Good morning!
Ready, set, GO BAG! That's right I said go bag. Do you have yours prepped? Are you ready for an emergency? If the recent state of the world has not given us at the very least a jolt of reality-things can change at any moment- than I don't know what will besides the end of the world as we know it.
I admit I'm a self proclaimed prepper. That's right! Even before a nasty little virus emerged in 2019 I have been of the mind set "better safe then sorry". As an ER nurse I hate the feeling of being unprepared for the next moment. But in the ER you never know what is coming your way, so I have had to learned flexibility. But in my every day life I like to know that I have some back up if I need it. So, for years I have been perfecting my go bag, emergency supplies, even my medical go bag. My medical go bag is another time, another story situation.
Be for children (BC), lol, my husband and I liked to go back country hiking. Throw some essentials into a bag, hike into the Cherokee National forest and spend a couple days. But since we have three littles, and I'm currently pregnant, that is off the table for the time being. We prepared when we went but did not think much about what if something happened. We were together, our family knew the general area we were, we had two way radios, we registered with the rangers, and we had supplies. However, it's the littles I want to talk about.
As a parents I had to ask myself "are we prepared to take care of our littles ones if an emergency occurs or we have to evacuate?" Over all, as a nurse I felt I could, but as a mother that's another story. As far as supplies go we were not. So my 6 year old has a go bag that has light supplies for him and his younger brother. But then I thought what if they need to ID themselves. My kid are very social but can clam up in an instant. They are still very little. So it was time to make a file and ID cards just in case. Young children do not have drivers licenses or state/country issue ID's. So they need something just in case.
I made laminated business card size emergency/medical ID's (to clip to them just in case), post card size for the emergency file and large stickers. I added the follwing information:
Current picture, name, DOB, address, parents/emergency contact info, alternates for emergency contact info, medical info, allergies, doctors info, hair and eye color.
Below I have provided a sample of the post card size.
I hope you find this helpful.
Be ready, be prepared, be prepped!!
Your Alternative Nurse.