Jenny Wasielewski could have been a number cruncher. But then she wouldn’t be a lifesaver.

Not in literal terms, anyway.

“I was going to school to be an accountant and I took an economics class and it didn’t go too well,” the Kenosha resident said. “And I thought, we’re going to make a change.”

Instead, after graduating from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater in 2007, Wasielewski entered the Wisconsin State Patrol.

She was a little more than a year into her service as a trooper last November when she came upon a situation that recently earned her the patrol’s Lifesaving Award.

Wasielewski, who normally patrols Racine County during the overnight hours, was heading home from a Nov. 14 midday overtime shift in Waukesha County when she saw a weaving pickup truck veer into the ditch near the Racine weigh station on Interstate 94.

She pulled over behind the truck, got out, and found the driver — a Racine County man whom Wasielewski believes was in his 30s — unconscious behind the wheel, with the windows up and the doors locked.

In the ensuing minutes, Wasielewski and two colleagues smashed a window to enter the truck and began CPR on the driver, who had no pulse.

“Training took over,” said Wasielewski, who found herself performing chest compressions while a patrol inspector used an air mask and bag to pump breaths into man.

It was the first time she’d ever done CPR on a real human subject. Wasielewski said the bone crunching sound as the driver’s ribs cracked was jarring.

The man was revived, taken to a Racine hospital, then flown to Froedtert Hospital in Wauwatosa, where he ultimately survived. Wasielewski said it turned out he had a bad reaction to medication.

Wasielewski said it took five to six minutes between the time she radioed for assistance until she and the other troopers were performing CPR.

“Anything more than that would have been getting into permanent brain damage territory,” Wasielewski said.

The state took notice of Wasielewski’s actions, honoring her and her colleagues with Lifesaving Awards at a special ceremony in Madison last month.

Honored with Wasielewski were Trooper Deborah M. Reis and Inspector Mark E. Barlar, both of Racine, and Inspector Nakia M. Guyton, of Franksville.

A 2003 Bradford High School graduate, Wasielewski is among the youngest ranks of troopers on the force.

Patrol Lt. Ted Meagher said she has been a good fit for the job.

“She’s got a good attitude in her job and believes in what she does,” Meagher said. “She’s worked out really well for the region, and we’re proud of the work that she’s done for us out there.”

Wasielewski said she enjoys the work, in spite of the crabby greetings she receives from the motorists she pulls over and the occasional romantic overtures she gets from drunken drivers she’s hauling off to jail.

Taking drunks off the road is one of her favorite parts of the job, Wasielewski said.

“I like to think I save people’s lives every day.”