The Job

    Professional lifeguards are mentally, physically, and emotionally prepared at all times to do their job.
    The primary responsibility of a lifeguard is to ensure patron safety and protect lives by preventing and responding to emergencies.
    (American Red Cross: Lifeguard Training ECC 2000 Guidelines)


    Life guarding was less of a job and more of a lifestyle - at least for me. I grew up on the beaches of Ocean City, Maryland, and there was more salt water than blood in my veins. I couldn’t imagine doing anything that didn’t revolve around the ocean. I believed then, and still do, that I would be a lifeguard forever.
    For the third year in a row, I returned to the Holiday Inn Oceanfront as the activity pool lifeguard. The only difference that summer was that I had quit the Ocean City Beach Patrol to take on the pool position full time. I had been contemplating quitting the OCBP for the majority of the previous year. One reason being that near the end of my employment, I had watched the tourist covered shoreline begin to show signs of the increasing obesity trend. Beach replenishment, which once served to pump sand from offshore onto the water‘s edge thereby creating wider beaches and less backwash in he currents, was no longer part of the annual preseason prep by the city. That resulted in more and more rip tides, eventually causing me to dread my days in the stand on 17th Street. At a mere 108 lbs, I would watch hoards of tourists, plump from indulging on Thrashers french fries and Fishers popcorn, frolic dangerously close to passing rips. I hoped that they would heed my whistle and save me from having to save them. Could I feasibly pull three or four 200+ lbs people out of a rip tide, swim them parallel to the shore until we were out of its suction, and then back to the beach?
    The stress over that question finally pushed me to end my career as a beach guard, but for two summers before I quit I had been working on my days off at the Holiday Inn's activity pool. When they heard that I was quitting the OCBP, they offered to match what I had been paid as a beach guard and to put me on full time. The hotel happened to be on the same block that I previously guarded on, which made for an easy transition. Not to mention a move to what I figured would be a much less stressful job.

    My second summer of working full time at the Holiday Inn was creeping by at an agonizing pace. The beginning of the season had been abnormally cold and wet, keeping the pool primarily kid-free, but by late June the weather had returned to average summer temperatures: 90 degrees, humid, and void of any cooling breezes. From then on it seemed like every kid who stayed at the hotel spent the entire day in the water at my feet. With two slides, a lazy river, a swirling whirlpool, and a multitude of spraying fountains, I can't say I blamed them. My coworkers and I often stopped by on our days off to have some fun ourselves. I couldn't have asked for a more ideal job than as the lifeguard for that pool.
    My training as a guard came into play mainly in the form of first aid. Every day there seemed to be instances of cuts and scrapes, stubbed toes and bloody noses, bumped heads and heat rash. There were only a few more serious injuries, including an epileptic seizure, a broken tooth, and a burst blood vessel in a diabetic‘s lower leg. But there was nothing I couldn't, or wasn’t prepared, to handle.
    The "saving" aspect of my job consisted of pulling toddlers out of the current leading to the lazy river. In most cases, the little ones would be so excited about the pool that they would hop up and down in the shallow end, laughing and splashing, completely unaware that they were about to be swept away. The current was fairly strong; some adults even had trouble when they tried to move against it. Not to mention it dipped from one foot to three and a half feet within two or three yards. By the time the kids noticed that they were being pulled into deeper water, it was too late. Jumping in from off the deck into waist-deep water and pulling them out wasn’t nearly as glamorous or awe-inspiring as saving someone in the ocean, but the parents sure acted like it was. On average I jumped in for a child about four times a day - my high point was eighteen times, in one ten hour period, during 4th of July weekend. That was the roughest part of the job, and that being said, I was significantly less stressed than I had been as a Beach Patrol guard. Besides, I was still, technically, on the beach, the pool being just off the boardwalk. So even if the summer was moving slowly, I would have been the last person to complain. Life was good.

    Late one day that July, I had just gotten off rotation at the main chair and was on my way over to the towel stand to reapply my sun block. I had a great tan going, but the intensity of the sun - and being out in it for ten hours a day, six days a week - made me more than a little wary about going without a daily coating of SPF 35. I had just finished my legs and was getting ready to lather up my stomach when I felt a hand grip my shoulder. It tightened into a vice and spun me around so quick that, for a moment, I sympathized with the stereotypical hostage victim of bank robberies seen in films. Startled, I had dropped my bottle of Panama Jack, spraying white, coconut-scented globs onto my lower legs and the surrounding deck. Joe Sherman, the hotel's concierge, stood inches from my face, still gripping my collarbone like it was the only thing holding him to the ground.

    "Joe, Jesus! You scared the shit - I mean bajeezes - out of me." I tried to keep profanity out of my vocabulary when I was at the pool. Not because it was my place of employment (my bosses and coworkers were all extremely laid back and I saw them in a social context pretty often), but because so many innocent ears were around.

    "Katie..."

    I stared at him for a moment, my shoulder starting to throb. He didn't make a move to say anything else, but I began to pick up that something was definitely wrong. His golden summer tan was nonexistent, replaced with a pasty, and slightly sweaty, pale sheen. His breathing was uneven and shallow. For a moment I thought he was going to pass out. I reached out and grabbed his forearm with my fingers, shaking him. I spoke lightly, quietly, afraid that I was about to hear horrible news.

    "Joe, what's wrong? Talk to me, Joe."

    His eyes went from glazed to crystal clear and he became animated almost as quickly as he had gone speechless.

    "We need a guard. Now." He pivoted on his heel and pulled me towards the gate leading to the indoor pool and cafe. I kept trying to ask what was going on, but he said nothing. When we entered the main lobby, I noticed several of the front desk personnel whispering in a circle. I caught the words "hot tub," " daughter," and "police," as I passed them. Chris Beebe, my boss and the hotel's manager, was holding an elevator door open for us. We stepped inside and the door slid closed.

    "Sherm, get off of her,” Chris barked at Joe. “You want to break her neck before we even get upstairs?" At Chris' command, Joe dropped his hand from my shoulder, which instantly began to tingle from the period of sustained pressure.

    "Chris, wha-"

    "We've got a situation, Katie," Chris cut me off before I even asked my question. His eyes met mine and, maintaining a steady gaze, he began. "An elderly woman decided to soak in the spa while her daughter was taking a nap. Her son-in-law and granddaughter are down at the pool, but we wanted to stabilize the situation before bringing them up. The daughter woke from her nap to find her mother unconscious...she had been in the hot tub for almost two hours. She called 911 and then the front desk, so the EMT unit should be on their way. Until then we need someone to handle the situation. Looks like you're that someone."

    I stood silent, allowing the information he was feeding me to soak in. Situation. He keeps saying situation. What does he mean? I took a breath and let him know that I had understood, or at least taken in, what he said. He cleared his throat and watched the numbers on the elevator continue to rise.

    "We’re headed to the sixth floor. The elderly woman," Chris said, glancing down at me again, "was barely breathing when her daughter found her. She may not be breathing at all when we get there."

    Protect lives by preventing and responding to emergencies...
    If victim is not breathing, tilt head back, lifting the chin to open the airway...
    Look, listen, and feel for breathing for no longer than five seconds...

    In two months I was due for recertification training for CPR. I was out of practice. I don't have my pocket mask. I don't have my gloves. I’m not ready. These things weren't supposed to happen at the hotel pool, at the less stressful job.

DING.

    The elevator doors slid open. As we stepped out into the hall, every ounce of doubt I had in myself was pumping full force through my bloodstream, making it hard for me to walk. Chris had been saying something as we stepped towards the door, which was held open by a weeping African American woman in a flowered bathrobe, but I can't remember now what he had said. I’m not even sure if I had heard him then. From behind me Joe's breathing had turned into harsh gasps; Chris whispered into my ear, "It's okay."

    Someone had pulled the elderly woman out of the hot tub and laid her on the bed. As soon as I saw her, a switch in me was thrown. That switch had been installed the first time I had put my lifeguard training to the test. The instant it was flipped, I turned from human to machine. I was there for one reason: to do my job.

    "I need her on the floor, and I need everyone's help to get her there," I shouted, moving towards the woman. I ordered various loitering employees around until I was sure she would be evenly lifted. On the count of three we moved her to the floor, and with the same barking tone I soon had a stack of towels by my side, plenty of room to work, and complete silence. I can’t imagine how it looked to those standing around the room, but at the time, my concern and focus wasn’t on them.

    Look, listen, and feel...
    Look, listen, and feel...

    She wasn't breathing. I didn’t have my mask or my gloves with me, and although I had been taught that I could refuse to perform rescue breathing if I felt my own health was in danger, that option didn’t cross my mind. I hoped she didn't have any communicable diseases as I tilted her head backwards, opened her airway, pinched her nose shut, and lowered my mouth to hers to begin rescue breathing.

    Take a breath before you give a breath.
    Look, listen, and feel...
    Take a breath before you give a breath.
    Look, listen, and feel...

    After several breaths, I felt for signs of circulation in her jugular. Oh God. She had no pulse. I searched in my head for what to do next. No pulse. No pulse. No pulse....chest compressions! I moved into the correct position and delivered the instructed fifteen chest compressions. One...two...three...four...With each thrust I felt ribs snap and crack. I performed two more rescue breaths before repeating the cycle of compressions and breaths three more times. Where the hell are the paramedics?

    I had come to a crossroad. There was still no pulse and nothing I was doing was helping. My heart began to race. What if I don't save her? What if she dies? I had never had anyone die on my watch, at my hand. Ever. On the brink of panic, I remembered: at the beginning of the summer the hotel installed AED’s in each hallway; portable Automated External Defibrillators, or in laymen‘s terms, “shocking pads“ for flat-liners. I can't recall whether I ran to get the black box off the wall next to the ice machine or whether I had someone else do it, but moments later I was back in mechanical mode again.

    Professional lifeguards are mentally, physically, and emotionally prepared at all times to do their job.
    Protect lives by preventing and responding to emergencies...

    I pulled open the woman's robe, immediately eliciting cries of protest from the weeping daughter in the doorway. I ignored her as emotional and irrational, as did everyone else in the room. I knew what I was doing, and there was no time for modesty. I thoroughly dried her chest with towels, flipped open the AED’s cover, and pushed ON.

    "Attach pads to victim now." The machine spoke in a recorded, serene, feminine voice. I pulled the backings off the pads and stuck one onto the woman's right chest, the other to her lower left side, just above her hip bone; her skin was still hot to the touch. Sure that the pads were secured, I plugged the attached electrode wires into the machine and pressed ANALYZE.

    "Analyzing." If the heart was in defibrillation, the shocks should reset the beats into a normal rhythm. If the heart was in arrest, then the machine wouldn't send any shocks at all because they wouldn't do any good. The heart would be dead. I waited for the voice, the always cool, calm, soothing voice. The voice that promised to deliver the message in the same tone, regardless of the news.

    "Prepare to shock." I let out the breath I had been holding.

    "Everybody stand clear," I shouted, even though I was the only person anywhere near the woman; everyone else had retreated to the edges of the room. Some had even gone out into the hallway completely.

    "Shocking in three...two...one...." I pressed the SHOCK button and the woman's chest heaved up several inches before falling flat.

    "Analyzing."

    I repeated that cycle seven times before the paramedics finally arrived, the woman’s heart never fully arresting. After every three analyzations that the AED performed, I gave her CPR. The EMT personnel that entered the room on the eighth cycle had been briefed by Chris, who had gone downstairs early in my efforts to wait for them. They didn't say much, other than they were late because of an accident on Coastal Highway that blocked the ambulance's path. When recounting this story for filing of a hotel accident report, it struck me that the Fire Headquarters, where the paramedics happen to wait for incoming calls, is on 15th Street, Bayside. The hotel was only as far as 17th Street, Oceanside. I wondered why the EMT unit didn't tell the ambulance to meet them when they could, and just run to the hotel. I never found out the answer to that question, and it still troubles me to this day.

    The rest of that day is blurry in my memory. After they took the woman to Atlantic General Hospital, I know that I was told to go home. I ignored the order, interpreting it as more of a request, and said I was fine; saving lives was part of the job description. Joe mentioned how professional I was, and how he couldn't imagine doing what I had done.

    “She could’ve died, man.”

    Sometime around then, when Joe had said those words, the day's events, and the possible outcomes, began to dawn on me. I can't remember whether I began to shake or throw up first.

    Professional lifeguards are mentally, physically, and emotionally prepared at all times to do their job.
    Mentally, physically, and emotionally prepared.
    Emotionally prepared.

    The remainder of the day my mind remained preoccupied, reeling with anxiety and the aftershock of stress. When I got home from work that night, I had a hard time telling my parents what I had done. I kept getting choked up, a lump in my throat kept my words from forming coherent sentences. Once I had gotten all of it out in a way that they could understand, my dad called the hotel to make sure I had been given the next day off, since I couldn't remember whether they had or not. Brian Hooper, the night manager, assured him that I should definitely take the day off, and that I would get it with pay, which seemed odd to me because I wasn’t used to that sort of thing happening in my line of work. The title alone, Professional Lifeguard and Lifesaver, implies that preventing death and injury is one of the key components of the job. Getting a day off, with pay, for doing your job - it just didn’t make much sense. I’m still not sure how I feel about accepting that money, but I sure did need that day off to get my head straight.
    Thinking about how that day played out, I knew that I should've been sent home. I should have been physically shoved out the door and into my car. My bosses and coworkers probably thought about it, but in the end they hadn’t made me go. It's a wonder no kids drowned, seeing as how my attention definitely wasn't on them. All I could think about were the "what ifs" and "could bes" I might have to face. I hadn't used a mask. I hadn't washed my hands. I hadn't worn any gloves. All those things were serious no-no's in my Disease Prevention and Transmission Training. What if the woman had herpes, or a viral infection, or AIDS? What if I had a bizarre germ on my hand from the sun block? I was positive that I had broken some of her ribs administering CPR as well. What if she tried to sue me? My certifications would protect me in court, but still...would someone sue a person who tried to save their life? Oh, God. What if I didn't save her life? What if she died? My head was spinning.

    When I returned to work, I was still a bit on edge and helter-skelter in the head. The rest of the week I had moments of complete mental lapses. One day I forgot to put sun block on and ended up with sun blisters on my upper back and chest. Another day I wore my orange Speedo swimsuit top with my navy blue TYR bottoms. Somewhere down the line I also managed to "glue" my car keys to my phone with surf wax when I tossed them into the wrong pocket of my bag. It took me about five days to return to my normal self. Right around that time, I discovered that I had a prize waiting for me in my employee box. I opened the envelope and pulled out a handmade card with a red, glittery, lifeguard cross in the middle of it. Inside it read:

    Dear Lifeguard Katie,
    Thank you so much for saving my Mam-Mam. I want to be a lifeguard when I grow up too! I love you.
    From,
    Alyssia

    The family must have been given my name by one of my bosses. I don’t remember ever giving it to them, or even talking to one of them directly. There was a folded note stuck inside the card that was from Alyssia's mother, the daughter of the elderly woman. She wrote her thanks and appreciation, letting me know that her mother, Gloria, was in stable condition at the hospital and would be fine to go home in a few days. She said the doctors told her that without my efforts to resuscitate her mother, she and her family would be attending a funeral instead of planning another vacation.
    Alyssia's card and her mother's note sit inside my top dresser drawer in my room at home, for easy access whenever I need a little reassurance that I can make a difference in the world. I plan on being a lifeguard for many more years to come, and although I hope to never have to put my skills to the test again, it's rewarding to know that I could successfully use them if the occasion called for it.

    Saving lives. It's in the job description.