I have found that comfort taken in recovery and remediation work is not all too different from other high risk behavior over-confidence. In fact, as a comparison, I can recount the time I got my first Harley Davidson. Safety was my priority. I had experienced friends’ deaths and serious injury due to motorcycle accidents and I promised myself that wouldn’t be me. I bought a DOT-approved helmet, riding jacket, riding boots, and gloves. Initially, I wore everything, every time. As the warm weather rolled in and my confidence grew, I shed my riding jacket. It wasn’t long before I was riding in shorts, a tank top and donned myself with one of those helmets that were not DOT approved, AKA “brain buckets”, which were just that, only good for containing the grey matter mess after an accident. I lived in Northern New Jersey and was riding on pothole-covered roads like I-95, alongside 18 wheelers, texting drivers and was frequently driving into New York City with crazy taxi drivers and oblivious site-seeing pedestrians. It wasn’t until my first spill and luckily minors scrapes and bumps that I realized, “What was I thinking?” I represented the stereotypical overconfidence ignorantly awaiting injury and consequence.
When working with mold, blood, other potentially infectious materials or infectious diseases, comfort and confidence leading you to neglect the use of proper PPE is not only extremely foolish, but highly risky.