Jun 5, 2013

The rush

Adrenalin is an amazing thing. When I get a call to hurry over to a baby that isn't breathing I immediately feel the rush of it bursting through my body; my muscles tens, my heart rate increases and my breathing quickens. For a second all my thoughts get jumbled up in my head and I start shaking - but just as quickly I'm on my way, I'm moving and my thoughts form around one sentence; "all you need is air!" It's what I build everything on - the baby needs to breathe and so do I - everything else is useless if that first thing isn't in place. It makes this insanely stressful situation manageable because if you know the first step it leads you to the second and so on. I know what to do and the difficult part is always the start - once you're going it's like riding a bike (on a tightrope between to skyscrapers - but still...). After you're done and the baby is good and stabile the adrenalin level falls quickly and the resulting exhaustion is comparable to the feeling after a good and long massage. It might sound like a weird comparison, but you're so relaxed and tiered that you feel like you could just sleep for days. 

I love the rush of adrenalin in that situation. It gives me the kick I need to perform my best no matter what time it is or how long ago I've slept or eaten. The thing is, that's not the only situation in which I get that rush. Lately I've felt it in various mundane situations provoked by random thoughts - well maybe not that random... It happens every time I start thinking about going to an underdeveloped country where security is an issue and where I won't have the same means to work with as here. The problem is that I don't know what to do with my tens muscles, shallow breathing and beating heart when I'm sitting on a bus on my way to work. I don't have any release for it so it just keeps building and I'm left with shaky hands and jumbled thoughts. I've scanned and printed my papers, made important phone calls and written important e-mails (which incidentally aren't as good an outlet for the overflow of adrenalin as bagging a baby, in case you were wondering...) and now all I can do is wait. Four more days of medium levels of adrenalin rushing through my system followed by six months of probably pretty high levels of the same - I'm thinking I'm going to sleep really well in December.

In the meantime I'm trying my hardest to relax, enjoy the summer and charge my batteries as much as possible.


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