Landscaping Lass’ Kirsten Macquet (left) and Elke Aitolu (right) on the job. Photo: James Coleman.
CONTENT WARNING: This story refers to suicide.
Nowadays, Kirsten Macquet starts her day at 7 am, with a coffee, and knocks off between 3 and 3:30 pm, having spent the whole day out in nature.
“Being outside, it’s a huge factor,” she tells me as we stand in the backyard of one of her jobs in Curtin.
“It’s so good for the mind and the body, and just doing something physical is really great too. Being your own boss and having your own business is a really good mental challenge too. It’s given me purpose again.”
With the radio blaring (as soon as we finish the interview, it’s back on), it turns out there’s “a lot of singing and dancing” in the landscaping profession too.
It’s all a life away from where Kirsten found herself five years ago – tear-stained and at wit’s utter end.
Elke is Kirsten’s first apprentice, hired earlier this year. Photo: James Coleman.
Kirsten was a paramedic for 14 years. Her family emigrated from South Africa when she was 10 to start a new Australian life on Mornington Peninsula, Victoria.
“I was working in hospitality to get myself through university, in a bachelor of ‘Behavioural Neuroscience’ – so more along research lines – when a customer collapsed and I was kind of the first one to take over and manage the scene,” she says.
“It was his wife who turned to me when the ambulance arrived and said to me: ‘Oh, you should do their job’.”
It stuck, and Kirsten started with Victoria Ambulance aged 22, before moving to an air ambulance base in Orange, NSW. She initially “loved coping under the stress”.
“The more chaotic, the better,” she says.
“It doesn’t necessarily mean gruesome, more like a complicated clinical situation that makes you think, ‘how are we going to get this person out of here’, for example.”
But it all changed after a particularly bad night shift in October 2020.
“It was just back-to-back cardiac arrests, and messy as well. One involved wiping blood off my station officer’s face and then the next one was pulling the wife off the patient because he was deceased. It just took its toll. It was a feeling of numbness.”
Two months later, in December, she left work after telling her colleagues she was sick, went home, and tried to end her life.
“I didn’t tell anyone but, because I’d left work crying, they eventually found me, and I woke up in hospital. It was very different being on the other side.”
She tried to return to paramedicine for 12 months, where she received treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), but the damage was done.
“It just made me more angry and frustrated. I realized after 12 months that I need to make a change. I can’t keep living like this. As much as I still absolutely love ambulance, it’s just not right for me and for my health.”
Kirsten is already looking to hire more apprentices to keep on top of demand. Photo: James Coleman.
A 2019 study from Monash University reveals a “high incidence” of PTSD in paramedics and student paramedics, with the rate as high as 16 per cent, or “significantly higher than the 4.4 per cent average across Australia’s general population”.
Researchers noted this is largely “because of the empathetic relationship that develops between the paramedic and the victim”.
“Paramedics typically experience distressing dreams, flashbacks, avoiding activities or people that may trigger these flashbacks, irritability, difficulty sleeping and concentrating and hypervigilance,” the study says.
“They also experience fear for the safety of their own family, alcohol abuse and increased absenteeism.”
With no other skills, Kirsten was lost at first on where to go, until landscaping came up as something that – like paramedicine – offered “every job and client as different”.
“It kind of just fitted,” she says.
She started her apprenticeship under a local landscaping business in Orange, before relocating to Canberra in 2022 to be closer to family and finishing her Certificate III in night school.
It was here she met her first apprentice, Elke Aitolu, then straight out of high school.
“We didn’t talk much in class – she had her group of friends … and I was sort of the mum of the group, being older. But she came out and helped me with a job, and so I got to see her work ethic.”
Kirsten founded her own business, ‘Landscaping Lass’, in October 2024, and just a few months later – supported by the Australian Government’s apprenticeship provider Mas National – took on Elke as an apprentice.
The pair prefer to keep themselves to the central and northern parts of the ACT, but business is booming for them everywhere. Now, less than a year later, Kirsten is already looking for more able workers.
“Maintenance jobs could be anywhere between 15 to 20 per week, especially during peak season, and construction jobs between two to three,” she says.
The admin part turns it into “a bit of a seven-day-a-week-job” and she also teaches two nights a week at the Canberra Institute of Technology (CIT).
Part of her misses the camaraderie of emergency services, but there are no regrets.
“Don’t leave it too long. As soon as you’re not feeling right, take a step back, take some time off to reassess and re-evaluate. Don’t just head down, bum up and keep at it, because once you get to that point of no return, it’s hard to come back.”
If this story has raised any issues for you or someone you know, you can call Lifeline’s 24-hour crisis support line on 13 11 14, the Suicide Call Back Service on 1300 659 467, Kids Helpline on 1800 551 800, or MensLine Australia 1300 789 978.
