantastic group of nurses and docs who treated me
like one of the gang , and made the transition from rural to urban E.R.
relatively painless. Thanks guys!!
We really wanted to live in the Bellingham area. I lucked out again, because
right when the travellling nurse job ended, I got a position in the ER at St.
Joseph Hospital, a Level III trauma center. It's a 27 bed E.R., and the
nurses and docs here are really great -- great at what they do, and cool and
wacky in the finest E.R. tradition . They've made me feel welcome and part
of the team as we "save lives, stamp out disease and vermin, wherever we
may find it"...another words, treat 'em, street 'em, or admit 'em! You know
the drill!
But the years were beginning to take a toll on my bod, mostly the aches and
pains we all get from pounding the concrete floors on busy shifts for too
many years. I loved the work, but I could see that some day, I'd have to
find something else in nursing to do. Long story short...I got a great job
working at North Cascade Cardiology in the electrophysiology section of the
practice. I still do triage, still start IV's, and once got to defib a guy who
went into V-tach in our lobby, but it's M-F, 8-5, weekends and holidays off.
I'm happy here.
My wife and I are now living in Ferndale, a stone's throw from the Canadian
border, in a great little house on the beach which looks at snowy Mt Baker to
the east, and the San Juan Islands to the west. We feel really lucky to be
here.
It's been almost 30 years since I first stepped into that EMT-I classroom.
Like you, I've got a lot of memories and stories, the kind that we all share in
our common bond in emergency services. I'm still writing music, but I've
started writing a novel now, once that combines a lot of those memories and
stories with the story of my own step-son, critically injured in May 2006,
which for the first time put me on the wrong side of the guerney...an event
that changed all of our lives. I hope I can do the story justice...
You can contact me at: info@ernursehumor.com And please, if you enjoyed
this music, tell your colleagues about it!!!!! I think that word-of-mouth and
networking on the internet are the only ways nurses will get to hear this stuff;
I'll need all the help I can get!
| CEO, Big Kahuna, El Presidente, and general nurse-type-guy of world famous Whining Dog Productions |