Valentina and Dean call the ambulance when their guest overdoses
Preferred Name: Valentina
Gender: Female
Age: Early 40s
Who is Valentina?
Valentina lives alone in Sydney. She describes her ethnic background as ‘half European – half Australian’. She was born in Australia but one of her parents was born in Germany. Valentina works full-time. In her interview Valentina explained that she had responded to a number of overdoses, and had overdosed herself. She had only recently learnt about take-home naloxone and said her own experiences with overdose meant she thought that ‘everyone’ should have access to it.
Brief Outline:
When visitor Noah overdosed at the home of Valentina and her former husband (Dean), she initially panicked and felt ‘hysterical’. She called emergency services and the operator she spoke to over the phone helped her feel calmer. Valentina and Dean didn’t have any naloxone at the time. Instead she performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation while waiting for the paramedics to arrive. In concluding her story, Valentina described the paramedics as ‘always professional’ and ‘amazing’.
When I realised what was happening I panicked and felt hysterical, but I called an ambulance right away. The operator on the phone was really good and helped me calm down. Noah wasn’t breathing properly, I could hear him making almost like a gurgling sound, so I gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation until the ambulance got there.
When the ambos [paramedics] came in they asked whether Dean and I had also taken drugs. I didn’t want to talk about what we’d taken, but since there were fit wrappers in the bin and stuff, Dean and I decided to have a conversation with them. The ambos woke up Noah and then stayed with him for a while to make sure he was okay. They were professional, and my overall experience with ambos has just been amazing, but it was a horrible situation.
Reflecting on her experiences later in the interview, Valentina argued that ‘everyone’ should be able to access naloxone and keep it in case of overdoses, and that she was ‘100% supportive’ of the initiative, feeling that ‘it should be everywhere, and everyone should be able to get it, and everyone should have access to the training’.
A few years ago, when I was still with my ex-husband, Dean, he and I took heroin with Noah, a guy who was visiting from out of town. Noah and Dean left the house to get the heroin and when they came back, we all took it together. Noah’s overdose began right after we took the heroin. He just passed out on the chair and fell on the floor. Noah was already on high doses of Seroquel [insert link to key terms Seroquel], because I think he had schizophrenia, and he’d been drinking. I reckon this contributed to his overdose.
When I realised what was happening I panicked and felt hysterical, but I called an ambulance right away. The operator on the phone was really good and helped me calm down. Noah wasn’t breathing properly, I could hear him making almost like a gurgling sound, so I gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation until the ambulance got there.
When the ambos [paramedics] came in they asked whether Dean and I had also taken drugs. I didn’t want to talk about what we’d taken, but since there were fit wrappers in the bin and stuff, Dean and I decided to have a conversation with them. The ambos woke up Noah and then stayed with him for a while to make sure he was okay. They were professional, and my overall experience with ambos has just been amazing, but it was a horrible situation.
About 10 years ago, Valentina (F, early 40s, NSW, non-prescribed opioids) was living in a share house with other young women. At the time, she was using naltrexone to reduce her heroin consumption. One day decided to use heroin while no one was home. Valentina explains that she overdosed because her tolerance to heroin had dropped.
So I went into this girl’s room and I had a shot of heroin, and because [I had been using] naltrexone [a prescription drug used to manage alcohol or opioid use], I hadn’t been using [heroin], so I was as good as clean. [I] then had a shot and [because] my tolerance was zero, I overdosed. No one was home [at the time]. [Eventually] one of the girls [I lived with] came home, saw me passed out on the floor, assumed correctly it was heroin, and called the ambulance. It was the same [paramedic who] had seen me, like, a couple of weeks ago [when I called them for someone else’s overdose] and recognised me. So, I don’t know, I just thought that was a bit kind of sad in hindsight [to have a paramedic recognise me for that reason].
Valentina (F, early 40s, NSW, non-prescribed opioids) says that take-home naloxone is a ‘simple’ way of saving lives. Promoting its use was part of her motivation to participate in our research.
I think everyone should have access to it. That’s what struck me. If we can save lives with something so simple, then yes. So if I could do something to help make that happen, I wanted to help […For example,] if you were dealing out of your house and you had people using there […] it would be in your best interest to go get a prescription and go have some Narcan there because it’s looking after your customers.
Valentina (F, early 40s, NSW, non-prescribed opioids) recounts a time when she and a friend both overdosed on the same night. She explains that, along with a group of friends, they decided to leave their house and stay somewhere else after an operator said the police would arrive if they called triple zero again.
We got smack [heroin] and then my girlfriend had a shot, $50 worth, and overdosed. And I think they called an ambulance at that stage, and I had half of what she had and I overdosed. The ambulance was on its way [to us], and my boyfriend at the time was trying to resuscitate me […] And in the meantime, my girlfriend’s come to and she’s okay, and the ambulance arrives and gave me a shot of naloxone. [So I came to after overdosing] and the ambulance left. I think someone had said to my girlfriend [during] the second call [to triple zero], yeah, ‘This is the second ambulance you’ve called for tonight. If we hear from you again, you know, we’ll have to send the cops around or something.’ So we cleared out the entire house and went up around the corner to a friend who was a dealer, and we all just crashed there for the night. So that was pretty harrowing.