Breach Your Mind
Explore life's depths and unlock the secrets of mental well-being on "Breach Your Mind." Join us as we navigate the intricacies of the human experience, offering insights, inspiration, and practical strategies for a fulfilling life. Get ready to breach the barriers of conventional thinking, embrace self-discovery, and nurture your mental health. Let's embark on a transformative journey together. Welcome to Breach Your Mind.
Breach Your Mind
Confronting Chaos: Stress Management for Supervisors in Critical Incidents
What happens when your gut instinct compels you to rush to a dangerous scene without a formal summon? Join us as we recount a gripping personal experience where I faced the unimaginable stress of a shots-fired call. From the nerve-wracking drive to the scene to the overwhelming relief of seeing my team safe, we explore the intense pressure and instantaneous decisions that define such perilous moments. This narrative shines a light on why stress management is not just beneficial but essential for supervisors in high-adrenaline situations.
Ever wondered about the unique challenges a supervisor faces during high-stress investigations? In the next segment, we dive into the responsibilities that come crashing down and the pivotal role of teamwork and communication in navigating through chaos. Hear firsthand how the team managed to neutralize a threat and adhere to strict investigative procedures while dealing with the looming stress of ensuring everyone's safety. The episode also underscores the unwavering commitment to accountability and public trust, crucial for maintaining integrity in law enforcement.
Lastly, we discuss the importance of comprehensive incident debriefs and the often-overlooked aspect of mental health in high-stress professions. Standard operating procedures can only take you so far; real-life experiences and on-the-job training are indispensable. We delve into the necessity of addressing emotional and psychological stress proactively, whether individually or through group activities like critical incident debriefings. Recognize the value of maintaining your mental and emotional well-being, and learn why it's crucial to process these experiences to prevent severe long-term consequences.
Team 1, stand by. Copy Team 1, standing by. Hey guys, so on this episode I wanted to talk about something that I've personally experienced, something that I went through on my own. I say went through on my own, I went through myself and because of that I think that it allows me at least a little bit of room to kind of talk about it. About it.
Speaker 1:Of course, while talking about it I'll kind of lay out the backstory on what brought this particular topic to light. In particular, it's talking about managing your stress following a critical incident. So you know, we had Pete on a while back and we talked about critical incident debriefing and things like that. But at the time that I first experienced something that kind of felt like should have had something along those lines, you know, I didn't get the opportunity that's the short end of it through no fault of anyone in particular, at least not an intentional fault. It was just one of those things where, you know, there were other individuals that were deemed more important for it at the time and they were the ones that got it and I'm glad they did. So the particular incident that I'm referring to is I'm going to keep it vague because the topic itself is already I don't want to say risque, but it's already kind of a sensitive topic to begin with. But if any of you have been following or know me personally, you know the kind of supervisor I am. I take a personal interest in my people and the people that I supervise and that I manage. I make their well-being my personal goal. You know, my goal is to make sure everybody on my team gets home at night, and that even means, if it's to the extent that it costs me mine. You know I've said it before that I would rather take the hit than any of my people if that's what comes to happen. In reality that may not be the case, but in my heart, that's how I feel, in my mind, in my heart, as their supervisor, as their leader, I would prefer to take the hit so that they could go home and spend the rest of their time with their families and their loved ones and their friends and so on. And there's no altruistic reasoning behind it. It's just the way I've always felt this particular incident.
Speaker 1:I wasn't called to the scene initially. There were other team members that were called to the scene and they got there and the situation started to evolve. I wasn't on the scene but I was, you know, obviously listening to everything on the radio and paying attention to what was going on. And you know, you're always told trust your gut, trust your gut instinct. And while I'm listening to what's going on the radio, my gut instinct was telling me this wasn't, this wasn't going to be the ordinary call. You know, this was a for this particular type of call, it wasn't going to go the usual way. And because of that, you know, I went ahead and got in my vehicle and I started toward them. You know, hadn't been called, there had been nothing said on the radio at the time that you know required me to respond, other than my own gut feeling. So I left and I'm going driving normal, you know, because I'm trying to tell myself okay, it's just a gut feeling, there's nothing that's been said that that should cause you, you know, any kind of alarm right now, other than you probably should just go. So I was driving normal.
Speaker 1:And then it happened I heard something over the radio that, as a supervisor, I had not heard before. You know, I heard it for other shifts, heard it for other agencies, but I'd never heard it for my own, I'd never heard it from my own shift, where I'm the supervisor and those people are my responsibility. What I heard on the radio was shots fired. Now, I didn't know if that meant that my teammates had been shot at, if they had shot at somebody. I had no idea. All I know is I had a team member key up on the radio and announce shots fired. Team member key up on the radio and announce shots fired, which automatically, you can imagine, gets a response from you know, everybody even remotely close and I put the hammer down. You know, I threw on the lights, threw on the siren and put that pedal to the floor.
Speaker 1:And when I tell you that that Dodge Charger couldn't go fast enough, that's an understatement, I believe. If I could have teleported to the scene, I would still complain about how long it took, because it felt like it took an eternity for me to get there. You know, and thinking about all this, I want you to keep in mind the kind of stress that's building up in you as an individual, as a supervisor, as a professional. You know, think about the kind of stress that's building up in your body. You know I'd already had the stress of the gut feeling. I already had the immediate stress when I hear shots fired. Now I'm adding to that. You know driving in an emergency response at a high rate of speed. You know that stress there. And then there's all the thoughts that are going through my mind because obviously my teammates are focusing on the job at hand, so they're giving radio updates if they can, but they've got more important things to do than just sit there and chat on the radio with me. So I've got that stress running, all the different scenarios through my mind on what could be going on.
Speaker 1:Get in the area, get to the street, pull onto the street immediately, stop my car and as I pull up, close my headlights, cast a light across the roadway and into the yard where they were, and I could see my two teammates that were there. They were taking cover behind a tree, so I got a little relief from that because obviously they were both still standing. However, I still didn't know if either one of them had been hit. I didn't know if the threat was you know still directly where they last saw them or what. So I bail out the car, grab my rifle and I start trying to gather some information. All the while I'm hearing sirens in the air from other responding units. I'm hearing people key up on the radio saying that they're on the way and I'm still trying to gather information from my teammates on what's going on.
Speaker 1:And turns out that, you know, they had an active shooter inside the house. Someone had grabbed a gun and brandished a gun and was preparing to fire on my teammates, to fire on my teammates, and that was when the call went out. So at the moment that I got there and we're assessing everything, we still don't know the status of the active shooter. We don't know what their status is. We don't know if they're still in the same place they were. We don't know if they were hit. We don't know anything because they can't be seen. So that adds another layer of stress, because now you've got that layer of stress added on top of everything else, of whether or not that person has slipped out through a back door, out through a window, whatever the case may be, and is now setting up for an ambush or is circling around using the shadows, because this is all happening at night. Are they circling around in the shadows getting ready to start picking us off? So there's that added layer of stress on top of all that.
Speaker 1:In the meantime, more units start showing up and as they're getting there, I'm giving them directions on where I'm wanting to go, because one of the things that you want to do is you want to try to create a perimeter. You know, lock down the situation so that it doesn't go beyond where it already is. You don't want to put any extra civilians at danger. You don't want the chance of the person getting away. You don't want them to have the opportunity to gain an advantage over you. So the goal was to get a perimeter set up. So I start directing people hey, go over to the, go over to the, the two, three corner, go to the three four corner, get to this corner, get to that corner.
Speaker 1:And in the meantime, you know, my direct supervisor at the time, who wasn't on scene yet, gets on the radio and says hey, we need to start getting those houses that are immediately around you evacuated. And to be fully honest, I was immediately frustrated because I already had my hands full. I'm still trying to get a perimeter set up because I didn't have 360 degrees of coverage at the moment. So I'm trying to get that perimeter set up and then someone who's not on scene is giving me orders on what I needed to do. So now, you know, on top of all this extra stress, now I've got this frustration that's popped up. And they weren't trying to be malicious with it. They were trying to be helpful and trying to help me keep focused on all of the things that need to be accomplished.
Speaker 1:But at the time I couldn't accomplish those things because I didn't have the resources available. You know, I think at the time I only had a couple of individuals on one corner and a couple individuals on another corner, which you can cover a object, a residence, a building, whatever you want to call it. You can cover it from two corners, reasonably, depending on the size of it and the way it's cut. But that wasn't sufficient for me For what we had going on. That wasn't sufficient. I wanted a full, 360-degree coverage with as many people as I could get there before we made any other movements. So I get on the radio and I say you know, okay, we'll take care of it, just as soon as I can get enough people here to take care of this. And you know, looking back on it, I probably said it a little more unprofessional than what it was. But just like everybody else.
Speaker 1:I was in the moment too. I'm trying to focus on the task at hand and that just wasn't the primary goal at the moment. It was obviously important to protect the other citizens who were asleep in their home and had no idea what was going on home and had no idea what was going on. But at that moment my primary concern was making sure we kept the threat right where it was, that it didn't extend physically to another location, because what we're concerned with when we're doing stuff like that is we're strays you know bullets that didn't strike an individual and then travel into the home of an unsuspecting citizen who's just minding their own business and they inadvertently get hit. You know we want to prevent that, which is the reason why we do things like that. So you know it's a priority. But the main priority was to me at the time was keeping that physical security of where the threat was, keeping it exactly where it was.
Speaker 1:So as more people start getting there, I start getting, you know, all the angles covered and that's when we start, you know, doling out people to go, start waking others up and getting them to try either evacuate or take cover in their home, because it's really hard sometimes to look at people and tell them hey, you need to leave your home immediately, there's an immediate threat and you need to leave. A lot of people are going to be stubborn, especially here in the South. They're going to look at you, I'm not going anywhere, we can't. You know, we obviously can't force them in that moment and getting into a fight with them about it is not going to be beneficial. So we ask them you know, hey, at least take cover on the farthest end of your home. That way, in the event that rounds do come through, you know you guys have got some cover and you're further away, there's more object for it to travel through, yada yada. So all of that's being taken care of. We get the perimeter set up and you know, we're just kind of in a stalemate at this point because obviously we've got command staff coming, we've got special units coming that are specially trained to handle these particular situations. So we're waiting on them to get there and we're just kind of in a holding pattern and, as the supervisor is in the NIMS class or the training that most public safety go through nowadays to make sure there's a unified command and communication and so on and so forth, things that they learned that they needed to do after September 11, 2001,.
Speaker 1:I'm the one in charge of all that. So I'm taking a step back and I'm trying to figure out my head's swirling. I don't know what I need, what I need to do, what I haven't done, so on and so forth. So I take a knee next to another supervisor who showed up to help out and I'm not saying anything to him. He's not saying anything to me. We're just sitting there and he looks up at me because he's in a prone position with his rifle pointed at the residence. And he looks up at me and he says Sarge, are you good? And I needed that. I needed that little break of concentration, that break in thought to kind of help me. I'm like I'm trying to think of everything and I just don't know that that I've got everything done. I feel like there's more than I need to get done and I just can't think of it right now.
Speaker 1:And thankfully, because you know he was covering his one responsibility at the moment, he said well, can I make a, can I make a suggestion? I said absolutely. He said you know what about we pull some people back that are closer in and start pairing people up and, you know, start pairing teams up so that they've got variety of tools that they can use if they have to engage threat. So you know, that sounds like a good idea. I appreciate it, thank you so much. And that individual doesn't know how helpful that one moment was, because that one moment helped slow my brain down. It helped slow my thought process down and the information he gave me was beneficial to what we were doing. You know, I don't. I don't think even to this day he knows how helpful and how much I appreciate just that one little moment. So we take care of that.
Speaker 1:Admin gets there, the special teams get there and, you know, finally decide we're going to breach the home and start going after the threat. Long story short, as far as that goes, you know the threat had been neutralized upon the first call of shots fired. The threat had been neutralized upon the first call of shots fired. You know everything we were doing was by the book and right, everything else, but the threat had already been neutralized and you know there was no more threat. So in any kind of event like that, every agency I know of will secure the scene and a special investigative team will come in, whether it's a state agency, whether it's, you know, a division of the same agency, they've all got their own different things. If it's another agency from a neighboring area, you know it's all set up to have another special investigative team come in and start to investigate what happened.
Speaker 1:You know, was there any wrongdoing on the side of law enforcement? Were there things that could have been done to avoid this? You know what happened. We all want to get down to what happened and how we could have prevented it and so on and so forth. And if there was wrongdoing on the side of public safety or law enforcement, you know we want to hold them accountable. You know we've seen it play out in the media many times now. Where there has been wrongdoing, there has been wrongdoing. I'm not going to sit here and say that all of the ones that played out and have played out in the media have been just, but there are some, most certainly, that there was wrongdoing on the side of law enforcement and I think it's important that we can address that, that those of us in the profession can acknowledge and address when things like that happen, because you'll hear all of us say you know, nobody hates a dirty cop more than a good one, and it's because anytime something like that happens, it affects all of us. You know, it doesn't matter where in the country it is, it affects all of us. So it's important that we find these things, it's important that we address them and we deal with them and if somebody needs to be criminally charged, that they're criminally charged. You know, it's important that this is done because we do have a responsibility to the public to maintain that trust and, as time has gone on and various reasons outside of individual control, that public trust is something that can be hard to keep or to earn back at times.
Speaker 1:So anyway, moving forward, I'm getting sidetracked. So we're standing by and we're waiting for this agency to come in. For us it was a state agency. We're waiting for them to come in and start their investigation. Of course, all of the emergent stuff is already over with. So you know, they're getting out of bed, getting dressed and trying to get to us, but they're not in a big, huge rush because there's no reason to. You know, we're holding the perimeter, we're holding the scene down, so and we have to do that until such time they get there and finish their investigation. So there's nothing for us to do.
Speaker 1:And while we're waiting, at some point, you know, I start looking around and I noticed that my two team members that were involved immediately in all this they're missing. I don't know where they are. I've got no clue where they are. And that adds just another layer of stress, because while some of the other stresses may have left, there were other stresses that got put in their place. There were other stresses that got put in their place and just the stress of waiting alone can be enough to to cause issues, to cause you stress, because you're just sitting around waiting. You know whether it's because you need to use the restroom, whether it's because you got other calls going on, whether it's because you've got, you know, a lot of questions with no answers. You know all of this creates a stress buildup in you. And then now you're adding to this my two team members, who I take a personal responsibility for. They're missing. At least to me they're missing.
Speaker 1:What I didn't know is, you know the admin staff pulled them aside and said, hey, we're taking you back to the office, it's time to get you debriefed and you know, start getting you interviewed for what happened. But nobody told me this and everybody's in their own little groups talking about whatever they're talking about and I'm just kind of standing there. Everybody else that was not needed at the time was released and they'd gone home, but for the rest of it it was me standing there in the middle of this street in a subdivision, you know, looking around at these little groups that are piled up, people talking or doing whatever and nobody's talking to me. You know, I'm the on-duty supervisor, those were my people and no one's talking to me. Nobody's telling me what I need to do. And of course we've got an SOP on how to handle things, but there's only so much that an SOP can detail out, because if you start getting too specific in them, you start limiting options on how to handle situations. So you know, as far as I understood our SOP at the time, you know I was out of options.
Speaker 1:I didn't know what else there was to do. I'm the on-duty supervisor and the second command supervisor was involved in this incident and another team member was involved in this incident. So I've only got a limited number of people on the street handling calls. I'm tied up here. There's no supervisor actually, you know, assisting with any calls going on on the street.
Speaker 1:And here I am, you know, sitting here twiddling my thumbs, trying to figure out what's going on. So I turn and wind up walking down the street to where my vehicle is I'd used it to block off the road and I'm standing next to it and finally one of my supervisors comes over to me and he says hey, you good, what's going on? And I said no, honestly, I'm not. I don't know what the hell I'm supposed to be doing right now. He said what? Honestly, I'm not. I don't know what the hell I'm supposed to be doing right now. What do you mean? I said what am I supposed? Where are my people at? What am I supposed to be doing? What is there for me to do right now? I feel like I need to be doing something and nobody's talking to me. And he said well, I mean, honestly, your people, they're going to getting debriefed, they're getting ready for their interview and so on and so forth.
Speaker 1:For the incident and the rest of it, there's really nothing to do, you know there's, it's just wait. We got to wait for the agency to get here to start doing the investigation, and a little more conversation happened Eventually. I was like OK, well then can somebody else come take my spot so I can leave? And he said, yeah, are you good? I'm like, yeah, I just need to leave. He said okay, so we got somebody to fill my spot and I left and I rode around the rest of the shift no knowledge of what was going on with my people Really no knowledge of what was going on back at that house. I just went back to work and started trying to get back to my job at hand as the supervisor on duty at the time and managing the calls that the rest of my team was having to deal with.
Speaker 1:And then, a few days later, they wound up having a critical incident debrief to where they called in the individuals that were involved in the situation and they went through the critical incident debrief with them and everything like that. I didn't get invited, at least in my opinion. I was just as much involved in it. You know, heard everything on the radio, the same as everybody first on scene after the call for shots fired went out and then managing, you know that chaos that was ensuing at the moment. I was very much involved in it, but I wasn't invited to the debrief. I get back to work and I find out. Yeah, you know, we had that debrief the other day.
Speaker 1:I asked what debrief? Oh well, you know, we called so-and-so and so-and-so in and you know we did the critical incident debrief. I was like, okay, I would have liked to have gone to that. I've never been to one and you know, I kind of had my own things with that. Oh I'm, you know all the different things that were said at the time and it wasn't intentional and I don't want it to come off as that. You know I'm saying that was an intentional thing because it wasn't it's. You know I wasn't the one that pulled the trigger, I wasn't the one that saw the person present the gun and so on and so forth. You know, and on the on the macro view, you know those individuals were the ones that were affected by it. So I mean it makes sense. You know, fortunately, since then we've we've gotten better about that.
Speaker 1:And you know, when we have to do critical incident debriefs, you know pretty much everybody, everybody, from top to bottom, multiple agencies that were involved they all get invited. Everybody that may have had something to do would, at the time, get invited to the critical incident debrief. And that's something that should happen. It's a positive thing and that's something that should happen. It's a positive thing. But, you know, because I didn't go to the critical incident debrief, I was left to deal with the rest of that stuff on my own. You know, because, like I said earlier, we have an SOP, but there's only so much that that SOP can cover, there's only so specific that that SOP can be before it starts really limiting what options you have on handling situations. And I'm sure there's probably some other agencies that have some kind of, you know, promotions manual and yada, yada, yada.
Speaker 1:For, you know, when you move up in rank and you start becoming a supervisor but we're not one of those. You know, our promotion system is vastly different than that and everything you learn as far as how to be a supervisor comes from the supervisor before you. You know, when you're a corporal, you're ability to supervise comes from on-the-job training from your sergeant or any training classes you may go to. But those training classes are talking about leadership but they're not talking about active shooter situations. You know. Obviously there's classes that are, but they're general because it's not specific to your agency and in our line of work you don't just have to adhere to the law, you have to also adhere to your agency's policy, your SOP, because if you violate that SOP while handling the situation, even if what you did was legal under the law, you can still have repercussions civilly if you violated your SOP. So you know that's a lot to put on individuals.
Speaker 1:And when you're moving up in the ranks and becoming a supervisor, it's your supervisor's responsibility to make sure that when you make that next step that you're prepared for it. To make sure that when you make that next step that you're prepared for it. And despite the efforts of my sergeant before I was promoted, despite his efforts, we never had an officer involved shooting. We never had an active shooter situation for me to see how he handled it, for me to learn from him on what should be done. Everything I learned regarding situations like that were through conversations, through what training I could get, through knowledge of our SOP.
Speaker 1:So you know, when it come down to the metal meeting the bone, it was on me and then, once it was all said and done with, I had no outlet for my questions, I had no outlet for the stress that I had been under. And if you don't think that here in your, your teammates call out, shots fired and knowing that their lives are imminently at risk. If you don't think that's something that will affect you as a supervisor, then either one. I don't believe you're doing your job like you're supposed to as a supervisor, as a leader Sorry, it's just the way I feel. Obviously, you should be able to be calm, collected and manage things, but if that doesn't make you feel some kind of way, then I question your ability as a leader, because you should take a personal responsibility in the well-being of those that you're responsible for, at least in my uneducated opinion.
Speaker 1:So I had all of that on me. I had all of that stress and it was left on me to manage it. And I had to. But I had to first be conscious and aware that I was experiencing it. I had to be conscious and aware that what I was going through was affecting me, and then I had to find ways of dealing with it. And then I had to find ways of dealing with it. My ways of dealing with it were going back to our SRP SOP, having conversations with others that were there, others that had been in similar situations, going to the gym and working out, you know, using physical exercise as an outlet for the stress and the energy that had built up in me. You know I had to find some positive ways to cope with all of that so that if and when that ever happens again, I'm ready for it.
Speaker 1:So I honestly don't really know how to end this one, other than just kind of telling you and I don't want this to come off as you know oh well, it's a cop thing or a public safety thing, because every individual, regardless of their profession, can experience a critical incident, something that's going to cause them stress, something that's going to cause them some trauma. And it's not just those of us that do this for a living and I say us because it incorporates all of us, because dispatchers, law enforcement, firefighters, ems witnesses all of us, when these things happen, all of us experience it. So you don't have to be in the profession in order to, you know, go through this. And a traumatic incident for someone who's not in public safety could simply just be a really bad auto crash. And maybe they witnessed an auto crash and, you know, they ran to the scene to try to help out. And maybe they witnessed an auto crash and they ran to the scene to try to help out and they saw the destruction that occurs to the vehicles and the human body when those things happen. That can be traumatic.
Speaker 1:So what I'm talking about in particular, I guess, with all of this is we need to be aware as individuals not just as public safety professionals or anything like that, but just as individuals. We need to be aware of that stress, we need to be aware of how it's affecting us and we need to make sure that we've got positive ways to manage that stress, positive ways to manage it, positive ways to overcome any trauma we may have gone through with it, whether it's through critical incident debriefing, whether it's through, you know, uh, positive actions on your own, whether it's going to the gym, spending time with family and friends, going fishing, whatever. Um, you know we need to, we need to make sure that we're doing things like that and, for the love of all things, stay away from, stay away from substances. You know you go through things like that.
Speaker 1:If you're in the middle of dealing with the trauma, dealing with distress, dealing with the memories and the thoughts and everything else, stay away from your substances. Stay away from your alcohol. Stay away from any kind of prescription medications or recreational drugs. Stay away from that stuff until you can. Obviously, I think the recreational drugs and things like that. Stay away from those. But the other stuff, you know, stay away from them until such time that you've dealt with it on a sober level, on a level that you know when you're sober you're able to manage it just fine, because those substances are only going to mask things, they're only going to hide it from you. They're going to suppress it. They're not going to make it go away. You know, for every time you use a substance to try to solve an internal conflict, all that winds up happening is when that substance wears off, that problem's still there. It doesn't fix anything. So stay away from those while you're trying to deal with that.
Speaker 1:But the most important part of it is, like I said, acknowledge it, own it, address it, manage it and overcome it.
Speaker 1:Whether that's something you have to do on your own or whether it's something you do, you know, through a group activity, like the critical incident, debriefing, manage it, deal with it, push past it. Don't just shove it down in that little box that we all have inside of us, because every one of us have it. We all got that little box where, when something happens? We just shut, keep shoving things down in it. But at some point that box is going to get full, at some point it's going to start to overflow and you don't want to have to clean up that mess, because that mess can be awful, it can be horrible, it can be costly emotionally, physically, financially, emotionally, physically, financially, it can be costly. So don't just shove it down in the box. Compartmentalize it until you get through handling the incident, but once it's done, unpack it and start dealing with it. It's important because you're important. All right, guys, until next time. I appreciate it. Thank you for stopping by and, uh, be safe.
