Some will say this is an untimely posting, but so be it. Strike while the iron is hot.
This week has been a tough week in Mississippi. Two police officers were shot and killed in the line of duty. A Mississippi firefighter died while on duty. There was a loss of three teenagers in a motor vehicle crash near my hometown. You'll note that us in the rescue field use the term "motor vehicle crash", as opposed to "accident". Accidents, by nature, are things that cannot be prevented from happening. Poor choices, inattention to surroundings, and a host of other factors, some singularly, others cascading together lead to bad outcomes. Preventable outcomes. Fall and break a leg on the ice in winter? Bad outcome, not an accident. But I'm not here to talk about accidents.
You see, anytime we work through a crash, a shooting, a heart attack, a house fire, or any other form of human tragedy that you can dream of, we're often asked to share information and details. Most often times, the request comes from well-meaning, but ill-informed people.
Here's a tip: Just don't ask.
Why?
First, in most cases we're legally prohibited from telling you. You know, that whole "patient privacy thing." But first, put yourself in the other person's shoes. Do you want us describing the efforts we used to resuscitate you, or how we had to pry your broken body from the car? Or what it was like pulling you from a house fire? Or how your spouse beat, stabbed, or shot you? If you don't want those details of your life out there, then have respect for those we're called to help.
Secondly, your prayer chain doesn't need details in order to effectively pray for someone. Did you see an ambulance at the neighbors? Did you see a fire engine working through a road congested with inattentive drivers, headed to a growing column of smoke on the other side of town? You can stop right there and pray for whoever is on the receiving end of that. You can pray for the hands, hearts and minds of those delivering the aid. It doesn't matter whether the smoke is just a pile of brush, or if that EMS crew is feverishly working against all odds to breathe life back into someone. What matters is someone needs help.
Most importantly, we just don't want to talk about it. Sure if it's a simple trash fire, then no big deal. But if it's a really bad case, we're doing all we can to forget as much of it as possible. The bad part is, we'll never forget it all. We'll carry some image around, or some smell will linger in our nose, and it'll last even longer in our memories. One day years from now we'll smell a similar smell, and it'll all come rushing back. Firefighters, police officers, and EMS personnel on average, in one year's time, see the same amount of human tragedy that you'll see in an entire lifetime. Think about that. How many times in your life will an ambulance be at your house, or how many times will you call the fire department or the police department for an emergency? How many deaths of very close friends or loved ones will you personally experience? Or how many of those will die while you're pouring all of you energy into trying to keep them alive, even if just for a little while longer? We see your entire lifetime's worth of tragic circumstances each year that we work. We don't want to re-live those moments. We get enough to keep us busy without telling the stories all over again. Yeah we'll tell the stories amongst ourselves, but we're family like that. It's hard to understand if you're not inside that circle. Just trust me.
Before you say I'm going off half-cocked, which I probably am, just know that I believe God has a plan for each and every one of us. I believe in prayer and what it does for us. But I also know that a simple prayer is an effective prayer. Have faith, practice faith, and live according to that faith.
But please, just don't ask us what happened. I don't know how many fatalities I've worked in 30-ish years. I don't care to know. I remember a few, mostly those that presented the most difficult situations from a technical point of view. I remember some that stuck with us for emotional reasons. But for the most part, I don't remember the vast majority of them. We get pretty good at building a huge mental wall to keep all that in a safe place. Don't ask us to poke holes in the wall.
Post-script: If you're Fire, EMS, or Law Enforcement and need a safe place to let these stories out, find a peer counselor in your area. A peer counselor is another firefighter, medic, or officer trained in critical incident stress management. We get this training so we can help our brothers and sisters in this business. We help the helpers, and we do it confidentially and without question. We'll listen, we'll guide you, and if we think you need more help than we can offer, we'll get you in contact with a mental health professional. You're not crazy, you're normal. We want to keep you normal.
