Catching Up With Sally Gould
Ever wondered what it’s like to be a first responder? Frog, The Secret Diary of a Paramedic shines a light on the little-known daily life of the people sitting behind the wheel in the ambulance, with flashing lights and sirens blasting. In Frog, the award-winning debut author Sally Gould, courageously shares a searingly honest memoir capturing the adrenaline pumping, magical, heart breaking, often absurd and unpredictable path of her early years as a paramedic.
I was excited to get my hands on an early copy of the book and thrilled to have the opportunity to dive deeper into this behind-the-scenes diary with Sally herself.
What can readers expect when they pick-up Frog?
Readers can expect to jump straight into the ambulance with me as I begin my paramedic career as a student ridealong. I take readers along with me to all the jobs – the gory, hilarious, frustrating and magical, and give them front row seats to my learnings, failures and the challenges I face along the way. I hope to satisfy readers’ curiosity about what being a paramedic is really like, as well as challenge them with the extremes of my job, all while having a bit of a laugh along the way (hello dark humour!).
Sally, tell us about the choice of Frog as the title?
The working title for my manuscript had always been ‘Diary of a Paramedic’ but when it came time for submissions my agent Tom Gilliatt and I chose this title as something a bit unique. It’s unexpected and has been grabbing a lot of attention due to its ambiguity. Frog is the nickname for intensive care paramedics, rumoured to be because ‘everything they touch croaks.’ Regardless of the meaning or its history, the nickname has stuck and given the ending of my book (spoiler alert), it seemed like a fitting title.
Frog is an incredibly thought-provoking and moving read; what prompted your decision to write this book?
The book initially grew from the journals I took as a student ridealong to capture all the weird and wonderful things I was seeing on the job. It started as a way for me to reflect on my experiences, make sense of them and grow from them. But once I started drafting it as a book, it turned into a story that I felt compelled to share with a wider audience. At its core it is a love letter to my career, and it is also an acknowledgment and validation of the work of all my paramedic colleagues. Beyond that it is recognised as a story that appeals to many due to its universal themes of resilience, identity, toxic workplace experiences, sexism, mental health challenges and having to fight to achieve a dream.
As a mother with a fast-paced career as a paramedic, Sally, how do you manage to fit your writing into such a busy schedule?
This is the million-dollar question! There’s always such a tension between maintaining my high clinical standards at work, being present and showing up for my kids and pouring my passion into my writing – and I certainly get the ‘balance’ wrong at times. If anyone has the magic solution, I’d love to hear from them! I regularly remind myself that there are seasons of life in which one area gets a bit more of a spotlight than the others and that it will shift over time and that’s ok. I’ve also gotten good at seizing small windows of time.
Many writers might shy away from such a self-reflective memoire; how did you approach writing this book?
I knew the story would lack authenticity if I omitted the uncomfortable parts – the mistakes I made, my shortcomings and my mental health struggles. It was an integral part of my growth and I felt it was important to be courageous and through being so, encourage more honest conversations around these topics. It was equal parts cathartic and painful to revisit, write and edit the difficult times on the page so I consciously took good care of myself during the process.
Frog is gripping and raw, a book filled with rapid glimpses of the little-known reality of those who respond to our emergency calls, we would love for you to share one of those experiences with us.
A job that stands out for me is one from very early on in my probationary period when my partner and I were called to a patient who had jumped in front of a train and was still alive and trapped underneath. This job encapsulated so many elements of the role of a paramedic and why I am continually drawn to it – the unpredictable environments (was crawling under trains anywhere in my job description?!), the challenging combination of social, emotional, psychological and medical needs of a patient, the autonomy we have to make life changing decisions and how we can work together to deliver care to patients wherever they are, whatever their predicament. In those beginning stages of my career, I myself was overwhelmed by what is expected of a paramedic and in awe of the calm demeanour with which my senior colleagues carried out their job.
Congratulations on winning the 2023 ASA/CA Award for Narrative Non-Fiction with Frog, how does it feel to have your work recognised in this way?
Thank you! Winning this award was an exceptional way to gain traction with my writing and a huge boost to my confidence to have my work recognised. It gave me a sense that maybe my writing was good enough, that people would actually read my book and that it was a story worth telling.
Sally, you have been a paramedic for almost fourteen years with Frog focused on the beginning of your career. Would you consider writing a sequel?
Fourteen years as a paramedic has certainly given me an enormous repertoire of jobs I have attended, lessons I have learnt and incredible experiences. I’m keen to write another book but at the moment it’s not looking likely that it’ll be a sequel. But perhaps fans of Frog could convince me otherwise…
Frog, The Secret Life of a Paramedic by Sally Gould will be released on the 30th April 2025.
Just a note that this book contains topics that some readers may find challenging, including trauma and suicide.
SMSA Members can borrow Frog from our library on level 2 as of May, you can also purchase a copy from your local bookstore, here is a link to our friends at Abbey’s.
Feature Portrait Credit: Lawrence Furzey
Feature Author: Victoria Hall