CERT Certified!!

For my calling in our ward (Emergency Preparedness Specialist) I was asked to take the local CERT Training classes. (Community Emergency Response Team) For 6 weeks we attended every week and learned something new to help us be a part of this team. It was VERY hard for me. We had to learn how to fight fires, how to treat "the killers" (airway, bleeding and shock) & triage injured (yuck), how to search and rescue, and how to organize and dispatch our own teams if need be, just to name a few.

Now, to be totally honest, I went into this course thinking it would be fun and exciting. I attended each week, only to find it mentally and emotionally exhausting. The whole thought process of picking and choosing out of those I know and love (neighbors and friends) of who I may be able to help and who I can't in a disaster situation was chain yanking.

The CERT motto is the "do the greatest amount of good for the greatest amount of people", so in an emergency you have to basically decide who might live and who might die, tag them as such and plan accordingly. And then there was the thought of search and rescue and leaving people behind, if need be, because they are beyond our scope of training etc. I dont know!! ... but I had nightmares and it just really was so *real* to me. (could it be the huge earthquakes our world is enduring? of course... and the fact that I feel so responsible to help my ward members prepare because of my calling?!) I dont know... but it has been a deep thinking situation for me.

The next to the last class they covered how you may react after an event like this and the effects of this kind of stress a large event could have on you as a CERT member. The instructor then shared her story, as an EMT, of caring for and loosing a mangled baby ejected from a vehicle in a car crash and the emotional toll it has taken on her. She ended up having an emotional breakdown (mimicking a heart attack) towards the end of class after re-living it for us!! She was shaking, crying, and in shock right there before our eyes. And she was the trained EMT Instructor! My cage was so rattled when I left that class I cannot even tell you!!

Anyway... so I was VERY nervous for our last class in which they would create a mock disaster for us. I honestly was not sure I *wanted* to be trained in this particular venue in life. I was grateful for what I could do for my family because of it... but I was not jiving at all on being responsible for others in this manner. I was seriously thinking about quitting.

We got to our class and corrected our final tests. We could hear them setting up in the next rooms for the mock disaster. The fire alarm started going off and was re-set over and over after going off because of the smoke they were creating for our disaster.

We watched the news footage of the earthquake in CA in 2004 (Pima county?) and all the inital drama as it unfolded there. That was our set-up. We were responding to an earthquake. We finally were ready to begin and they asked for a volunteer to be the team leader. Team leader is ultimately in charge of assigning all the smaller group leaders and all the co-ordination of all the volunteers, as well as record keeping. We had 26 people in this class... and the only one I really knew was Camille (my EP Specialist Assistant taking the class with me). No one would raise their hand! He asked 4 times. I was SO nervous about the entire event... I finally had the thought cross my mind... "if you don't conquer this it will always be a fear". I RAISED MY HAND!!! What was I THINKING???? I stood up and walked to the front! I WAS THE TEAM LEADER! Huh??? And now all the other people in the room were looking to me for guidance! (add also to my nerves that I had missed the night on search and rescue due to strep throat, so I only knew what I read in the book for that part! ACK!)

The lights were shut out and all we had were our flashlights, we could hear the "victims" screaming for help and knocking on the walls and it was smoky and eery. I asked for volunteers and got 3 men to volunteer; one to head up the Medical Area team, one for the Search & Rescue team, one for Fire and I had to finally ask one of the larger men to head up the Transport team because no one else was volunteering! I handed out radios and asked Camille to come and be my right hand girl to write everything down.

I dispatched my S&R team out first, and then got in a little bit of a "discussion" with my Transport team leader; he thought they should leave WITH the S&R team and told him to wait for a radio back from S&R to know where victims were. He went ahead and took his team and left after S&R dispite what I said. 

It was sad... even though it was a "mock" event. Our first victim was a dead infant (CPR doll). That really set the tone for the whole event. One by one they brought victims back to where we were. We ran our head-to-toe assesments, triaged where we could and I tried to keep on top of it all. I had one volunteer who was older and deaf, and she had forgotten her hearing aids. She had her adult daughter with her. She was discouraged because she couldn't hear well to know how to help. I quickly came up the with the assignment of standing at the door and asking the victims names as they entered the room, she could ask and her daughter could listen and write down the info. It worked out well and I was grateful to be able to give her a job so she could feel included! :)

It was utter chaos, but it turned out to be pretty well organized chaos. We had "victims" in shock trying to help and getting in the way. We had "injured" trying to leave the room to "look for their family members". The "injuries" were complex and very real looking. It was all VERY well plotted and executed and it felt quite real.

After we had found all the "victims" and got them to safety (minus the "woman in labor" in a "room full of poison" that I had to counsel them to leave there and mark the door for more trained individuals to handle - HARD to think about!) we were gathered for a review. They were REALLY pleased with our group and how we handled it all. They said our biggest problem was Transport being on top of and then passing S&R. (was kind of nice to hear that I chose correctly even if the leader did his own thing). They also praised my efforts and said that I was the first woman they had ever had be the Team Leader!!! :O Really??

What an amazing event in my life!! I was SO pumped!! Not only did I face my greatest fear in all of this, but CONQUERED it!! They were also really pleased when I explained that I have a heart condition and knew I could not be the one transporting or even likely S&Ring because of it! The instructor smiled and said that he was so pleased... that he must have taught me well because our other mantra as a CERT member is that we are #1 priority. Our safety first. He was glad I choose a job I knew I could physically do and still "do the greatest good for the greatest amount of people". It was wicked cool!

It was SUCH a rush!! Talk about empowering yourself! Greatest fear conquered! I do NOT enjoy being in charge in. the. least! I do not enjoy being "responsible" in the least. And I was really worried about this whole event... and I really feel like my Heavenly Father guided me through this! I had prayed before I went to class for the courage to endure this.... and I think He helped me do more than endure!! *GRIN* WAHOO!!! I am woman! Hear me roar!!!!!!! I can fear this no more!!! *GRIN*