I do miss some patient contact too. But not all! Somedays I did feel that I’d been able to make a difference and help, even if that help wasn’t really medical and was more to do with social issues, mental health or just being a human! I’ll miss the stories from the pre-war generation and always remember the privilege of meeting a Spitfire pilot and two soldiers who were involved in the D-day landings. Plus a host of other amazing people with fantastic life stories that showed courage, determination, staying positive and strong despite adversity, and sometimes who were just plain weird! 

To replace this, I now get to meet and teach a host of interesting people from round the world skippers to superyacht crew, cruise ship captains to commercial seafarers. All of whom have amazing stories and experiences to share. 

But I don’t miss the time wasting calls, the regular characters (frequent flyers!) and those who just aren’t prepared to try and self care. Some of the most time wasting things I’ve been sent to were: 5 midge bites on someone’s leg, a dry mouth during a heatwave, repeat prescription requests (frontline Paramedics don’t prescribe), chronic problems that were years old and not an emergency at 3am on a Sunday, minor injuries - and I mean so minor you could hardly see the cut - that could easily be managed with a plaster at home! You literally wouldn’t believe some of the calls that the Ambulance Service gets!

I also don’t miss the verbal and physical abuse, constantly apologising for the delay in getting to someone, sitting outside the hospital for whole shifts, the PPE we had to wear long after lockdown, the late finishes and the late or missed meal breaks. 

During my career, I was assaulted a handful of times, and it might surprise you to hear that little old ladies with dementia generally use their talon-like fingernails as their weapon of choice, and to good effect! They’ve drawn blood more than once! I also picked up a shoulder injury in the process of tackling a patient to stop them from stabbing themselves in the stomach. Maybe I should have taken up Rugby after all!

But the worst assault was a punch in the face by a woman wearing handcuffs. Definitely an ‘ouch’ moment with some choice language and very watery eyes afterwards! Despite employers' assurances that assaults are always prosecuted, they’re not. Especially if mental health issues are the root cause. So, my assault went unprosecuted. Even worse, although I requested to go to hospital for assessment, I was sent to another job straight afterwards, my manager didn’t bother to check whether my colleague and I were OK and I was expected back to work (with 2 black eyes!) the next day. I really don’t miss feeling like you are just a bum on a seat!

The job changed immensely even in the time I was working frontline. From when I started as a trainee Technician, we would do 6-10 jobs in our 12 hour shift, and sometimes, if we were lucky, we got a bit of down time at a standby post. Most night shifts, you could pretty much guarantee an hour or so of shut eye at a standby, which really helped with my 1 hour journey home in the morning. Late finishes happened of course, but they weren’t frequent and generally weren’t more than half an hour late, unless it was an unusual or particularly involved job that ran over, in which case you generally didn’t mind so much.

For me a day shift meant getting up at 04.00, leaving at 05.00 to be at work and ready to go for 06.15. If (haha!!) I finished on time at 18.15, I had an hour drive home, then had to shower, eat and be in bed before 21.00 to get some sleep before the next 04.00 start. I normally only managed 5-6 hours of sleep. Night shifts were the same but in reverse and generally with less sleep due to noise, heat and daylight.  I used to work 2 days, 2 nights then had 4 days off, but you lost the day before and the day after nights as you needed to sleep. It was a pretty brutal weekly routine and known to be the most life shortening. 

We would get some annual leave every 8 weeks, but it was very inflexible and meant working 7 out of every 10 weekends, most bank holidays and generally not being around when your friends and family were. Much of our mandatory training was moved to be completed in our own time - of course we would be given overtime pay, but I resented being forced to allow work to eat into my precious time off.

So I don’t miss the constant and utter exhaustion, nor the missed or late breaks and the late finishes virtually every night. Late finishes meant even less sleep and a late break is one that falls in the last third of your shift, so that means you’ll have worked more than a normal person’s entire working day before getting a break. In the last 8 months before I left the NHS, I only had 3 shifts when I didn’t finish late and/or had a late break or no break at all. 

In the last 2-3 years, a lot of my time was spent sitting outside the hospital waiting, sometimes for entire shifts or more. Of course the waiting meant that we were effectively nursing patients, sometimes seriously ill or injured patients, because there just wasn’t any room inside the hospital. This could be really stressful at times, stretching our skills and patience - Paramedics are not trained in nursing care. But I’m not going to bore you with my views on how badly and why the system is broken, or what needs to be done to fix it!

Working on the frontline is an exercise in micromanagement. Everything you do is measured. The time from a call coming in to acknowledging it, the time to get to a job, the time spent on a job, the time spent getting to the hospital, the time spent handing over, the time spent waiting, the time on your break. It’s all measured and if you run over time, you know about it! 

My last shift was a night shift and at midnight, all of my systems and log ins were wiped. So I couldn’t check emails, complete my timesheet (of course we finished late!) or submit it, and we were lucky that my colleague was able to log into the patient report form that we were in the middle of completing! Way to go Ambulance Service - what a great way to make your employees feel valued!

Bizarrely I’ve actually found it quite hard to adjust to working more freely and flexibly, being trusted to log my hours and manage my own time. I still feel the need to justify what I’ve been doing every minute of the day, though neither of my employers demands it! Being able to pop out some days (if I’m not teaching) or start and finish early has done wonders for my work life balance and I’m starting to believe that I’m trusted. I also suffered from terrible impostor syndrome for the first few months - something I now realise has affected me all of my working life. 

The excitement of being able to eat, drink and go to the toilet whenever I want is still there a year on! I can choose when and where to take my lunch break. These are basic needs that are often lost in a frontline role of any kind and the luxury definitely isn’t wasted. I no longer have to bolt down food in too little time (though that’s proving a hard habit to break), I can use a pen with blue ink at work, I don’t have to tie my hair back all the time, I can wear nail varnish and best of all, I now have time around my working day to be productive in other areas.

But there were many positives to working as a frontline Paramedic and I will alway be proud to call myself a Paramedic and to have done the job right through a pandemic. I probably have contributed to saving a few lives though we rarely get to find out what happens. But I always tried to do the very best I could for everyone I treated and I was quite protective over my patients, even the difficult characters. It’s an eye opening job and you never forget some of the stuff you see - both good and bad! 

There’s a documentary called ‘The First Wave’, all about New York from March to June 2020. It follows doctors, nurses and patients. When I watched it it reminded me just how tough those days, weeks and months were, going about our day not knowing whether we would catch it ourselves or pass it on to loved ones or patients. It reminded me of the resilience we developed, the camaraderie, and also the fear we all felt but pretended we didn’t. But it also reminded me just how far we’ve come since those early days of lockdown. We now know what we’re dealing with, we have vaccines that work, we know how to treat it… and I played my small part in that.

While I worry about staying current and not having much patient contact now, I’ve actually learnt more in both new roles than I probably would have done on the road. Teaching Paramedic students means you definitely have to stay ahead of the game, knowledge wise, and the world of maritime medical operations keeps you on your toes for sure. I still do some event work too, and that gives me patient contact in both medical and trauma situations.

In terms of what I’ve gained from taking that monumental step away from the NHS, time is the biggest thing. I have time to do things around my working day and with most weekends off, I spend more time with my friends and family. The longer time off in the ambulance service was great, but no one else was around at the same time, and it was really inflexible if you wanted holiday at any other times. Now I can use my mornings and evenings productively and go out when everyone else is around.

At the start of lockdown, I’d just come back from volunteering with ABSAR in Antigua (http://www.absar.org/), and felt generally dissatisfied. Of course, a global pandemic didn’t help. I sat and thought it through, and came to the conclusion that if I could find a job involving medicine, marketing and marine, it might just be my dream job! The only problem was that jobs like this don’t really exist. I put it out to the universe, and contacted some well known maritime medical companies on this planet, but didn’t even get a reply!

A chance conversation with a friend in lockdown led to an introduction to Red Square Medical. This developed into some teaching, then ad hoc marketing work, a monthly retainer and now a job that involves medical, marketing and marine! So maybe dreams can come true! 

Family and friends have commented recently that I seem happier and more relaxed since changing my job, and I love both of the new roles that I’ve taken on. Though they’re completely different, they complement each other pretty well and challenge me on many levels. 

What I’ve gained since leaving the NHS is a new sense of self worth and more time. I feel valued as a person and not just a number. I have time to myself. I’ve learnt new skills and been able to push myself in new ways. I’m finding different methods to keep my competence up to date - and while I wouldn’t say I’m a lover of podcasts yet, I’m getting there!

I’ve never been someone to stay stuck in the past either. I had days that I loved working for the Ambulance Service for sure, but also days when I was beyond exhausted, felt under valued, feared for my life and just hated the job and people in general! But it has been a fabulous stepping stone and the experience I gained there will provide transferable skills for many parts of my life - except the rugby tackling - I probably won’t pursue that one!