Are you okay?

Three simple words. They can have such a great impact on you. Maybe hearing these words makes you feel better about the priority 1 medical you just took. Or, maybe these words will bring you to your knees, weeping and sobbing over the infant that unexpectedly passed away. When is the last time somebody outside of this field of work asked you this and truly meant it? When can you say somebody truthfully wanted to know if all the calls and situations you deal with daily have taken any sort of toll on you mentally or emotionally? For me, nobody really has, not in a long while anyway. But again, that's what we get paid for, right?

But not exactly.. Yes, we're paid to hold it together when the going gets tough. But we are human too. We want to be there for that person, to have sympathy and compassion, to let them know that we aren't just a programmed robot taking their call, but a real human being. You want to comfort them, be there for them, make them feel like somebody actually cares about them in their time of distress. Sure, you have to get the help out there and make sure something gets done. But sometimes when you know things have already taken a turn for the worst, all you want to do is reach through your headset and give the sobbing mother on the other end a hug and tell her everything is going to be ok, even if you know it's not the best day ever. Am I on the right track?

So many people forget that there is a human side to this business. It isn't all about disconnecting from your emotions and forgetting it all, as most think happens. We hear things, experience things that nobody should ever have to experience. Yet, the status quo says "that's why they're." What most people don't realize is that sometimes, all we want to do is run to the bathroom and have us a good long cry. It could be anything, a freak accident, a sudden death, a suicidal subject. Nobody knows what we hear through that headset, the secrets we are told and then forced to have engrained in our minds. This end of the headset is rarely a nice place to be. We live through it daily. And many of us have to find our own peace, wherever that may be.

Again, it's not to say that every call we get involves somebody who is dying or suicidal. But occasionally, you get that call that rattles you a little too much, resonates deep within your psyche. You take that call that turns your stomach, the call that makes you want a cigarette or a beer, and you don't even drink or smoke. You think about it, dwelling on minor details that you think could have made a difference. You feel for those who had to go through that experience, the EMT who performed CPR for 30 minutes straight to no avail. You think about the students that witnessed their teacher collapse to the floor. You feel their sense of helplessness, their cries of distress. And you did what you could do, but it was already too late..

I think that's one thing that is hard to accept; sometimes, it's just how it has to be. Call it divine intervention or a fact of life, people die, some sooner than others. People suffer life changing injuries that you can't fix, no matter how much you want them to be fully restored. People's lives are changed in an instant, whether it be from poor health, or the poor choices of others. It's not to say we don't get good moments in this job, but not many people call 911 because something happens to be going well at that particular moment in their life. Yet, we keep moving forward, protecting and serving the public with our voices speaking through headsets, resonating over 911 lines and radios throughout all the land. It's what we do and what we love. We are here not for one particular group of people, but for the commonwealth of our communities. We have the best job in the world anybody could ever hate. And we love every moment of it... right?