Making Choices

Every morning, I ask God to put me where He needs me. While He may very well do that, He has given us free will and it’s up to us whether to heed His call or not. Let me tell you a story and why, as people involved in preparedness, we should ALWAYS stop.

I ran to the post office today, which in Montana is generally a big operation. It’s a long ways away along a stretch of empty highway with almost no cell signal. As I was driving back to the camp, I came across several vehicles stopped in the road, and noticed a white van head-on into a tree. There were several men around the vehicle.

He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him.

Luke 10:34

This was my first decision point. I could have just assumed that the men on scene had it under control and drove on. I could have just called 911 and left it at that.

I slowed down and rolled down the window, asking if everyone was alright. One of the men shouted that they hadn’t gotten the doors open yet, so they don’t know. Decision point two: I could have just assumed that they’d handle it.

Not in my nature. I pulled over, threw on the hazards and started walking down in the knee deep snow. Before I got there, they got the doors open and announced that everyone said they were OK. Decision point 3 – I could have just turned around.

I wavered, but I know that I train and that I carry supplies. I decided, let’s just go look and confirm – you’re already knee deep in the snow. As I got closer, this odd phenomenon that my wife comments on all the time happened, everyone just automatically looks to me in a crisis. This first man turns to me and says “she has a small cut on her wrist, but there’s a lot of blood on the floor”. I pushed through and said let me take a look….sure enough, lots of blood.

The man said he’d go call 911 as he has a signal and I begin an assessment despite her assertion to me that she’s fine. I find that her leg has hit the emergency brake and given her advanced age, she’s bleeding excessively. I directed two men where to find my first aid kit and immediately apply direct pressure, telling her it’s going to hurt. It took them a bit to find it, but they got me my kit and I quickly applied a pressure dressing (from my friends at BattlBox – see above) which slowed the bleeding enough to make it manageable.

I have a few lessons from this:

1. Always stop, every single time. While there might be several people WILLING to help, none of them had a first aid kit or the skills necessary to do a thorough patient assessment or control bleeding.
2. Never ever take a patient’s word that they are fine at a trauma scene. They are likely in shock and don’t know if they are hurt. We teach people after a shooting incident to look at themselves for bleeding from injuries they didn’t feel.
3. Make sure that the first aid kit is easily accessible and ON TOP of whatever is in the trunk or rear of your vehicle. The guys had a hard time finding it.
4. Never EVER go anywhere without a first aid kit.
5. Keep gloves in the map pocket of the door. I keep some in my first aid kit, but the event developed so fast that I was already applying direct pressure before I had a kit with me.

For those who afraid to help medically due to liability, every state in the US has a Good Samaritan Law, which protects you from lawsuits if you try to help in good faith. God requires us to help if we can. I’ll leave you with a piece of Tactical Wisdom on whether or not you should render aid:

 If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.

James 4:17

Help when you can. I don’t share this for accolades, I share it to motivate you to help each other. My biggest pet peeve is all these videos of accidents or attacks and everyone is filming instead of helping.