Carrie Derin is lucky to be here.
Almost five years ago, Derin was out quadding with her family in Moose Mountain Provincial Park when she turned to look at a beaver house.
“I wasn’t paying attention to what was in front of me and I ran into a log that was fallen by the beaver,” Derin said.
“It impaled me through to the back of my seat.”
Derin immediately knew that she could not panic and tried to remain calm during the incident.
“At that point, we tried to figure out what was going on,” Derin said. “We tried to saw the end off the log to relieve the pressure and realized that wasn’t going to work.”
“We winched out the log with the other quad we had, and I packed the wound with any clothing we could find.”
The Derin family was in an area with no cell service, so her husband had to go for help.
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“My kids were out there. There was nobody to go for help other than my husband, and I basically had to be the parent,” Derin said.
“So I kept them calm and in turn, they kept me calm while we waited for help. It was just business as usual. What do you talk about?”
Eventually, Derin was on her way to Regina, after being airlifted by STARS out of the park. Her pulse, however, was failing and her blood pressure was low. They radioed ahead to Arcola for two units of 0- blood, and they performed the transfusion on the way.
“So if it wouldn’t have been for those units available in rural Saskatchewan, and blood donors like we have today, I don’t know if I would be here,” Derin said.
Being at Canadian Blood Services during National Blood Donor Week, and Wednesday being World Blood Donor Day, means a lot to Derin.
“I just want to say thank you. Never thinking that I’d be the one that had to use it, and a former donor myself, I just want to say thanks.”
Canadian Blood Services has made a call out to the public, as their reserves are low. They are sitting at around 12,000 units, while their reserves need to be sitting anywhere from 20 to 25,000.
“We have a renewable resource in being able to give blood and I just think that unless you’ve tried it, I think you don’t realize how important it is to the people who benefit from it,” Derin said.
As for her family, Derin says the incident changed them.
“We’re definitely closer. We definitely appreciate life more and live for today, because you never know when things can happen.”
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