Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Self-Arresting
Careening down the mountain head first while lying on your back, your job is to stop yourself from plummeting to your death by digging your ice axe into the snow-while not ripping your arm out of its socket or accidentally getting your crampon snagged so you don't break an ankle. This was all new to me. As was crevasse rescue. These were beginner climbing skills. BEGINNER. Again, I just practiced them with the rest of the Intro group because I was on auto-pilot. Talk about foreign concepts! But sometimes it's just good to "do things". I'm a calculated risk taker, but there comes a point where you've researched something all you can and then next step is to just "DO". It's kind of like taking the first step out of a plane when you go skydiving. Just take that first step, because once you take it, you can't change your mind and step backwards into the plane. You have to deal with what's in front of you right then and there. Sometimes you have to trust the universe.
First Steps
Buying medical evacuation insurance makes this all real.
More so than putting down the $500 deposit and filling out the application.
More so than purchasing airfare that costs two grand.
More so than the UPS guy delivering the sleeping bag that is supposed to keep me warm for a month in the mountains, yet only weighs 3 lbs and compresses down into a bag the size of a small cat.
Yep, its the medical evacuation insurance that is the reality check. Especially the phrase in the contract that states that "transportation of mortal remains, if necessary" is covered.
The fact of the matter is, I probably have a higher chance than most people of needing to use this insurance. Eight years ago my lung collapsed while I was 7 months pregnant. The subsequent lung surgery to fix it (a few days after an emergency c-section, mind you) came after a month in the hospital with various chest tubes and other pain inflicting interventions...which came after months of bedrest for a high risk pregnancy which came after years of fertility treatments. Throw in a spouse's heart surgery and you've got a great first few years of marriage.
So I have an axe to grind. Or a bone to pick. Or an ass to kick.
Since I read Into Thin Air in 1998, I decided I want to go to Everest. The lung situation has put an interesting twist on my desire to go there. I said I'd like to do it when I turn 40 and here I am. Every cough or ache or doctor appointment in the past 13 years has me constantly thinking in my head/asking every physician, how will this affect my ability to go to Everest someday? They look at me like I am insane, but humor me anyway. My endurance, my stamina, my breathing...my mind spins with questions. Will I be ok at high altitude? Because being at high altitude is the wrong time to find out the answer to that question.
But the pulmonologist and thoracic surgeon have never wavered and both agree: The altitude won't affect my lung. I want to believe them.
Back to the sleeping bag.
I laugh that I even own a sleeping bag. I can count on two hands the number of times I've camped in my life, all 40 years of it. I'm pretty sure the last time I camped was 12 years ago, when I went on an Introduction to Mountaineering course in the Cascades. Imagine that, a girl from the flat Midwest just up-and-decides one day that she wants to climb a mountain. That's how it happened: I read a book about Everest and then decided, I'm going to take up mountain climbing.
When you're young, you do a lot of things without thinking. This can be good because it helps expand your horizons. But the sheer stupidity of things sometimes becomes apparent when you look back on them years later. One of the memories I have about the Intro course is how shocked I was the first night to find out I had to pitch a tent myself. On snow. Really? People camp on snow? Who knew? Not wanting to seem like an idiot, I just "did" stuff on the trip like I was "used to it". You know, like camping on snow. I vividly remember freezing all night long, even wearing every stitch of clothing I'd brought on the trip. Who knows what kind of sleeping bag I had back then...the gear list said "sleeping bag", so I probably just figured in my simplistic midwestern girl head that there was only one kind of sleeping bag. Lesson learned from that incident, though? Spend money on quality gear. Which is what I'm doing for THIS trip.
More so than putting down the $500 deposit and filling out the application.
More so than purchasing airfare that costs two grand.
More so than the UPS guy delivering the sleeping bag that is supposed to keep me warm for a month in the mountains, yet only weighs 3 lbs and compresses down into a bag the size of a small cat.
Yep, its the medical evacuation insurance that is the reality check. Especially the phrase in the contract that states that "transportation of mortal remains, if necessary" is covered.
The fact of the matter is, I probably have a higher chance than most people of needing to use this insurance. Eight years ago my lung collapsed while I was 7 months pregnant. The subsequent lung surgery to fix it (a few days after an emergency c-section, mind you) came after a month in the hospital with various chest tubes and other pain inflicting interventions...which came after months of bedrest for a high risk pregnancy which came after years of fertility treatments. Throw in a spouse's heart surgery and you've got a great first few years of marriage.
So I have an axe to grind. Or a bone to pick. Or an ass to kick.
Since I read Into Thin Air in 1998, I decided I want to go to Everest. The lung situation has put an interesting twist on my desire to go there. I said I'd like to do it when I turn 40 and here I am. Every cough or ache or doctor appointment in the past 13 years has me constantly thinking in my head/asking every physician, how will this affect my ability to go to Everest someday? They look at me like I am insane, but humor me anyway. My endurance, my stamina, my breathing...my mind spins with questions. Will I be ok at high altitude? Because being at high altitude is the wrong time to find out the answer to that question.
But the pulmonologist and thoracic surgeon have never wavered and both agree: The altitude won't affect my lung. I want to believe them.
Back to the sleeping bag.
I laugh that I even own a sleeping bag. I can count on two hands the number of times I've camped in my life, all 40 years of it. I'm pretty sure the last time I camped was 12 years ago, when I went on an Introduction to Mountaineering course in the Cascades. Imagine that, a girl from the flat Midwest just up-and-decides one day that she wants to climb a mountain. That's how it happened: I read a book about Everest and then decided, I'm going to take up mountain climbing.
When you're young, you do a lot of things without thinking. This can be good because it helps expand your horizons. But the sheer stupidity of things sometimes becomes apparent when you look back on them years later. One of the memories I have about the Intro course is how shocked I was the first night to find out I had to pitch a tent myself. On snow. Really? People camp on snow? Who knew? Not wanting to seem like an idiot, I just "did" stuff on the trip like I was "used to it". You know, like camping on snow. I vividly remember freezing all night long, even wearing every stitch of clothing I'd brought on the trip. Who knows what kind of sleeping bag I had back then...the gear list said "sleeping bag", so I probably just figured in my simplistic midwestern girl head that there was only one kind of sleeping bag. Lesson learned from that incident, though? Spend money on quality gear. Which is what I'm doing for THIS trip.
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