Back in early 2000s my wife and I were big into scuba diving and I wanted to be a dive master so I thought becoming an EMT-Basic would help. I signed up for a 4 month class and enjoyed it. Right after I finished I wasn't enjoying my job I had at the time. I called up a friend I met in EMT class to see how Paramedic class was going. He said it hadn't started yet and it starts in 2 weeks. I called the school and signed up. At the time of signing up I had no inclination to become a PM as a full time job. I had zero clue what I was going to do with it.
PM class was 13 months. Really, really enjoyed the ambulance clinicals. But to become a PM on an ambulance that responded to 911 calls required you to be a fire fighter. I had NO desire to go into a burning building. But...the last month of PM class the county fire depart was hiring PM-only with the stipulation that you become a fire fighter. I was over working in engineering jobs so I knew if I didn't do it right then I wouldn't do it so I applied. Oh, and in the middle of paramedic school my wife had our first child!
So February 6, 2006 (hence the name FM2606 for firemedic and 2/6/06) was my first day with the county FD. I became a fire fighter, which is a huge adrenaline rush but our department didn't fight many fires but a metric shit ton of 911 medical calls, the majority of which are pretty benign.
It didn't take long to see many FM get hurt mainly due to lifting patients (no powered stretchers at the time). I also have a chronic illness so with these 2 things in mind I figured if I got hurt or sick I needed something of a backup plan and engineering was not it so I started my Master's in CS online through DePaul University and finished in 2015.
I started working part time remote jobs, working a bunch of OT at the department and just enjoying the fact I had 2 jobs I really enjoyed. But then a switch flipped and the stupid bullshit medical calls weren't rolling off my back as easy. My colleagues in the department were irritating me, blah, blah blah. My mind set had changed and I just wanted to hang on until I was 55 y/o. I was around 48 / 49 when this happened.
Then Covid hit and due to my chronic illness I was taken out of the field and went "upstairs" to the office. Thinking I could use my computer programming skills I'd eventually pivot to something different in the FD. Well, long story short that didn't work out and I started applying left and right to remote jobs on Indeed. One job was really interested with a salary that was more than a district chief position in the department (2 promotions from a fire medic) so I took it and here I am. 2 1/2 years later. I still think FF/PM is the best job ever but it was time to go.
PM class was 13 months. Really, really enjoyed the ambulance clinicals. But to become a PM on an ambulance that responded to 911 calls required you to be a fire fighter. I had NO desire to go into a burning building. But...the last month of PM class the county fire depart was hiring PM-only with the stipulation that you become a fire fighter. I was over working in engineering jobs so I knew if I didn't do it right then I wouldn't do it so I applied. Oh, and in the middle of paramedic school my wife had our first child!
So February 6, 2006 (hence the name FM2606 for firemedic and 2/6/06) was my first day with the county FD. I became a fire fighter, which is a huge adrenaline rush but our department didn't fight many fires but a metric shit ton of 911 medical calls, the majority of which are pretty benign.
It didn't take long to see many FM get hurt mainly due to lifting patients (no powered stretchers at the time). I also have a chronic illness so with these 2 things in mind I figured if I got hurt or sick I needed something of a backup plan and engineering was not it so I started my Master's in CS online through DePaul University and finished in 2015.
I started working part time remote jobs, working a bunch of OT at the department and just enjoying the fact I had 2 jobs I really enjoyed. But then a switch flipped and the stupid bullshit medical calls weren't rolling off my back as easy. My colleagues in the department were irritating me, blah, blah blah. My mind set had changed and I just wanted to hang on until I was 55 y/o. I was around 48 / 49 when this happened.
Then Covid hit and due to my chronic illness I was taken out of the field and went "upstairs" to the office. Thinking I could use my computer programming skills I'd eventually pivot to something different in the FD. Well, long story short that didn't work out and I started applying left and right to remote jobs on Indeed. One job was really interested with a salary that was more than a district chief position in the department (2 promotions from a fire medic) so I took it and here I am. 2 1/2 years later. I still think FF/PM is the best job ever but it was time to go.
Here's my LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/curtis-lewis-09b655b3/
That's it in a long winded nutshell. Hit me with more questions if you want.