How First Responders Can Find Balance During the Holidays
Emergencies do not stop for the holidays, and neither do First Responders. As a public safety professional, working through the holidays while trying to maintain your family life, personal health, and social life may feel like juggling more than you can handle. As a result, you may find yourself attending more to one over the […]
Tribal Healing: How Peer Support Impacts a Generation
This article is courtesy of Patrick McCurdy, Retired Sergeant/Deputy. I remember as a kid marveling at the fact that I was going to see the year 2000, and the turn of a new century during my lifetime. Now, we are almost a quarter of a century into this new era. Though technology is changing at […]
Be Mindful of Negative Coping
We all experience emotions and events that are uncomfortable, painful, or traumatic. Those moments or circumstances often cause lingering thoughts and emotions that must be dealt with one way or another. At some point, we may engage in numbing behavior to put off having to process unpleasant feelings. That behavior may look different for everyone […]
Suicide Intervention
Many people are not sure what to do if they think someone they know might be thinking about suicide. Be direct. Ask the question. Let them know you care. In addition to this article, you can also watch a short video about suicide intervention. Go online: https://rb.gy/sky6k8. First Responders are more likely to die by […]
Bringing Moral Injury to Light
First responders make sacrifices to serve their communities, sometimes to the detriment of their own mental health. Mental health challenges such as depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress injury occur at higher rates among first responders compared to the general population. These issues can often lead to dangerous and unhealthy coping strategies, such as substance abuse. […]
Helpful Grounding Techniques You Can Use to Manage Anxiety
Anxiety is the most common form of mental health issue in the United States, overlapping significantly with substance use disorders. The National Epidemiological Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions surveyed more than 43,000 people and found that nearly 18 percent of respondents who struggled with a substance use disorder in the past year also had […]
Avoid the Consequences of Lack of Sleep
As a first responder, you may be used to hearing that you need to get some sleep. A job like yours requires extensive mental and physical energy with the potential to wear you out by the end of the day. Therefore, it will require that you get sufficient rest to be adequately prepared for the […]
How Does The Body Remember Trauma?
Re-experiencing past trauma as physical symptoms that manifest in the body can be alarming. When someone experiences physical symptoms of post-traumatic stress (PTS), the body does not remember the event as something in the past. These symptoms can intrude visual, auditory, and other bodily functions causing the body and mind to feel as though they […]
How Does Compassion Fatigue Affect First Responders?
A first responder’s work can be rewarding, but over time, it can also take its toll on an individual and lead to emotional exhaustion. This exhaustion can result from high emotional involvement, such as working with traumatized individuals in the community without adequate support. In the emergency services community, compassion fatigue can often be thought […]
The Burdens That We Carry
This article is courtesy of Patrick McCurdy, Retired Sergeant/Deputy. — Being a First Responder is difficult. You see and experience things on a regular basis that would send most people reeling in shock. Most people cannot even begin to imagine the depths of sorrow, tragedy, evil and darkness that you witness and deal with. Despite […]