Go

No one, even if you enjoy your job, likes Monday mornings. Shit just goes wrong. You're not into a weekly routine.

This past Monday, like any other, was like that for me. It was just the kind of morning where you need to keep resetting your alarm for another 15 minutes of sleep, and in the end, you wake up raging that you need to now rush to get to work, while fighting with traffic and knowing that you still need to stop at Dunkin Donuts for your XL hot mocha, 2 splendas, skim, with a turbo shot. Slid into work at the :55 mark (usually I'm a good 15 minutes early, check my schedule, see which to truck I'm in for the day, and do my truck check before I even punch in) and the day started off like any other.

I was paired with one of my favorite mentors for my second one-on-one and we were off.

At around 11:30, we get a page for a transfer, standard, no needs. We show up to the hospital about 15 minutes early. Nurse is finishing up paperwork and the med nec. We're standing across from our patient's room, ready to introduce ourselves and ask for a sig, when, well... Shit goes down. Like MOVIE SHIT.

The room next to our patient's... goes into code mode. We hear it over the speaker. I look at my partner, he nods, and just to confirm what he meant, he mouths "go". Following his lead, I take off like a gunshot to the room and see this woman, appearing to be in her late 70s, not breathing. And I work. I get the bed down so that she's flat (I'm not sure if all hospital beds are like this, but ours are built and made to be able to do CPR on) and start going through the motions. I'm doing chest-compressions only at this point and humming "staying alive" in my head. I hear the rush of doctors coming, with the crash cart. I hear my partner yelling "DON'T STOP HIM, IT'S ADEQUATE CPR! DON'T STOP HIM!" and the doctors start to intubate. They stop me. Then the next thing I know, I'm seeing chest rise. The doctors have taken it from there.

I back away.

I walk past my partner, who I now see has an AED in his hand, head to the bathroom, and proceed to puke my guts out.

We don't stick around. We grab our paperwork, patient, and go.

I didn't think it'd get this cliche so quick.

Mondays mornings. No one likes Monday mornings.