KAREN:  Okay.  We're back from our little break.  And you were talking about delivering babies, which another thing I wanted to ask you about was emergencies and dealing with emergencies and trauma.  And do you remember the first one you had to go to? 

PAULA:  Well, one bad thing about me was in the sight of the blood, I used to faint. 

KAREN:  Oh. 

PAULA:  And that was a very bad advantage, you know, when you're a health care provider. 

So the first emergency, I did, that I had problem with that, some young man had gone out to get in wood, instead of cutting the tree first and then taking the limbs off, he was cutting the limbs first before he cut the tree down.  Accidentally the axe got stuck, but it fall down and hit him on the head.  Excuse me. 

And head wounds would really bleed, bleed lots.  Even if it's just a tiny little thing. 

And I tried to -- excuse me -- stop the bleeding with pressure, because we have nothing else.  I was so embarrassed, I keep getting light-headed and -- and then I would let the mother somehow have -- you know, take my hand from pressing that and somehow show that the pressure is not released, then she would be pressing it while I go out and put my head between my knees and tried to real -- that was awful embarrassing and -- but I managed to take care of that. 

So after traumatic things like head cuts, I would want to faint.  And so I told myself I have to get rid of this.  I can do it if I want to, I can do it, and I'll do it. 
So I told myself, next time I see a lot of flow of blood, I'm going to only concentrate on saving that life, never mind the blood.  And I did it, you know. 

I've gone into one of the suicides, a person who had shot himself on the head, and I went in early in the mornings when -- when I called -- when I was called, and when I went in the house, there was pool of blood on the floor, some coagulation have set in.  And this person was just covered with blood. 

And he -- he didn't seem to be breathing, so I was breathe for him and check the heart, but the heart was very weak. 

And when I took -- took tissue, gauze, and wiped -- wiped the face, I realized that there was gunshot wound on the forehead.  And right away I felt for the back, because the exit wound is bigger and there was some brain in it, too, on the hair. 

And so I told the parents that he wasn't going to live.  And so that was very hard thing.  One of the children I used to do -- take care of, I used to take care of.  So --

KAREN:  I don't know how you deal with that kind of a crisis. 

PAULA:  Yeah.  It's -- I did it anyway.  And for some reason, the blood didn't make me faint. 

Then I asked myself, was it because the person was dying that I didn't even get sick, because when I -- when I was going in, they didn't tell me what was going on.  If there's blood involved in this, I'm going to just concentrate on the life of that person.  And I didn't get sick. 

And then next time somebody fall -- one of the elders fall down and had a cut on their head.  I went in, because he couldn't get up right away, there was pool of blood when I came in.  And then I was only concentrating on the life of that person and not -- never mind the blood thing.  And that's how I overcome, you know. 

And there was other tragic things, like two machines, two snow machines collided to each others.  And one was unconscious.  And the other one was okay. 

And just from checking the peoples with flashlight and the peoples weren't, you know, responding to light, just stay kind of dilated and not getting smaller, never constrict, told me that person wasn't going to live because the doctor -- the doctors, you know, when they come to the town, they used to help us a lot, too, and teach us things like that, that the person is brain damaged, they are not going to live, their eyes are like that.  So I -- I knew from there.
 
And there was some other things, too.  Like one person had shot herself with a shotgun, and shotguns make lots of big, big holes.  She had shot herself on the side with shotgun, and she was probably still alive, so she repeated that, making it bigger.  And even touched the spine.
 
And blood just had already, when I -- this was after I became supervisor instructor.  People were still calling me for emergencies, so I went and know that she wasn't going to make it.  So all kinds of emergencies. Sometimes I wonder how I did it, how I took care of them.  Seems to be knowing -- I think subconsciously know, my arms and my hands just know what to do.  And if they live, you know, it's a reward, you know, something like a reward.  Makes you feel good.  But if they don't live, you know, it's different, too.