They’re often hailed as heroes facing extraordinary dangers to save others from harm’s way.
But after the fanfare dies down, they’re left with only the stark reminder of the fragility of life and the memory of things that most people never have to see in their lifetimes. Sometimes, there’s no recognition for their efforts. Sometimes, it’s just all in a day’s work. Either way, emergency personnel regularly face critical injuries, high stress, and even death, yet somehow they find a way to keep going.
Firefighter Pat Youngern said his job can be one of the most rewarding—but those rewards come with a price.
“There is this misconception that people have,” he explained. “They think that being a firefighter is all cool and great and everything, but you get exposed to a lot of bad stuff.”
When they have a bad day at the office, it’s a bad day
Youngern said most firefighters have a call they’ll never forget. His came the day he responded to a house fire that took the life of a child; he was the person who found the child.
“I dealt with that one for about a year,” he said. “And it’s still there. There are little things you see that remind you, or your friends and neighbors will talk about it. It never goes away.”
Les Hugie, clinical manager at American Medical Response, still remembers one particular call: It was July 11, 1996, at about 5:15 p.m. He was the first paramedic at the scene when an officer was fatally shot.
“We see things on this job a lot of people don’t see, and the majority of the population doesn’t want to see,” Hugie said.
Fortunately, emergency personnel on the Central Coast aren’t tasked with handling the volume of traumatic calls familiar to bigger metro areas like Los Angeles. Unfortunately, there have been some significant local calls as of late. From rescuing a family dangling from a freeway overpass to responding to officer shootings, emergency responders have been busy lately with high-profile incidents.
When such a high-stress call comes in, responders say they first put aside emotion and hone in on getting the job done. They don’t focus on what they can’t do, they only focus on what they need to do.
“Because things happen so fast, sometimes there is no time to have an emotional response,” said California Highway Patrol Officer Rob Wallace. “That doesn’t mean emotions don’t come into play afterward.”
When the adrenaline subsides and the call ends well, there are usually smiles all around. But obviously, not every call goes right. Though rescuers saved a woman and girls on a bridge, a truck driver died. And, as evidenced by the more recent injuries to two officers during an arrest attempt and the death of another officer on duty, the situations can become quite grim.
Dr. Monty Clouse, a clinical psychologist, works with the San Luis Obispo Critical Incident Stress Team, which the Santa Maria Fire Department sometimes uses to help its firefighters cope after a stressful call. He said emergency personnel have a fix-it attitude and a get-things-done mentality, which help them cope afterward as well.
That’s important. Because when the patients are handed off to medical personnel, when the uniform comes off and the shift is over, the responders need to process what they’ve just experienced and come home to the daily rigors of civilian life. Making that transition is critical to their own well being.
Honey, how was your day?
Lisa Vargas, a 22-year veteran paramedic, remembers one of the toughest calls she’s encountered. It was a robbery at a dress store, and the victim happened to be her good friend
“Of course, I didn’t know it was going to be her when I went on the call. I was angry,” Vargas said. “She ended up dying from her injuries, and they were gruesome.”
She explained that the stress of a call might hit you immediately or a day or two later, so it’s good to have a bond with a partner.
“It makes you feel a little more vulnerable because when you put on the uniform, you feel invincible, and of course you have to have a little of that to do your job, but you feel it afterward,” she said.
Because they’re going through a difficult time together, partners form close bonds. Most emergency personnel agree that their biggest support network comes from work. Their partner or their firehouse mates know them well and share a bond in having gone through the same calls. Often, if someone isn’t dealing well after a call, his or her partner is the first to notice it.
“There are things you don’t have to explain to your partner—they know your mannerisms, the tone of your voice, the expression in your face,” Vargas said.
Sometimes the stress emergency responders have to deal with doesn’t come from the victim’s situation, but from the victim’s friends and family. Some have been known to spit at responders and call them names.
“I’ve had a 5-pound ashtray thrown at my head by a man because his wife had the nerve to die on him, and I couldn’t help,” Hugie said.
Santa Maria Fire Chief Dan Orr said his firefighters often experience similar reactions when a call isn’t going someone’s way.
“We’ll get a call that Mom’s having a heart attack,” he said. “We show up, you look at the coffee table, and there’s drug paraphernalia on the table, and suddenly it’s a different call. They’ve got all these people in their house, and they get mad.”
Due to the possibility of such situations, police officers will now show up as escorts.
Do you want fries with that?
Many emergency personnel use “gallows humor” to cope with the things they see.
“It’s no disrespect to anyone, it’s just a coping mechanism,” Hugie said.
He said a strong faith in God and a wife who’s good about hearing all the bloody details helps him cope. Other families, however, have members who aren’t so interested in the details. Everyone copes in their own way, that’s why it’s important to have many options.
The way someone reacts to a traumatic call may vary depending on the individual and what’s going on in his or her life. That’s often why calls involving children are the hardest to bear. Many responders have children of their own, and a situation involving children often hits too close to home.
“Someone with a new baby will go on a call involving pediatric arrest, and all they want to do is go home and hug their little one,” Hugie said.
Other factors can come into play, Dr. Clouse said.
“How I deal with it will depend on other stress, how many family members I lost that year—all those things will come into play in how I react,” he explained.
That’s why Hugie is a strong advocate of good diet and exercise and rest. He admits, however, that emergency personnel tend to like to drink and have fast food because it’s a feel-good mechanism.
CHP Officer Wallace agreed: “The healthier you are, the better you handle stress.”
Just as everyone has a different post-call way of transitioning to everyday life, each has a unique trigger.
“It’s interesting to hear what triggers people,” Orr said. “For some, an anniversary will bring it up, or certain smells. Firefighters are very tactile, so that might trigger a memory. We’ve got people who are very visual, so that can bring back memories.”
For Hugie, the process was visceral: “Often times after a stressful call, I was really hungry. That’s a survival thing. You want to do something that makes you feel alive.”
Getting help and moving on
The experiences emergency personnel see as a regular course of the job can really add up to some emotional wounds.
“It’s similar to war. War is acute. You serve your 265 in Afghanistan, and then you’re done,” Santa Maria Fire Chief Orr said. “This is chronic. You see a little bit, and a little bit over a 30-year career.”
Most departments have a protocol in place for emergency personnel to get help after a stressful call. The process kicks in immediately after the call, with talking to either a critical incidence team or a partner. After the initial shock, if someone is still having trouble, he or she can usually get anonymous help through the employers’ Employee Assistance Program. The only thing the employer gets is a number indicating how many employees have used EAP.
It’s rare that it gets that far, however, because most of the time it takes an exceptional person to work in emergency response. Not only do such people know what they’re getting into in the first place, they typically tend to be better than the average citizen at coping with trauma. In the case of the fire department, there are even protocols in place during the hiring process to determine who’s best capable to handle the load. Prospective fire fighters go through a psychological evaluation prior to an employment offer.
“I’ve had the psychologist say, ‘No, Chief, not this one’,” Orr said.
Hugie concurred: “Not everyone is cut out to do this job. It’s pretty tough to get a job here nowadays.”
For AMR, a protocol went into place after an incident in Goleta when a postal worker opened fire on co-workers. Since then, certain events trigger an automatic call for the critical incident team. Shootings, stabbings, and any incident involving children mean the team will respond; everyone will gather, and they’re given a chance to talk things out, Hugie said.
Sometimes, it’s the partner who will come forward days later and say, “You know, so-and-so isn’t taking this well.” And an offer of help will come once again. However, help can’t be forced on somebody, because that can often make things worse.
To offset any hesitancy to seek help, most departments bring it right to the personnel and make it easily accessible. Then they make it available some more. And even then, sometimes, there’s still hesitancy.
“They will think, ‘We’re supposed to be strong; officers are the ones that are here to help, not be helped,’” Wallace said.
Between 2003 and 2007, the CHP saw 13 officer suicides. While there isn’t data on what led to the deaths or if they were related to stress from calls or from home, the number of them did prompt the “Not One More” campaign that encourages officers to get assistance by assuring them it’s OK to ask for emotional help.
Sometimes that strength isn’t just about the uniform; it’s a generational stereotype.
“The new guys are more apt to accept that help offered. But you’ll sometimes see the older guys say, ‘No thank you, I went through ‘Nam and I can handle this.’ Or else they’ll drink it away,” Orr said.
Youngern said he found it hard to ask for help initially when he needed it. However, other firefighters who had been in a similar situation almost immediately reached out to him to tell him they understood and what to expect emotionally.
“I said, ‘No, that’s not going to happen; I’ll be alright.’ Sure enough, about four months later, I was feeling everything they said,” he added.
Youngern said he hopes new fire fighters realize it’s OK to have a hard time with a call and reach out and talk about it.
“Nobody wants to admit that something bothers them,” he said. “Nobody wants to admit that.”
It’s totally worth it
While Youngern refers to the tragic call he can’t forget as the worst day of his life, he also remembers another incredible event. A call about a man choking came in, and with time of the essence, Youngern was relieved that the call came from directly across the street from the fire station.
The man was on the floor. Unconscious. No pulse. Youngern started CPR until the medics came and dislodged the food he was choking on. Youngern sees that man walking around in front of his house now and then and thinks about how his actions saved that man’s life.
Those calls are few, he said, but totally worth it. And they keep him committed to his work.
“You start out in this job as a young person and you leave old and broken and damaged,” Youngern said. “But there’s a rewarding aspect to it all. It’s rare but worth it to hang around for the one out of hundreds experience that what you did made a difference.”
Those good days are what Wallace at the CHP says offset the bad ones.
“Everybody has good days and bad days. We may have extra training to cope with certain situations, but it certainly affects us,” Wallace said. However, he added, “most stresses are temporary. If you can just get over the top of the hill, it’s going to be OK.”
Dr. Clouse said that for all they do, it’s still important to recognize emergency workers.
“I just would like to get the message across that the community needs to speak up,” he said. “That really goes a long way in helping them do what
they do.”
Contact Arts Editor Shelly Cone at scone@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Feb 16-23, 2012.