Wilderness Intense!

Many of you may remember from my 'Where Two Roads Diverged' posting I mentioned that I signed up for a Wilderness EMT course located in Washington state. Well, yesterday was the completion of my first week of this month long course and I wanted to give a quick update on my experience thus far. I think one of my main reasons for wanting to post about it, besides giving an update, is because of my excitement already from taking this course.

My day begins early each morning around 5:30am when I arise to get ready for the day ahead of me by putting on at least three layers of clothing and making sure I eat a hearty breakfast and pack a nutritious lunch. After battling through Tacoma traffic I arrive on Fort Lewis Army Base where I meet up with 6 of my other classmates and my two instructors. We begin class at 8am by taking a classmate's vital signs, which include, blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate, pulse oximeter level (oxygen level), pupil reaction, and lung sounds.

The rest of the day is filled with lectures, hands-on experience to become familiar with the many fun tools an EMT-Basic gets to use, and then scenarios in which we are able to apply everything we have learned. The day typically ends around 5pm, but then we are given homework/reading assignments that consume the rest of the evening.

We have covered a TON of information already this week but realistically it is only the tip of the iceberg. Luckily for me, the majority of it is review from my Wilderness First Responder (WFR) course - and a good review it has been since it's been a couple of years since I've taken that course.

As you can probably already tell, this WEMT course is really intense! To give you an idea, a WFR course is typically taught over a 10-day period, which is pretty intense in itself. This past week - 5 days - we have already covered the vast majority of that WFR course as well as a ton of additional EMT-B level training. To give you another perspective, taking this course through BYU-Idaho would have taken me 4 months to complete. I will receive the same certification in 20 days. To get a general idea of what we learn and study on a day to day basis, you can check out this course's tentative schedule.

I am absolutely enjoying this class! Even though it is really intense and I come home each day feeling like my brain is drowning in an ocean of information, I love how it is based on experiential education - hands on experience. That is my style of learning. Throughout the day we have little practice sessions to become familiar with what we have just learned in the lecture, but the true and bulk of the learning, for me, comes at the end of the day when we spend the last couple hours playing in the woods acting out possible real scenarios of what we might come across as urban or wilderness EMTs. One can sit in a classroom all day and learn this stuff, but they can't save a life or treat an injury if not applied outside the classroom.

One day this past week, as we were doing scenarios, I volunteered to be the Primary Rescuer (the rescuer in charge), which does the majority of the assessment, gathers the information, and makes the decisions. We came upon an unconscious injured male who was inverted on the side of a steep slope, face down in the mud, with possible spine injury. I was kind of bewildered as to what to do first - stabilize the spine, try to check the airway, or somehow move the patient. We ended up having to begin this scenario over 3 times in order for us to understand and perform the best care this patient needed in a quick manner. I was really grateful that we started over until we got it right because it gave us the experience to learn what we needed to do and why. You can't learn that in a classroom. My instructor was a little bit surprised at my positive attitude of having to start over so many times and that I wasn't frustrated or upset. My dad's words came into the back of my mind, "If you do it right the first time, you don't have to do it again." The learning comes when we correct our mistakes. Even though I had to start over 3 times I walked away from class that day excited and pumped because of that learning experience.

One week down, three more to go, and a lot more fun to be had! We are allowed to take pictures and I hope to be able to get some to post on here. It's slips my mind as the adrenaline starts kicking in when we are doing the scenarios. All in all, I am thoroughly loving my class, learning a ton, and enjoying being in my old stomping grounds again.

Unexpected Challenges

I struggled a lot with what my February challenge would be, but as the month progressed it almost seemed as though the challenge to learn something new presented itself to me. I actually learned how to do two new things this month, both of which were awesome because both learning experiences were something that I found to be thoroughly enjoyable.

During the winter months I spend a lot of time indoors because I strongly dislike being cold! I'd take 115 degrees over being cold any day! But slowly over the last two winter seasons I have been exploring some winter sports, which I have really enjoyed despite the freezing temperatures (i.e., snowboarding, snowshoeing). This month, for the first time I went cross country skiing. I found cross country skiing a bit similar to snow shoeing, but with a little bit more coordination.


The above picture of me is my triumph of finally getting back up after falling with my XC skis on. It was a toss up between the difficulty of putting my XC skis back on (which I could never do without help) to get up or to get up with my XC skis on. I usually chose the battle of getting up without taking my XC skis off. That was a challenge all in itself, but got better and better after each fall (which occurred a bit more frequently than preferred).

The trip to go XC skiing began in the late afternoon, which didn't leave us much daylight and so consequently our location was closer than originally planned - Mesa Falls. It was absolutely gorgeous! Thinking about it, I don't know if our original destination would have been much different. It was SO peaceful to be skiing through the stillness of a beautiful forest - there was no sound other than the sounds of nature; the calm breeze through the trees, an occasional rushing of water from the river far below, the sweet chirps of birds as they flew overhead. It really was a bit of heaven! Without the distractions of the world to interrupt us or the responsibilities and stresses of life interfering, everything was perfect. I wish I had discovered my great liking of XC skiing earlier in the month so I would have been able to go multiple times, but I hope to have a few more opportunities to go again upon returning to Idaho.

With being a perfectionist, certain things take a lot longer for me to complete. For several years now I have wanted to learn how to make a leather journal. In my mind, this was buying a journal from the store and then making a leather covering for it. Never did I think I would learn how to do the whole process from start to finish, but I have successfully learned how! Going back to the whole perfectionist thing, it took me a long time to figure out how I wanted my leather journal to look. Once I figured that out I was ready to begin. I soon learned that even though each step is pretty easy to do, it took a lot of time and a lot of patience! But each step was well worth the final product!

The basic design of this leather journal was what I had in mind in the beginning, but a couple of things were design ideas that came during the process of its creation, for example, the leather strap page markers with beads on the ends, and the acorn as a closing mechanism. It turned out beautiful - better than I had expected!

I have learned a TON and have changed A LOT since my experience began at Anasazi. And even though as I move forward with my life I find myself continually looking back and drawing from the experiences, ceremonies, steppings, sittings, stories, and all else that is incorporated into the Anasazi Way.

In my truck I have my Rememberance Pouch hanging from my review mirror. It is something that I always look at whenever I am in my truck. It helps me remember my walking and something that I am trying to live up to. Recently I have had the desire to make a new Rememberance Pouch. I have never completely made one before, since the ones supplied at Anasazi are all pre-made. The process of making the Rememberance Pouches (pictured below) has brought so many new awakenings into my life and a new perspective that I have needed to grasp.

In the process and completion of making these Rememberance Pouches I have decided that it was time to take down my Rememberance Pouch and put a new one in its place. I am walking a new journey now with many goals ahead that I desire so greatly to reach. This Rememberance Pouch is now my constant reminder to me of all of those things in my walking right now that I am trying to accomplish. This journey is not an easy one; there will be an unspoken amount of trying, testing, stretching, and sacrificing but it is a walking that will lead to the greatest Final D there is with the richest blessings unimaginable. This journey is the Path of WE.

I am grateful for my unexpected challenges this month. I have discovered not only new activities that I would like to continue and develop, but I was also able to discover things about myself and receive awakenings that have began to help me turn towards a greater Light in my life.

February Challenge: A humble success