Your first Code Blue

I have been a GN for about 2 1/2 months. Today, I experienced my first code blue. It happened so fast, we barely saw it coming! I work in a telemetry floor, and my preceptor and I happened to be sitting down in front of the tele monitor. I was looking up the number of one of my pt's doctors, when my preceptor asked the monitoring nurse if a certain pt's baseline HR was in the 40's, which was what this pt was running. Now, I know it sounds silly to ask that question because NO ONE'S baseline HR should be that low, but I have seen that low on this floor. So, I was on alert, but I thought that maybe that pt was running at her usual sinus rhythm. Well, my preceptor decided to check it out, and I followed her. We looked for that pt's nurse, and my preceptor went inside the pt's room, and asked her if she was okay. The pt never responded. She went into asystole and we first called the Rapid Response team, but when I tried to find a pulse ANYWHERE, her skin was cold to touch and her cap refill was greater than 4 seconds, and her fingertips and toes were blue. Then, all hell broke loose.

Within minutes, about 20 people showed up in her room and began compressions, I put up the ambu bag, but to be honest, I froze on the spot! I started shaking, my adrenaline was pumping, and I could not believe it was really happening! Afterward, I felt like a failure because I don't think I contributed to anything.

So, my questions are these: When was your first code blue?

Was it your pt?

Did you lead the code?

How did you react?

How did you feel while you were working on the pt?

How did you feel afterward?

I'd really like to know anyone's responses because I want to know if I could have done something else aside from what I actually did. Is it normal to just FREEZE??

Thanks for the responses in advance!